Overview
MY TOPIC :How Japanese fashion migrated into American culture(u can chose some Japanese designer to write about)
SEMIOTIC ANALYSIS RESEARCH PAPER ASSIGNMENT PREP SHEET:
PAPER DUE DATE: Due by online submission on Tuesday, May 5, 2020*
*Please note: the online submission will be open until May 5 at 11:59pm. You can use the same assignment link to submit a rough draft and your final draft.
LENGTH: 1500 – 2000 words, 4 sources + 2 annotations
RESEARCH PAPER PROMPT: Compose a semiotic analysis of an artifact or practice (e.g., a story, song, tradition, or artwork) belonging to a cultural community that has migrated to the United States and which is not your own.
Choose the cultural artifact/practice:
This may be a story, song, artwork, film, video, food item, fashion line, ad campaign, or other cultural object or tradition associated with a cultural group that has migrated to the United States. The cultural group may have migrated recently or a long time ago. It is also acceptable to choose a cultural group has migrated internally within the United States.
Keep in mind that your end goal is to develop an argument/thesis as to why this artifact/practice is meaningful to the cultural group you have chosen and, more specifically, why the artifact/practice is significant in the context of that cultural group’s experience in the United States.
Make an initial assessment of the artifact/practice:
Start at the denotative or literal level and describe what is directly said or shown in this artifact/practice. Note that you are working at the descriptive level here, e.g., what a painting looks like and how it is composed in terms of form, color, texture, and perspective.
Then move to the level of connotation, or suggested meaning, and ask: What overall idea(s) does this artifact or practice convey, i.e., in a general sense, what is it about? Come up with an initial interpretation and write it out as a sentence. Keep it general to start, e.g., “this TV episode conveys a message about beauty standards.”
Research context of artifact, artist, and cultural group: Context is critical in determining the meaning of an artifact or practice and its component signs. Be sure you research the background of the artform or genre; the artist, performer, or producer; and the cultural group you have chosen.
Analyze the signs of which the artifact/practice is composed: Look carefully at all of the component signs that work together to make the artifact/practice meaningful in some way. Remember that a sign is any perceptible thing that conveys meanings or messages – words, colors, shapes, sounds, clothing, facial expressions, and physical gestures, as well as perspective, lighting, and camera angle, among other formal elements, are all potential signs.
Identify as many signs as you can.
Make note of what each sign shows or says (denotation) and what you think it means or suggests (connotation). In other words, ask: what ideas or messages does the sign communicate?
Remember, however, that what a sign means depends on the code system, or cultural context, in which it is being interpreted. For this reason, signs can be interpreted in different ways depending on context. Use your contextual research on the artifact/practice, artist, and cultural group to help you determine the most plausible meaning(s) of a sign.
Articulate the key ideological message conveyed by the artifact/practice: Cultural artifacts/practices may convey ideologies – that is to say, they communicate culturally-specific attitudes, beliefs, or values. To identify ideological messages in an artifact/practice:
Review the list of signs you’ve identified and look for common reference points – to what recurrent ideas or themes do the signs point?
Make a list of the themes, e.g., “diversity,” “beauty,” “freedom,” “wealth.” Are some themes more prominent than others? Is there one theme that is emphasized more than the others?
Once you have identified the predominant theme, look at the constituent signs for clues as to what stance or attitude is advocated towards the theme/idea (e.g., “wealth is desirable” or “freedom requires sacrifice”). Note that it helps to look not only at the meanings of individual signs, but also at how signs work together to convey meaning.
Take, for example, the Benetton campaign slogan “United Colors of Benetton.” How we interpret the slogan depends on the presence of other signs. Let’s take this slogan in the context of an advertising image showing women and men of diverse skin tones and ethnicities modeling a colorful variety of Benetton clothes: https://brandnewworldat.wordpress.com/2016/12/06/b...
In this context, we could plausibly interpret the word “color” as a sign of both individual style and racial/ethnic identity. When read as part of that image, the phrase “united colors” communicates a particular social attitude or statement of values, that is, an ideological message to the effect of: “there is unity in diversity” or “diversity makes us stronger.”
Articulate your main argument or thesis by relating the core ideology to its cultural context: How does the ideological message communicated by the artifact/practice relate to the experiences of the cultural group that produced it? How and why is this ideology meaningful to them? If we’ve determined, for example, that an artwork conveys the ideological message “beauty comes in many forms,” we should proceed by asking why this relativist stance towards beauty matters to the individual or group that produced the artwork. If the artist belongs to a cultural community that has been marginalized from the American fashion industry, for example, we might conclude that this position serves to de-center Euro-American (white) beauty standards and makes room for more diverse expressions of beauty.
STRUCTURING THE PAPER
Develop introductory paragraph: No matter how you begin, remember that you must develop an argument/thesis as to why the artifact/practice is meaningful to a particular cultural group and, more specifically, why it is significant in the context of that cultural group’s experience in the United States. One way to begin is to describe the artifact/practice you have chosen and introduce the cultural context in which it is produced and used. Another option is to begin by explaining the ideological message that the artifact/practice communicates and then proceed to analyze how and in what cultural context(s) this message is conveyed. Alternatively, since you are analyzing an artifact from a cultural community that migrated to the United States, you could begin with a story about that group and its migration experience.
Draft the body of the paper: The body of your paper should focus on demonstrating how the signs you identified work together to communicate the central ideological message of the artifact/practice. Don’t forget that the meanings of individual signs and the message of the artifact/practice as a whole depend on context.
Develop conclusion paragraph: Wrap up with a few sentences that consider the following big-picture questions. These are what we call the “so what?” questions: What have we learned from this analysis? What story does the artifact/practice – through its ideological message(s) – tell about the world we live in? What stories does the artifact/practice fail to tell? What is left out and whose stories aren’t being told? Take, for example, the 1950s TV sitcom, Father Knows Best – the patriarchal ideology is evident in the name of the show itself. The big-picture questions we might ask include: Why did people in the 1950s desire patriarchal images, and what need did those representations serve? Why weren’t women’s stories being told on TV at that time? What does this say about gender in 1950s America?
Edit and revise: Read your paper with particular attention to flow, correctness, precision, and the rules of spelling, grammar, and punctuation. Strive to reduce clutter and improve clarity.
Reread topic sentences: Do they preview the main ideas of their paragraphs?
Reread concluding sentences: Do they set up transitions to forthcoming paragraphs?
Evidence check: Ensure that quotations and/or paraphrases are purposeful and properly cited.
Reality-check: Share your edited draft with a trusted friend or tutor. If that person finds your writing to be well crafted and your reasoning to be sound, you're ready to submit your paper.