H - 1st Amendment Project
Rich Cameron
Issue date: 5/15/02 Section: 100x MM Online
Day class students should not start working on this assignment as important details may change.
The First Amendment certainly is in the news these days, from attempts at censorship, to violations of copyright protections, to filtering of the Internet.
This assignment is designed to get you look closely at a current specific free speech/free press/free expression issue. After looking at the current issue you will need to identify what area of media law is involved and research that issue. A significant part of the report must be your opinion of the issue and how it affects you in your daily life.
The paper should have three distinct and significant parts:
- 1. Describe the current event.
- 2. Extrapolate it to the area of law affected. Include history, prevailing concepts and laws, etc. The Journalist's Toobox web site at www.journaliststoolbox.com/newswriting/freespeech.html may be a good resource.
- 3. A discussion of your feelings and how it affects you or how you interpret the issue.
- 2. Extrapolate it to the area of law affected. Include history, prevailing concepts and laws, etc. The Journalist's Toobox web site at www.journaliststoolbox.com/newswriting/freespeech.html may be a good resource.
You MUST START with a current news event item that directly relates to the First Amendment/Expression clause, something not more than two months old. Don't waste time and space explaining the first amendment as a whole. Just start by talking about the current event
The specific issue in the news is important. A purpose of this paper is to compare the specific with the general. For instance, you might be in favor of gun control -- a Second Amendment issue -- until you or a loved one is robbed. Suddenly you feel the need to carry a gun for protection, even though the gun control laws make it illegal to do so. You would need to start your paper with a specific case where gun possession rights are either being curtailed or enhanced; to talk about gun control as a general issue is not enough. Then talk about the global issue of control (history, the current law, the national debate, etc.) and then include personal application and interpretation.
The issue must relate to the expression clause of the First Amendment (see First Amendment lecture). The religion establishment, religion exercise, assembly and redress clauses ARE NOT eligible.
Start by reading the current version of the Freedom Forum's "The State of the First Amendment." The document is available as a First Amendment document on the organization's web site at www.freedomforum.org. (The links to it are found in the First Amendment area of the site. You must have Acrobat Reader to read it.)
Good online sources for additional up-to-date information on First Amendment issues include the Freedom Forum (www.freedomforum.org), First Amendment Center (www.firstamendmentcenter.org), the American Press Institute's Journalist's Toolbox (www.journaliststoolbox.com/newswriting/freespeech.html), the Student Press Law Center (www.splc.org)or the ACLU (www.aclu.org) web sites, though there are plenty of current newspaper and magazine sources for this assignment. You might also check at the college library's EBSCO periodical search.
The report should be presented in the following format:
Research Paper -- Your typed paper should be 1,000-1,500 words. It may also contain illustrations. There should be a minimum of three written sources and they must be properly cited in footnotes, endnotes or in-text notes (a bibliography should be included, but it is not enough).
Important Note: It is okay to borrow material from other sources --most good research papers do-- but it must be properly cited. Cite quotes or facts. I mark down for material obviously borrowed from other sources but not cited.
Part of the reason students fail to cite sources properly is that they don't know when and why to cite them. Cite sources when you borrow the words, facts, or ideas of others. Reasons to include citations include:
- To foster academic honesty -- It is okay to borrow from other sources. Scholars do it all the time. But don't pass it off as your own work. Doing so is plagiarism and is grounds at some schools for explusion. Blatant plagiarism, at the very least, warrants zero on your paper.
- To show you aren't making it up -- When you present facts you want to show that you know what you are talking about. Citing sources adds credibility. If for some reason the information is wrong, then the monkey is on the source's back.
- To facilitate reader's research -- Your citation should include enough information that the reader, whether it be your instructor or someone else, can look up the information and use the information for his/her own research.
There are a number of "official ways" to cite sources. Chief among them are the MLA guidelines and the APA guidelines. Most other citation formats are offshoots of these two. In many cases your instructor may require you to follow one format or another. For this paper, anything resembling either of these two formats will be acceptable.
Failure to include citations may result in a lowering of your grade by up to 30%, or three grade levels.
See additional notes on how I grade this assignment.
Some online sources that can help you with the proper citations include:
- The Little, Brown Compact Handbook
- Particularly helpful in creating citations is a free online tool called Citation Machine at www.landmark-project.com/citation_machine/cm.php. Just choose the type of source and it askes you the questions you need to answer.
- Other helpful sources include:
- Other helpful sources include:
- A Student's Guide to evaluating web pages
Remember, this assignment represents 25 percent of your grade for the semester. Put effort in it and don't wait until the last minute to complete it. You might want to refer to the files on the Journalism web site.
A suggested format for your paper might be:
Part I - Introduction of the current issue should take 1.5 to 2 pages minimum. It is often better to have a minimum of two independent sources so that you get a better description of the issue. Don't waste time introducing the First Amendment. I know what it says; get to the issue and make sure it is about some specific event.
Part II - The more global issue that explains the general legal issue involved. Explain the issue and include some history. This section should be two to three pages minimum and include at least a couple of independent sources.
Part III - Personal application. This is the essay portion of the paper where you not only give your take on the specific issue, but also examine how the specific or general issue applies to your life. You might include sources in this section, but it is possible that you aren't borrowing anything for this section, so sources are less important.
| SPECIAL NOTE FOR ONLINE STUDENTS As you know, I usually prefer NOT to receive assignments as attachments. This assignment is an exception. It probably SHOULD be sent as an attachment. But it is important that you send it either as a Microsoft Word (.doc) or Rich Text Format (.rtf) file. If you use a word processing program other than Word, your program probably saves as a default of .wps. I cannot read these files. But virtually all word processors save as .rtf from the "Save As" dialog box. Please do not send the assignment in parts. Send it all, including citations as one document. |
