ISIS

Description

1. Pick your topic and email Prof. Burke for email confirmation that it is acceptable.
2. Research the historical facts of the situation. Depending on how long ago your topic is,
you will find newspaper articles or history books. These will be factual sources.
3. Label who you are calling the Agitators and label who you are calling the
Establishment/Control
4. Determine a short statement of the ideology of the Agitators and determine a short
statement of the Establishment/Control
5. Determine which strategies from Chapter 2 were used by your Agitators and which
strategies from Chapter 3 were used by your Establishment.
6. Name of Strategy- define it. Thing/Event(s) done by your
Agitators/Establishment that is an example of the strategy
7. Do this for each strategy that you see used. There should be examples from both the
Agitators and the Establishment.
8. This analysis will be your opinion! It is unlikely you will find academic sources that will
speak directly to this.
9. Which strategies were most successful? Why? This is your opinion. Remember that it
doesn’t mean that the successful strategies were only by the “winner” of the conflict; it
could have been a successful event along the way or part of a still ongoing conflict.
10. Now put this information into an outline. (See sample)
11. Start to put your above information into paragraphs.
12. Worry about transitional sentences AFTER you have the foundation.

I. Intro to the conflict
i. History– This should have a 1-3 page summary of the historical facts WITH
citations to the sources of the facts

ii. You can identify your Agitators and Establishment as part of the factual
history or you can identify them first- it’s personal style, but they should be
clearly identified by the end of this section
iii. You should have a separate explanation of the ideology for each- it can be
in one paragraph to describe both or a paragraph to explain each
iv. If it helps, you can label the sections: i.e. FACTS or HISTORY or
BACKGROUND; AGITATORS AND THEIR IDEOLOGY;
ESTABLISHMENT AND THEIR IDEOLOGY; or separately: AGITATORS;
ESTABLISHMENT; AGITATOR’S IDEOLOGY; ESTABLISHMENT’S
IDEOLOGY

II. Strategies/Tactics of the Agitators and the Establishment
i. You can do either one first. You MUST use the terms from our textbook.
Do describe/define the strategy/tactic, but spend more time on how the facts of
the situation are an example of the strategy or tactic
ii. This depends on your topic- you may want to label each separately or do it
together and describe the strategy/tactic of one and the response strategy/tactic of
the other.
iii. You can put commentary in here as to the measure of success you think each
strategy/tactic had and then just conclude at the end by summing up OR you can
have a separate section for the analysis of the relative success of each

III. Conclusion
i. This can either be a conclusion of the analysis you have already done or a
final analysis of the success of the strategies/tactics of each. If there is a
resolution to your conflict, you can still include what was successful along the
way of whichever side was defeated ultimately. This can also be a commentary
on why certain strategies/tactics worked and lead to the success
ii. If the conflict is ongoing your conclusion/commentary may include
suggestions for possible future strategies/tactics or be an analysis of what has
been done successfully or unsuccessfully so far
FORMAT
Prof. Burke style–
– use 12 point Times New Roman font, double spaced
– Use “normal” 1 inch margins on the side and top and bottom
– No need to align the words on the right
– Paragraphs should be indented
– You may use section titles centered if you want
– Use APA for your citations
– Do have a title page
– Do have a Works Cited page
– Works Cited and Title Page do NOT count toward the 10 pages for the paper
– Please number the pages after the Title page (number can be placed on anywhere
on the page you want)

Easy ways to fail the paper:
● Topic inappropriate or not related to communication
● Paper less than 10 full pages
● No use of class concepts
● Paper is all history

Each student will be required to write a 10 page paper on a societal conflict. It must
include at least 4 citations to outside resources. None of the class texts are acceptable
as one of the 4 resources, but you should use The Rhetoric of Agitation of Control. You
should NOT be using the other class texts for this paper. The resources may and should
be articles from the internet, from news sources, journals, texts etc. If you are able to
find articles on your topic through Google, that is acceptable. You must have your topic
approved by the instructor. This must be done in writing (via email). Any topics not
pre-approved are done at the risk of the paper being unacceptable and is at risk of a
failing grade or no credit. It is the sole responsibility of the student to seek approval.
Your goal is to explore your issue more in depth after learning about the use of rhetoric
in societal conflict. The paper should include a discussion of the historical context, a
discussion of agitators and establishment and their ideologies in that context, a
discussion of the strategies/tactics used by each and conclude with an analysis and
critique of effectiveness or ineffectiveness of each. YOU are providing the scholarly
analysis!
The paper MUST be an analysis of the use of rhetorical communication
strategies/tactics by agitators and established authority and not solely a history
paper or term paper describing the facts of the conflict.
Your paper will be an analysis of a large scale public conflict that has significant
ramifications. The focus is on development of social agitative groups and groups within
or between countries.
You should use concepts from The Rhetoric of Agitation and Control. Explain how these
concepts were utilized by the agitators and the establishment that you chose to write
about.
You should not write a history paper but parts of the paper obviously will touch on
history.