Observation 5

So far the research is going well. I havn't dove in completely with the research quite yet, but I have been searching and trying to find Coke commercials that will be appropriate for my project. In my project I will be analyzing different coca cola commercials from different decades throughout the last 50 or 60 years or however far back I can find them. I will compare the rhetorical techniques used in each of those commercials with what is going on politically in the country at the time. The research should be fairly easy, but will still require some time.

Observation 5

I am going to write my research paper on uniforms in high schools. I will do research on journal articles that have been written and on my and other people's opinions on wearing uniforms. Free Mind did not help my research process. It took too long to figure out how to use the program when I would rather write down my observations and brainstorming on paper.

Observation 5

As far as my research is going, I've been mostly looking at campaigns online that agree with my hypothesis and campaigns that are opposed to it.  The visual mapping was very helpful with the research process because I separated each possible subject into different categories to further allow me to research as many subjects as I can to better my understanding of my research topic.

Observation 5

I have not done a lot of research when it comes to scholarly journal articles. Since these movies are very recent, it is hard to find academic articles on them. When it comes to movie reviews, articles on the movies, and articles on the slow degrading of the human race, I have found a lot of information. I have a lot of opinions of a lot of different people on each of the movies and how they affected them. I think I will have a lot more success when I actually go to the library, instead of trying to search through our library's database.

Observation 5

So far my research is going well. I have interviewed some people about college websites and have received positive feedback. I have not started my research online, but I am going to begin that shortly. I need to also get some books on websites and on the formats of websites and how they relate to the general message that websites are trying to portray. All of these will be beneficial to my research paper on the effectiveness of college websites on students.

Observation 5

My research so far has given me enough material to start putting together a visual outline of where I would like to go with my paper. I have found visual rhetoric that supports my tentative thesis about Obama's campaign. At this point, all of my research has come from online sources. These are good sources, but I think from here it might be a good idea to find some other sources from other locations. YouTube, GoogleImages, and BarackObama.com have all been extremely useful.

As of now my research has been going pretty well. I have found some magazine articles as well as TV shows. I also found an informational paper in my dorm that is full with many facts. It states fact such as "42% of 3rd grade girls want to be thinner", "81% of 10 year olds are afraid of being fat", and " The average American woman is 5'4" and weighs 140 pounds. The average American model is 5'11" and weighs 117 pounds". These are some scary stats and I believe i will be able to find more stats like this.

Observation 5-Emily McCanless

So far, my research has been quite productive. I have found some sources that I can use for my argument in regards to abortion and how easily people are persuaded through the use of rhetoric. I still need more substantial sources that can give me alot of information but I have found some interviews, articles, and websites that appeal to different emotions associated with pro-life and pro-choice. I am having trouble finding sources that don't include information on the "ethics" of abortion rather than how each stance appeals to different emotions through rhetoric.

We also used a software, FreeMind, that helped us "map-out'' our reserach ideas. Although the program was difficult to navigate, considering we were given no prior instruction on how the program worked, it did make the paper "come to life" before your eyes. For me, I enjoy being able to visually picture things and the mind-mapping idea is great for doing this because nothing is concrete therefore you can extend your thoughts to wherever you want, so that you don't leave anything out. Then once this is done and you have looked at different perspectives of your topic, you can narrow down what you want to write about based on the direction your argument took as you "mapped" it out.

observation 5

My research has gone decent so far. I have still yet to narrow down my topic to a specific piece of rhetoric to use but I have many ideas that I can go with. I changed topics a few days ago to have to do with something about global warming because this is a topic I am passionate about and I have not gotten the time to word map my idea but once I do I know it will help conceptualize my topic better. I plan on researching how the media portrays global warming to the world and compare that to what is actually happening.

Observation 5

I think that my research for the research paper is going well. I have looked up all the techniques that I am going to compare and have looked at several posters, commercials, websites, and movies. What I feel that I need to do more of is find more facts and statistics about the number of people that joined the military in the years I am focusing on and interviews from people that tell what persuaded them to join the Navy. I plan to use the library databases to find academic references about the statistics of people that have joined and the Navy’s website to find interviews

I like using the FreeMind program we downloaded for this project. It helped me to connect my thoughts and put them on paper. It also helped me to think of new areas of research and organized the topics. I also liked using the program because if I had an idea, the web I am using automatically popped up, making me not lose my thought process.

Observation 5

My research is going pretty good, I have come across a couple different sources already. As for "visual mapping", I have tried to draw out what areas I would like to research. After figuring out what I want to research I try and relate them back to my hypothesis and how I intend on supporting my research topics. Everything I research needs supports and needs to help me support my hypothesis unless everything I find goes completely against is. Overall, brainstorming how I intend to research and lay out this paper is helping me get everything in line so that I can begin my rough draft.

Observation 5

Mt research so far has been sufficient enough to give me a basis for my topic and my thesis on which I will base my paper on. My topic has strayed from my initial idea to a more detailed one as I performed more research and mapped out which arguments I would like to highlight. Once I mapped out the topics I would like to cover in my paper I was able to do further research involving the psychological aspect of superheros and their impact on the society, and more importantly children. My topic has evolved, but needs further research in order to create a strong argument for my case. Overall, I would say my research topic is on the right track, but needs to be narrowed down to a few topics so that I can focus on them and go into detail.

Observation 5

So far, I feel that my research is going alright. I have looked into the recent Above the Influence campaign and their strategies of advertising, but have not really looked into any other recent anti-drug campaigns. Now I feel that I need to spend time researching older anti-drug campaign advertisements and their strategies. I have not done any research on the past campaigns and I feel like I am behind in that aspect of the paper so far. I plan on going to the library to find articles and/or ads, such as in magazines, that deal with past and present anti-drug campaigns and their advertisements.

I liked the mind mapping activity because it helped me to organize my ideas and come up with new "branches" that I could add to my research.

Observation 5

As my vigorous research proceeds, I have come to the conclusion that my topic was a sensational choice. My research question has been through many alterations but is finally flawless. It is as follows: What techniques does PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) use to campaign against animal experimentation? I have used www.peta.org for much of my research. I have also used the media to investigate their portrayal of animal testing. Much of the media and some journal articles make PETA have the resemblance of a terrorist group. However, some side with my perspective that animal testing is unethical. My research has a great deal to proceed and an exasperating amount to ascend. However, I believe that with much more work my research will prosper and my paper will be very factual, informative, and lastly persuasive. 

Observation 5

I think that my research is going well so far. I feel like I need to start doing a lot more research and start working on the paper more because I have not done as much research as I would like. I have looked at PETA's website and their campaign for vegetarianism but now I need to begin to watch all of the videos and find the rhetorical appeals in them. I also need to find a credible source that goes against PETA and against vegetarianism so that I can compare and contrast the pro-vegetarianism and the anti-vegetarianism. I liked the visual mapping process and feel that it helped me organize my ideas and also expand on the ideas that I already had and add more ideas.

Observation 5

I feel that the research is going well. I have looked up some basic information on the principles of communism and capitalism and have watched some episodes of the cartoon and have applied those principles to my own personal observations. I feel that now I need to do some background research on the history of this cartoon as well as do further reseach on capitalism and communism. I plan to go to the library to find academic articles as well as further analize the cartoon to find specific examples of how visual rhetoric is presented.
I liked the visual mapping program that we used for this project. It helped me visualize my thoughts and expand on them. It was also useful in that it helped me think of new ideas and different directions that I could take my paper.