Rashid Ahmad, Zoey Lipscomb

Alex Martinez, Kirell Williams

Professor Bialas

ENGL 297

11 October 2017

Ethnographic Research Proposal

Introduction: This ethnographic research project will examine social media writing. We plan to

find out the inner workings of social media writing in a respective workplace, and uncover the

role social media writing plays in the workplace. An even broader goal is to discover the effect

social media writing has on society, and how it compares and contrasts to other kinds of

professional writing. We plan to observe and interact with a social media content manager. With

interviews, observations, fieldnotes, and primary sourced social media documents we will

answer our research questions.

Research Questions: Millions of people are on social media, which means there are many

different ideologies and ideas within social media. We will discover if there is any bias or

inaccurate information in social media writings to reach the desired audience. Social media

writing is very broad and vast in the amount of subjects that are talked about. It can include

business writing or advertisements to really anything. This brings up the question of how does

social media writing compare and contrast to other forms of professional writing, and how does

it affect their respective workplaces. The workplace of a social media writer is unknown to us

and we want to learn what their work environment is like.This also brings up the question of
what are the processes of social media writing, and how is it created. Lastly, social media

writing can be very persuasive and will figure out how it influences society and its audience.

Research Subject: Social media professionals are responsible for using creative content to

deliver a brand message effectively ie. blogs, photography, social media platforms. They have

extensive experience in launching, managing, and growing branded accounts on all social media

platforms. In addition, they are capable of creating a brand's written and visual social media

voice from large amounts of social media data. Since Ms. Newton is a freelancer, she works for

herself. However, she has prior experience in the professional field at businesses such LA force

and Stevens, Sears, and Cover girl. Over the past ten years, Ms. Newton developed her skills

through multiple jobs as a public relation assistant, online content specialist, personal blog and a

global and community manager. Ms. Newton would be the perfect candidate for us because she

has the knowledge to explain specific techniques within social media writing. In addition, she

has personal and professional advice and experiences on how to become a professional social

media writer to accomplish our goal of the effect social media has on writing.

Data Collection Methods: Our data collection methods will be from an array of online sources

giving us data on how small businesses, blogs, etc. benefit from their social media presence and

how well they can reach their audience. Our interviews with Ms. Newton will provide us with

statistics from different businesses Facebook pages, Instagram accounts, and other online

platforms to see their audience reach and how their audiences and influence has grown due to

their use of social media. We will use the electronic community to find blogs, websites, and

social media accounts that will help us answer our research questions. Our fieldnotes and
observations with Ms. Newton will also help us gather data on the workplace environment of a

social media writer.

Data Analysis: With the fieldnotes, interview, and observations collected we hope to get a sense

of how the workplace operates, and the effects on society. Specifically, we could take a piece of

social media writing from our research subject and analyze it to figure out the effect it has on

society. We would first figure out who the piece of social media writing was targeting as an

audience, then based off that information we can figure out its purpose. After both of those

questions are answered we will be able to get an idea of its affect on society. Looking at our

observations, fieldnotes, and interview answers we will develop an understanding of the

workplace, its atmosphere, and how it operates. With primary sources such as blogs, websites,

and written social media writing we

Schedule of Work: We plan on contacting Ms. Newton by October 16th to set up a time to

interview her and observe her workplace and take fieldnotes. We hope to be able to interview her

make observations and fieldnotes by the 22nd of October. If by chance we cannot get in contact

with her we will contact our backup sudject by the 20th of October. We also plan to collect our

primary sources of social media writing that will include blogs and websites. There will be

continued research of our ethnography throughout the whole project in which we will analyze

and transribe all our data collected. We will have our first draft of our ethnography written by

November 15th and a final product by November 20th. We will have a more specific schedule

once the interviews and data have been collected.