Unit 3 – Brief Rhetorical Essay – Assignments 3.1–3.3

First Draft (3.1) 20 points Due Date: The beginning of your class on Tuesday 4/12
Length: 750–1250 words, about 3–5 pages (double spaced)
Format: MLA guidelines for spacing, margins, paragraphs, indents, quotes and citations, name
block, etc. Please print single–sided for hardcopies. Cite sources inside the essay in MLA
style; however, a Works Cited page is not required unless you incorporate sources from
outside of our class readings. In that case, you need to include only the outside source(s) on
the Works Cited page.
Versions: One hardcopy due in class and one copy uploaded as a .pdf or .docx (only) to Turnitin
under Assignments on Canvas.

Peer Review (3.2) 20 points Due Date: In class on Tuesday 4/12, worksheet will be provided.

Final Draft (3.3) 50 points Due Date: The beginning of your class Tuesday 04/19
Length and Format: See 3.1 above
Version: One copy uploaded as a .pdf or .docx (only) to Turnitin under Assignments on Canvas.
Grading: 50 points total
o 40 points based on a complete response to the prompt, including integration of information
from our readings
o 10 points based on mechanics (grammar, structure, punctuation, vocabulary, spelling, etc.)
Your Audience: You are writing this essay to educated readers who are concerned with the influence
of social media and the increasing level of disinformation in the sphere of civic discourse.
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Assignment Context
Disinformation spread via social media is an issue we all deal with. In “Facebookland,” The Atlantic
essay by Adrienne LaFrance, the author argues that Facebook and its partner platform Instagram have
become a “lie–disseminating instrument of civilizational collapse.”
In Ten Arguments for Deleting your Social Media Accounts Right Now Jaron Lanier argues that the
social media business model that sells the behavior modification of users to the highest bidder is the
ultimate disinformation machine. Lanier suggests that this model—when aimed at users whose
psychological status is continuously measured and manipulated—overwhelms the public’s ability to
engage in the most basic civic activities required to maintain a democratic society.
Assignment Prompt
For this brief essay assignment you will use information from our readings by LaFrance and Lanier to
support your own argument about how mass disinformation and widespread social media use affect our
civic society and the continued existence of American democracy. Your thesis statement should
answer the questions, “Does disinformation and reliance on profit–driven social media platforms
threaten the existence of an informed and civically active US population?“
Your essay will utilize claims and evidence from our readings to support your position. You may
incorporate additional information from credible outside sources and/or your own experience, but
information from our class texts must form the basis of your argument.

A successful essay might be structured like this:
Paragraph 1: Introduce the issue at hand, context, and include your thesis statement.
Next 2–4 paragraphs: Introduce each author, their text, the main claim of each, and two key subclaims
from each.
Next 1–2 paragraphs: Explain how one argument relates to, supports, and/or weakens the other
argument.
Next 1–2 paragraphs: Analyze and explain how the arguments support your thesis statement. You may
want to evaluate the effectiveness of each argument for your intended audience. (If you do this, keep in
mind the genre of each argument—for example, a magazine article typically doesn’t include source
citations; a book typically has them—and the context of the publication date. This historical context
matters even in our very recent past.
Final paragraph: Restate your thesis, summarize your work, and make a statement supporting the

importance of your take on the topic.

NO PLAGIARISM