Intercultural Communication Criticism Assignment:

In this assignment we will move beyond identification and description to analysis and evaluation in which you will analyze and critique an artifact related to an intercultural conflict. You must find your own artifact and this artifact must have been created within the last year. Your analysis of the artifact must use course concepts to make claims addressing how the message uses communication as power in the service of one side of the conflict.

Cultural criticism goes beyond merely describing what we see to making critical evaluations of what we see. By this, we mean that we want you to make a strong critical argument that is supported by evidence. Evidence will include data from the content of the artifact and the authority of the course content, including the video series titled, Doing Intercultural Communication Criticism. So don’t just tell us that someone is being unfair, discriminatory, etc., but show us how this is happening by defining and discussing a concept and then applying that concept to a specific example from the scenario.

Here is an example of a passage from good paragraph using a concept from the strategic analysis segment in this weeks video series related to the past ASTATE Helmet Sticker controversy.

In order to defend the use of the helmet stickers, the author characterizes one of the opponents as that Jewish, Lawyer, who probably has no connection to ASTATE sports. Playing to the prejudices of his supposed blue-collar, Christian, male audience, he is able to shift the argument to the character of the messenger, instead of the merits of his argument, and the supposed cultural differences between the local public and those expressing concerns about the stickers.  (The analysis could then go on to discuss issues such as ethnocentrism, ideology, hegemony, etc. from the textbook and lectures to help you make critical claims about the artifact and the intentions/actions of the author)

I expect a strong analysis would require at least five double-spaced pages.