Assignment Detail

PRPE 108: Unit #4—Digital Annotated Bibliography

The purpose of this assignment is to compile an annotated bibliography highlighting secondary research materials pertinent to an historic Alaska photograph from Alaska’s Digital Archive and to connect this information to the Alaska Native Heritage Month Webpage.

An annotated bibliography is a list of citations to books, articles, and other resources, each followed by a brief (about 150 word) descriptive and evaluative paragraph informing the reader about a resource’s main ideas and overall usefulness. Strive to find a variety of resources, such as a book, a print or electronic journal article, an audio recording, an online video, a scholarly website, a “personal” resource, etc.

Your annotated bibliography, spotlighting four or five sources, will take the form of your own Blogger Webpage. What’s a blog? For each resource, provide a complete APA reference citation and write a paragraph that summarizes or describes the source and addresses its apparent strengths and weaknesses. Also provide a link or two to the source, an excerpt, and other pertinent material, as available. Here is an example for a book:

Senungetuk, J.E. (1971). Give or take a century: An Eskimo chronicle. San Francisco: The Indian Historian Press.

Link to Excerpt: http://www.alaskool.org/projects/nome/Give_or_Take/Intro.html

The author, an Inupiaq artist from Wales, examines personal and the social consequences of rapid changes that occurred during the 20th century on the Seward Peninsula. He documents his family’s traditional lifestyle and their move in 1950 to Nome so his father could work for cash. The author concludes that, while such transitions are often difficult and entail changing traditions, many possibilities exist for maintaining Native values within the mainstream society. He further concludes that a deeper understanding of history helps this process. Though quite dated and thus barely referencing ANCSA, this is an insightful and deeply personal study.

In addition to annotated citations, write a two or three paragraph introduction to describe your photograph and provide context, a frame of reference, connecting each selected resource to your original image. Draw associations for the reader here, and try to tie things together. What do your sources help explain about the photo? Why did you choose them? What did you learn?

Try to make your Blog informative and attractive; images go a long way, and you may even link to audio files and/or imbed snippets of video. A simple, but sufficient, layout would begin with a copy of the historic photograph itself, followed by the introduction and linked annotated bibliography.

Each student will produce his or her own project while simultaneously contributing to one of several group-based collaborative essay bringing together group members’ starting photographs into a larger frame of reference by providing a general introduction to the photos and the bibliographies. These group-based blogs will in turn be linked to one central blog for the whole class: http://nativeheritageuaa.blogspot.com/

Links to final drafts, both individual and collaborative, will be submitted via e-mail. Process work will be submitted via hard copy, as usual, and shall include working draft(s) of text showing signs of revision, proof of a visit to UAA Writing Center, a Peer Reader Response Form (to be distributed in class during our peer reader workshop on November 19), and a Self Analysis Form.

Suggested Step-by-Step Instructions
Ø Select any one photograph from Alaska’s Digital Archives: http://vilda.alaska.edu/index.php. Save your photograph to your jump drive. Place it in into a word processing document so you’ll have it right in front of you as you research and write.
Ø Learn about blogging and how to start your own blog at https://www.blogger.com/start. When you are comfortable doing so, go ahead and get started and email me and your group members a link to your site. Whatever direction you take your blog in terms of its appearance, please prominently display the information that would usually be included on an APA title page: a project title, your name, and the name of your university. We’ll practice the basics of Blogger in class, so don’t worry if you’re unfamiliar with the concept or how to begin.
Ø You might then draft a very detailed paragraph describing and explaining the photograph. Try to answer the “Five Ws.” Who is in the photo? What does the photograph depict? What is going on? When was it taken? What time of year? Where was it taken? Why might the photograph have been taken? Try to do more than just describe what you see in the photograph. Try to explain it to your readers; teach them something.
Ø As you describe and explain your photograph, you will likely come up with questions you can’t answer for yourself. This is where research comes in. What do you need to learn to more fully describe the photograph? Develop some research questions.
Ø Attend our special multi-class period library day on October 31. We will meet at “the pendulum” and proceed to Room 306. Here we’ll have some great opportunities to learn research strategies, work one-on-one with librarians, and become familiar with UAA’s awesome new library. Lunch will be provided between class periods.
Ø DO NOT STRESS over APA style or the ins and outs of Blogger. We’ll spend plenty of time practicing both in class.
Ø Once you have written a complete rough draft, read it out loud. Listen to your writing.
Ø Take your working draft the UAA Writing Center and bring it class on our Peer Reader day.
Ø Both individual and group final projects are due on November 26.