CPN 100: Multiple Texts

Exploring a topic using multiple texts is an iterative process and essential for college writers to engage. Iterative means “a cycle of repeated work,” and this means that a student will return many times not only to the texts they are analyzing but also their ideas, writing, and reflecting about those texts – adding to their opinions, fine-tuning them, examining a new perspective, or even tossing out early ideas all together (this means revision, in all parts of the learning process). Effective writers read, examine, think about, discuss, make observations on, draw conclusions from, and reflect upon sources. Considering multiple texts in an assignment will involve understanding how each source cites other sources, builds upon a knowledge base, and adds nuance of ideas within a topic and evolving conversation or discourse.

Writers explore texts for a range of purposes, including synthesis, analysis, argument, presentation, remix, and others. With this in mind, your CPN 100 instructor will ask you to explore multiple texts and reflect on how those texts are situated within their topic, use their own sources, deviate or distinguish themselves from material produced previously, and ground their purpose and conversation in some kind of cited evidence. Your instructor might ask you to use two or more texts to do any of the following: to take a stance on a debate, to analyze the information within the texts for their usefulness, to consider how or if the texts contribute to the conversation you are having, to explicate the texts, or to explain and summarize them for a (different) audience, and /or to consider your own personal (subjective) or professional (objective) position in relation to the text. The exact genre of your assignment will depend on your instructor and your class but may include annotating your reading of each of the multiple texts, mapping each text’s use of sources and synthesizing, literally putting texts into conversation (such as in an essay, screenplay, podcast, FAQ,) or some other way of demonstrating engagement with the multiple texts. However your instructor approaches exploring and using multiple texts for discussion and writing, it is important to think critically and for a significant amount of time about each text, its own use of sources, and consider how, or even if, each will fit within the established purpose of the assignment and be presented to audiences.

In CPN 100, students explore, develop and compose assignments that may include synthesis, analysis, making claims, and reflection, using multiple sources.

Through the multiple texts assignment, students will:

• Read, discuss, reflect, and write about multiple sources for a specific purpose;
• Use composing styles and processes to develop their ideas supported by multiple texts; and
• Be able to produce a coherent text within common college-level written forms.

Things to Keep in Mind about Multiple Text Compositions

Writers may use multiple texts in different ways, depending on the assignment, the texts’ genres and the information each provides. However, the main purpose of focusing on “multiple texts” is to unfold and pursue the complexities in the way that texts are composed and in turn how the author of each chooses to include evidence and cite sources. While the “multiple text” may seem like just a logical extension of assignments completed previously such as the “one text,” it is a chance to really examine a topic from multiple angles as explored by many contributing authors, while engaging in your own slow reading and critical thinking processes before considering how your voice adds to theirs in a conversation.

An assignment using multiple texts may be combined with assignments for a variety of topics, so it is important to be sure you understand the requirements, complexities, and guidelines of your instructor. For example, your instructor may ask you to write using synthesis, personal experience, and several texts. Or, your instructor may ask you to create an argument using both written and oral texts, such as newspaper articles with interviews or surveys. The nature of each assignment will have unique guidelines, but ALL will require careful reading and critical thinking about the texts, topic, and use of sources.

To craft a successful composition using multiple texts, writers must consider the purposes of their writing assignment and their audiences’ relationship to the texts or issue explored. Some audiences may be more or less familiar with the topic explored by the texts or their use of sources. Rather than simply being the next step of “doing more,” by adding in more than one text, the consideration of multiple texts that themselves use sources, put into conversation with each other, will necessitate even further practices of complex and thorough reading, critical thought, and intentional composition choices.