Instagram Post:
High School Poster:
Karen Thomas
Kylee Pastore
Freshman Composition
29 November 2021
Rationale
My research topic revolves around mental health and how the mental health of teenagers has been impacted since the pandemic began. Through my inquiry-based essay, I reached the general conclusion that most teenagers were impacted negatively and it was seen through their everyday lives and routines. In my essay, my audience was mostly parents or anyone who were majorly interested in the same topic as I, however, for my Composition in Two Genres, I want to take a switch and make my audience teenagers instead. And considering my audience will be teenagers, the genres they typically value fall along the line of; instagram posts, music/song lyrics, comedy shorts, comics, myth/tales or any fictional short story, advertisements, school posters/flyers, trivia games such as Jeopardy, graffiti art, and possibly even powerpoint presentation, depending how they’re set up, and the list can probably go on from there. Through using these different types of genres/media, I want to help teenagers realize they’re not alone with what they’ve been struggling with throughout the pandemic and that there are also ways that they can move around their obstacles.
I’ve narrowed down the list to just a few genres that I believe my specific audience would take interest in; instagram posts, personalized advertisements, comics, school posters/flyers, and powerpoint presentations. In general, I want to be able to use these genres with a more informative purpose but also help encourage teenagers to take action.
Instagram is a major social media platform that a large majority of teenagers typically browse through, and because of this many people use this platform in order to spread information that some may feel should be significant to everyone or even just significant to themselves. Regardless, it’ll be something that a variety of people can possibly see. The general conclusion I reached in my essay can be shown through statistics, which can easily be represented in informational pictures that would capture teenage attention. This would work the same way as the powerpoint presentation, but the powerpoint would just be at a larger scale and can possibly provide more information. The same even goes for posters/flyers, the only problem would be that posters/flyers would have less content and wouldn’t be able to provide as much information.
When it comes to more creative approaches, such as personalized advertisements or even school posters, it’ll be much easier to catch teenagers’ attention. When I picture making a personalized advertisement, I would probably revolve it around shows, video games, or other media that a majority of teenagers have been taking interest in. I feel like if the approach is done in that way, teenagers are most likely to pay attention to what that ad has to offer and take interest in it. With school posters, it’s something that they’re more likely to see and if used with the right elements, it could easily capture their attention and get a simple quick message across.
Considering all of this, the two genres that will probably be best to use would be both instagram posts and the school poster. The instagram post is more likely to be seen by teenagers and would be able to provide the most information, in moderation. But then, the posters on the other hand will be something similar but it’s short and sweet and also it’s something that a student could be more likely to see when walking down a hall.
Reflection
Moving from my research essay to my composition project has allowed me to think more outside the box when it comes to how to approach my audience and strategically choose what kind of message I want to send to them. Between the two assignments, I switched my target audience. In my initial research essay, I wanted the information I provided mainly to go towards adults, specifically parents who may be concerned about the mental health of their children throughout the pandemic. With this composition assignment, I decided to turn it around and target the teenagers instead who are actually struggling with this problem. Choosing teenagers as my audience caused me to thoroughly think about what are the best genres I can use to catch the attention of my audience and also, how will I present both genres to also maintain their attention as well. However, although choosing teenagers as my audience is a very specific age group, it’s still ultimately a large variety of people with various interests and experiences. So, finding and deciding which genres and what elements can fully capture their attention were one of the obstacles I encountered. I attempted to keep my ideas as broad as possible in order to go around this obstacle.
The composing aspect for this entire project was very different compared to the research essay. With the research essay, I wanted to generally make sure that I was getting my points across while keeping a certain tone that will keep my intended audience interested. However, as I explored other genres, there were other aspects of my project I had to pay attention to apart from the tone. Those other aspects or elements consisted of things such as fonts, colors, images, diction, etc. I had to make sure all of these different aspects were something that were appealing towards my audience but I also had to make sure that they were something that went along with my topic.
So, the two genres that I ultimately chose for my project were an instagram post and a school poster. I chose an instagram post because it was one of the many social media platforms that I know that a majority of teenagers use quite often. Instagram is often used for sharing pictures of your various experiences but it’s also used to spread information across others. So, I believed that I’d be able to use that to my advantage. Knowing how popular Instagram is and how it is to use the platform and spread information, it was a great choice to use for my topic. I also chose the school poster, similarly to the reasons as to why I chose the instagram post. I’d imagine these posters being found all throughout high school, where teenagers can easily see and find them. Though compared to the instagram post, I couldn’t add as much information to the poster and would need to find a way to keep it short and sweet, while still getting my message across. That challenge is what made me interested in choosing the school poster for this project.
Overall, between the research essay and the composition project, this project helped give me a bigger understanding of rhetorical situations and how it’s seen throughout a variety of different genres. It’s allowed me to actively pay attention to different parts of my writing or my work that in past cases I wouldn’t think are as important.
