The purpose of this assignment
is to reflect on how the concept of genre may be helpful in designing electronic
documents.
Choose a web page not authored
by you, preferably one which you find doesn't work very well for you. (Turn
in a copy of the page with your analysis.) A good candidate for this assignment
is a web page, based on a non-electronic genre, that seems not to work,
e.g. a college catalog, the on-line catalog of a mail-order company, a
newspaper or journal. Another good candidate is a page that tries too hard
to be unique and loses any anchoring in an existing genre.
Using Agre's discussion of
genre, assess how well this page works, the ways in which it works
well or badly, and why. Issues to address include but are not limited to:
-What non-electronic genre(s)
might this be related to? E.g. many students' web pages are similar to
resumes. (Don't choose a web page like this.) Electronic journals and newspapers
are related to paper scholarly journals, popular magazines, and newspapers.
In what ways does this web page use or suit the genre being echoed, and
in what ways does it not?
-Can you identify electronic/web
genres to which this page is related?
-Apply Agre's framework for design (community, activities, relationships, media, genre) and his questions about web pages which relate this framework to web pages, to this web page. Does this help you to understand how and why this page works or doesn't work?
-Using Agre's framework,
the characteristics of the genre(s) being echoed, and/or some other genre(s),
make recommendations for improving this web page. You may find that you
recommend either reducing or increasing this page's similarity to existing
electronic or non-electronic genres.
About 1500-2000 words. Due Thurs Sept 16.