The encyclopedia for writers, researchers, and knowledge workers
Christine Photinos is the director of the Rhetoric Specialization in the MA English program at National University, San Diego. She teaches classes in rhetoric, technical writing, composition, composition pedagogy, information literacy, film, and literature.
Research we do on the web and through library databases often leads us to content from newspapers, magazines, and news agencies (such as Reuters and the Associated Press). What all news content has in common is that it connects in some way to something that is new or in the news. News content can be roughly divided into the categories...
Published on May 01st 2018
Effective paragraph transitions signal to readers how two consecutive paragraphs relate to each other. The transition signals the relationship between the “new information” and the “old information.” For example, the new paragraph might elaborate on the idea presented in the preceding paragraph introduce a related idea continue a chronological narrative describe a problem with the idea presented in the preceding...
Published on Dec 19th 2012
Rhetorical analysis of film refers to the study of how elements of a film work together to communicate ideas and create specific audience orientations, identifications, feelings, and attitudes. When you study rhetorical devices, you are studying how a text uses symbols to elicit particular responses or suggest particular meanings. These “symbols” might be words, sounds, or images, and a “text”...
Published on Mar 14th 2021
Synthesis is something you already do in your everyday life. For example, if you are shopping for a new car, the research question you are trying to answer is, "Which car should I buy"? You explore available models, prices, options, and consumer reviews, and you make comparisons. For example: Car X costs more than car Y but gets better mileage. ...
Published on Jul 25th 2013
URL stands for Uniform Resource Locator. A URL is just the internet address for any given webpage: Understanding the component parts of a URL can be helpful in a variety of situations. Here are just a few reasons why understanding URLs is useful: The URL often reveals key information about a site An understanding of URLs provides the needed foundation...
Published on Jun 24th 2014
Check your answers A) eBay page? 1. http://pages.ebay.com YES This is an eBay page. The domain name is ebay.com 2. http://movies.half.ebay.com YES This is an eBay page. The domain name is ebay.com (“movies” and “half” indicate subdomains). 3 http://pages.ebey.com NO This is not an eBay page. Note that “ebay” is misspelled as ebey. 4. NO This is not an eBay...
Published on Jun 30th 2014
