Amst/Engl 471
FINAL WEB PROJECT OR PAPER ASSIGNMENT

For your final assignment, you have a choice between a traditional term paper, or a web "paper" or project to be put online. The paper or web project should be a critical analysis of some aspect of current or historical popular culture. There is no formula expected for the paper or web projects but it should demonstrate awareness of the kind of issues (about race, class, gender, sexuality and so on), and approaches (production, textual, audience, historical) treated by the course.

Generally speaking, papers and projects focused on a relatively confined topic (i.e., a single movie rather than a whole genre) will be more successful than ones trying to tackle too large of a topic.

PAPERS should be approximately 7-10 pages and use one of the standard footnoting and bibliography formats (MLA, or APA). You are expected to use library resources, in addition to or instead of internet sources. When you use the latter, cite them by one of the standard online citation methods (see, for example, Columbia Unversity Press's guide to citing online materials.

WEB PROJECTS should be similar in style and sophistication to the term paper, but should to some degree utilize the multimedia and interrelational elements possible on the web.

Web projects may be either individual or group efforts. If two or more students combine efforts, you will be graded individually based on self-evaluations and evaluations by your group members. Technical assistance will be provided for those of you who wish it. And at the bottom of this page is a list of resources for learning to create web pages.

Below are some SAMPLE WEB PROJECTS, the first from this course last semester, the others from other campuses, that can serve as models or inspirations for your efforts. They are a more or less random sample but represent something of a range of approaches, degrees of technical sophistication, and content. Some are individual, some group, projects.

RESOURCES FOR LEARNING TO MAKE WEB PAGES

Web pages are made mostly though a code/language called "HTML" which consists of "tags" (letters put in brackets) that tell the browser what to do. The first two sites below will teach you how to put in the code to make pages work.

The alternative way to go is to use a program that makes code for you. There are many of these. One of the most popular is 'Dreamweaver,' available on many machines in labs on campus. There are also basic editors in browsers like Netscape and Internet Explorer that will also help you build webpages.

The advantage of learning at least a bit of the HTML code is that you are better able to understand how it all works, and correct for mistakes. But the ease of an editor also has its attractions.