Writing for Digital Media
Landrigan, Fall 2013
Assignment #1: Webtext Analysis
Due: Thurs 9/12
For this 2-3 page essay, you will choose a specific piece of digital media (webtext, website,
video game, etc.) and prepare an analysis of it. The medium is entirely up to you, but you should
choose a medium with some online component (that is, a YouTube video is fine, but a film is
not) and one with a scope appropriate to analyze in 2-3 pages. For this assignment, I will urge
you to avoid social media analysis (since we will cover that in a later assignment). You will all
run your choices by me – if you are struggling to come up with a webtext, speak to me sooner
than that.
Choosing Your Webtext
Start by selecting a digital text to analyze. I encourage you to choose a piece of media that links
to your final project (as you are imagining it thus far) or that links to your professional interests.
You might want to do a website analysis, perhaps looking at the online portfolio of a student or
working professional, or the website of a company you’re interested in working for, or the web
site of a local nonprofit organization. You might analyze a blog (or vlog, or podcast) you are
modeling for your own work. You might choose a specific video game to analyze, or focus on
digital creative narratives including multimedia poetry, essays, or stories.
As you choose the piece you wish to analyze, also start thinking about ways to shape and focus
your analysis. For instance:

If you choose to analyze the online portfolio of a student or working professional, you
might shape your analysis around how the designer negotiates displaying his/her
professional identity while expressing individual personality.

If you choose to analyze the website of a nonprofit organization, you might analyze how
the text and media on the site interact in a way that supports a specific message or stance.

If you choose to analyze a video game, you might analysis the game interface itself and
how it shapes the player’s choices in a way that creates a particular emotional response.

If you choose to analyze a multimedia creative narrative, you might analyze the multiple
media that construct the poem, essay, or story. You might shape your analysis on how
the media (e.g., text, images, sound, movement) work together, or don’t work together to
create meaning and a digital experience.
Drafting Your Analysis
Your analysis should address the rhetorical situation of the webtext you’ve chosen – that is, how
is the text designed, constructed, and composed to serve a specific purpose for a specific
audience, and whether or not, based on detailed evidence from the text, you think it is successful
at fulfilling that rhetorical situation. For example:

Purpose: What is the purpose of this webtext? Use the resources available to you within
the text to asses this purpose. (The “mission statement” or “about us” pages of personal
or professional websites and blogs, an author’s note for a creative text, etc.) How is the
website designed or composed to achieve this purpose? What other purposes can you
articulate based on viewing and interacting with the text?

Audience: Who is the target audience of this text? (Keep in mind that you may not be
the target audience!) Try to articulate the audience based both on the webtext’s apparent
purpose and its design. What are the elements of that audience’s demographics? How are
the various elements of the webtext working together to create a feeling (pathos) in that
audience? How does that interact with the webtext’s purpose?

Writer: Who composed this webtext? Remember that in the case of digital media, this
will very rarely be a single author. Try to explore the writer’s identity as an individual, an
organization, or a collective effort (in the case of video games or creative texts,
especially). What contribution did each “writer” make to the text, and how do those
contributions relate to the purpose and audience?

Genre: Spend some time describing the genre of the webtext, and assessing the elements
of the text that are in keeping with that genre (blogs, for example, are constructed in a
journal-esque “entry” structure, a unique feature of that genre). How does this webtext
demonstrate its genre? How might the writer have tried to extend or push the boundaries
of the genre? How do the elements of the genre interact with purpose and audience?
Keep in mind that describing is not analyzing. Each of the above sections asks you both to
identify the rhetorical situation, and to describe the digital media, but that only serves as a
foundation for the analyzing. Also, your opinions or feelings about the digital media example are
not analysis. Push beyond description or opinion to ask yourself the recurring why question –
why is the digital text constructed in this way? Why does (or doesn’t) it work for this purpose,
this audience, this genre?
When composing your analysis, you should feel free to pull in or reference class readings or
discussions to support your assessment. You might also reference outside sources as they are
relevant. Backtrack a bit—for instance, if you’re analyzing a video game, be sure to check out
the web site of the company that created the video game. Consider reading outside perspectives
and opinions on or about the company. If you’re analyzing a digital poem, see if you can find
any interviews with or biographies of the author.
Nuts and Bolts
 Typed, double-spaced, 12 pt. Times New Roman, 1” margins
 Use MLA, APA, or Chicago formatting for the essay (including a Work(s) Cited page).
Choose the citation style that makes the most sense for your project/professional
interests, but use one style consistently.