5.1: Formal Research Proposal Due: 3.12 CFP: Strange but Simple: The Rhetoric of Everyday Technological Change Editor: Professor Will Kurlinkus (University of Oklahoma) Contact Email: wkurlinkus@gmail.com We seek ~200 word proposals for chapters in our edited collection Strange but Simple: The Rhetoric of the Everyday Technological Change. Where much recent scholarship on technology has focused on cutting edge technological communities, in this collection we wish to explore trailing edge technological change, those techno-cultural trends that remain ubiquitous, ignored, simply there. As technology theorist Marc Wiser claimed more than 25 years ago, the most profound technologies are those that disappear. More specifically, were interested in how new technologies slowly leak into old communities, cultures, and spaces, leisurely changing the actions, values, and ways of thinking that go on therethe recent uptake of knitting by 20-something hipsters, the elderly joining Facebook, the constant presence of cellphones in college classrooms, the way Facebook has changed the way we mourn the dead. We imagine the best submissions will: 1. Select a community and technology and show how that technology has profound but unnoticed effects on the ways members of that community act. How has Facebook changed the very definition of what it means to be a grandparent? How has Snapchat changed the definition of a sexual relationship? How have cell phones changed the nature of the college classroom? 2. Include primary research 3. Include secondary researchspeak to pre-existing theories in rhetoric, composition, and technological studies that have been written on this subject. 4. Include some kind of rhetorical analysis: though we dont want simplistic and empty references to rhetorical concepts like ethos, pathos, and logos, we do want nuanced interpretations of communication, attentional economics, writing, learning, persuasion, emotion, ethics, memory, audiences, media, etc. ~200 word proposals for the collection will be due March 12, 2015. If selected, we expect annotated bibliographies demonstrating knowledge of the area on 4.7, annotated research notes on 4.21, and Final projects on 4.30.

[What goes in a chapter/article/speech proposal?] Describe what topic you are studyingWhat specific community have you decided to look at? Describe what you are specifically looking at within that communityWhat technological trend are you examining? Thesis: what are you going to be arguing, describing, talking about in this chapter? Give an exigency for the project: Why is it important that you are studying this project? Give kairos to the project: Why is it important that you are studying this project now. Give at least three research questions: What types of questions will you seek to answer in your project? Describe your methodologyhow are you gaining information on this community? Will you be doing interviews? Looking at specific texts produced by this subject group? Describe your organization: What are the steps/segments of your argument? Give at least two subtopics. First I will talk about this, then I will talk about this, then I will talk about this. Give a concrete larger-scale takeawaywhy is it important that this subject is being written about? How might the information you describe in this chapter be extended elsewhere? What will your reader learn that they can use? How might your analysis be applied to better the world? [Key tips for proposals]: Pretend like youve already done the research/the research is ongoingdont state that you havent started yet. Give at least one concrete example for every claim you are making, e.g, For example, I hope to examine Make sure your proposal is somehow meeting the theme of the book, journal, or conference you are proposing to. Reference something ongoing in the news, field, or area you are studying to give the topic currency. Be more straightforward. Get to the point immediately. Include a catchy title.