MINI MEDIA RESEARCH/COMM Mini Media Research
There are five steps involved in this assignment:
1. You will select a case to for your project. If you want to include social media data, the case needs to be recent and significant, so you can generate significant data in (near) real-time mode. For a case that’s not recent, it still needs to be significant so you can generate significant media (not social media) data from the archives. (Read below: you can re-use a global event essay case)
2. You will familiarize yourself with various tools (see TOOLS below) that can be used to analyze media data.
3. You will select tools to be used in your data collection and analysis. You can use one, two, or more tools. Generally the use of multiple tools will generate richer data.
4. You will use the tools of your choice to collect data and analyze the case.
5. You will write down your interpretation and analysis of the data.
A CASE
You’re free to choose your own case but it needs to be a global event. You can re-use the event you chose in the global event essay.
To use the tools, you need to be familiar with the case. E.g. to be able to use social media tools you need to recognize keywords or hashtags associated with the event.
Examples:
• If your case is “Charlie Hebdo”, examples of your keywords would be: #jesuischarlie, #charliehebdo. You can also choose to analyze the dynamics that emerged in the margins using less popular keywords such as #jesuisahmed and, possibly, comparing it with the more popular ones (#jesuischarlie).
• If your case is “Boko Haram”, examples of your keywords would be: bokoharam, “boko haram”, #bringbackourgirls.
• If your case is “Ottawa Shooting”, examples of your keywords would be: #ottawashooting, #ottawastrong, #canadastrong.
To be able to use newspaper headline coverage tool (http://pageonex.com/), your case needs to be significant/important nationally and globally that it would make it to headlines (in national/international newspapers). If you used newspapers as your choices of media in the global event essay, you can re-use them and use PageOneX to generate comparative data of headline coverage of the event. It’s best to use PageOneX to generate data within a certain range of dates rather than a single data (e.g. one week after the ‘date of incident’).
TOOLS (you need to create an account to access and use some of these tools)
• http://netlytic.org
• http://pageonex.com/
• https://global-factiva-com.proxy.library.carleton.ca/
• https://twitter.com/search-advanced
• http://www.socialbearing.com/
• http://www.talkwalker.com/

DATA & ANALYSIS
You’re expected to analyse how your case/event is either (or both)
(a) covered by media — PageOnex can be used to compare headline coverage of various major newspapers in the world and Fativa can be used to compare general online media coverage.
(b) discussed by social media users — social media tools such as Netlytic, Twitter advanced-search, Social Bearing and TalkWalker can be used to generate data on this matter.
In other word, the analysis can be similar to the one in the global event essay. However, in this assignment, you analysis and argument(s) needs to be supported by systematic data (collected by the tools).
To include the graphs of the data in your paper, you can use screenshots.
How to take a screenshot in Windows see: http://www.wikihow.com/Take-a-Screenshot-in-Microsoft-Windows
How to take a screenshot in Mac see: https://support.apple.com/en-ca/HT201361
FORMAT (2,000-2,500 words, not including references)
APA style preferredhttps://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/560/01/, but MLA or Chicago style is also allowed.
The word counts are provided here just to illustrate. You are not strictly bound to these numbers.
• Title. A thoughtful title that captures the essence of the case study.
• Abstract (100-120 words). (or Summary) A one- or two-paragraph statement summing up the study (e.g. what, why, when, where, how, and who). This summary introduces the project, questions, hypothesis, and highlights of the important findings.
• Introduction (200-250 words). (or Background). Describes what you did, and why it was of interest—opens the door to the case study and tries to get the passersby to enter. Typically several paragraphs that includes background information about the case and why it is interesting to study.
• Research questions (100-150 words). Presents and describe the question(s) that is the basis of your investigation, explains why the question was framed as it was. Include a series of inquiry questions (sub or smaller questions) that would logically help you in answering the questions. These will logically serve as stepping-stones for the methodology.
• Methodology (200-250 words). Describes the step-by-step procedure employed and explains why it is appropriate to this case study, provides details (e.g. how, what, when, where, and who).
• Data (400-500 words). Presents the data that were collected (so the reader can make a judgment about your work based on same information you used); the data should be organized and processed to some extent for clarity but should not be just a summary.
• Analysis (750-1000 words). An explanation of what the information you collected. The results (above) are just “facts;” the analysis is your interpretation (or opinion) of what the facts mean.
• Conclusions (200-250 words). A fairly concise statement of what the case study found and what you have learned.
• References. Provide a list of applicable references; generally include only citations to materials that were critical to your case study (i.e., not a long bibliography). Should include at least 5 readings from the course. There’s no maximum limit.
CRITERIA:
• quality of questions posed
• appropriate research method
• use of literature
• analysis of findings
• communication/writing
PLEASE SUBMIT IN .DOC or .DOCX
If you don’t have MS Word:
• OpenOffice, LibreOffice and Pages will save as / export to Word formats
• Google Docs — will also save as Word formats
• Computer labs have MS Word