ENG 3315: Journalistic Profile Assignment

This is an assignment guide on the journalistic profile assignment for ENG 3315: Advanced Writing. The tabs on this guide will help you find and use appropriate resources for your group project and presentation.

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Please see the following for the description and requirements of the Journalistic Profile assignment.

Implementing the techniques and devices we’ll study in the various modes of literary journalism, you will compose a 5-7 page profile of a person or organization related to your major and/or the professional field you wish to enter.
This is NOT to resemble a biography; it is to be a work of creative nonfiction—more specifically, a work of reportage that, as Lincoln Steffens once wrote of journalism, endeavors to represent its subject “so humanely that the reader will see himself in the other fellow’s place.”

When evaluating the journalistic profile, the instructor will consider the following:

• Introduction: Does the introduction work to engage the reader through the inclusion of interesting/thought-provoking details and ideas? Does it provide critical background to establish context and scope? If there is a thesis in the introduction, is it clear, sufficiently complex, and significant?
• Organization: Does the work endeavor to effect a focused impression of the subject? Is there a logical progression of ideas—and do they support the thesis of the profile (if one exists)? Does the writer transition effectively from one idea to another? Is each idea critical to the development of the profile’s central idea?
• Style and Content: Is the work honest and accurate? Does it employ sufficient research (i.e. has the writer checked his/her facts)? Does it implement the various devices of literary journalism discussed in class, such as interview, dialogue, interior monologue, scene construction, “status life,” etc. Does it earnestly endeavor to effect reader-subject identification?
• Mechanics: Has this piece been carefully reviewed by the writer and outside readers for errors in grammar and syntax? Has it been carefully reviewed by the writer and outside readers for spelling errors? Has it been carefully reviewed by the writer and outside readers for errors in punctuation?

Additional rubrics provided by your professor.