For this assessment, students are required to write a 1,000 word essay that draws on the key concepts explored between weeks one and three. They should respond to one of the questions listed below.

• Popular culture, Stuart Hall argues, is structured by the "double movement of containment and resistance." Discuss in relation to  a specific example of graffiti. 
• Drawing on an example of graffiti, discuss Michel de Certeau's claim that "many everyday practices are tactical in character … victories of the ‘weak’ over the ‘strong’" (de Certeau 1988, p. xix). 

In their answers, students must draw on the relevant readings and unit content in order to build a strong argument. They should aim to incorporate and discuss the work of key theorists explored in the opening weeks of the unit such as bell hooks, Michel de Certeau, Stuart Hall and Greg Tate. Students are also required to develop academic writing skills in their essays. If you have any questions about the structure of an academic essay, please ask your tutor, raise questions on the general discussion board and use the resources available at mq.edu.au/learningskills. You should also include in-text referencing and attach a reference list at the end of their essay. For more information on referencing please follow the link to Macquarie University Library’s Referencing Guide here: http://libguides.mq.edu.au/Referencing.

Each task will be marked according to the following assessment criteria:

1. Demonstrates a clear and effective grasp of relevant key concepts explored in the unit
2. Develops an argument that is supported by both theoretical concepts and analysis of a well chosen example 
3. Effectively uses writing skills to present academic research, including consistent and accurate use of in-text referencing.

Submission: Students will submit this task via the Turnitin link on the unit iLearn Site.

Late Penalty: Students who submit late work without an extension ​will receive a penalty of 10% per day. This penalty does not apply for cases in which an application for Disruption to Studies is made and approved.

Extensions: Students who have experienced a disruption to their studies and would like to seek an extension must submit a disruption to studies notification via ask.mq.edu.au. Please email your tutor if you have any questions.

In this unit, students are required to participate in the weekly forum in two ways. First, students must post a 200-300 word response to the weekly activity within the defined time frame. Second, students must also encourage engagement and peer learning by commenting on one other post in the weekly forum. The forum will be open from the Tuesday of each week until the following Tuesday. 

For this assessment, students will draw on their weekly tasks in order to submit one word document to turnitin that contains two sections. 

Section One: Activity Portfolio

For this section of the assessment, students must collate their activity posts from Week 1 - Week 7 and paste them into a Word Document. 

Section Two: Scholarly Reflection 

For this section of the assessment, students are required to select two of their own responses to the weekly activities undertaken in the discussion forms between weeks 1-7. They are required to complete a 400-500 word scholarly reflection task for each post.

In these scholarly reflections, students are required to outline the context of their post on the discussion forum, demonstrate how it enhances their understanding of the key concepts or methods explored in the unit, and discuss how their thoughts have developed since writing their post.

Students can find a template for this assessment task on the main ilearn page, underneath the link to the dialogue module and unit guide. Each post they include should be 150-300 words in length (about a paragraph). This means you may either use a full post, or an extract. The posts are not included in the word count.

This assessment task will be marked according to the following assessment criteria:

1. Submission of weekly writing activities, including two of the student’s weekly responses for reflection
2. Demonstrates a clear grasp of relevant key theoretical concepts and their context
3. Demonstrates the ability to identify the significance and implications of relevant key concepts
4. Demonstrates a critical engagement with relevant unit readings, cultural studies scholarship and debates
5. Stages a thoughtful reflection on the process of learning and engaging with cultural studies scholarship
6. Effective use of writing skills to present academic research, including consistent and accurate use of in-text referencing

Submission: Students will submit this task via the Turnitin link on the unit iLearn Site.

Late Penalty: Students who submit late work without an extension  will receive a penalty of 10% per day. This penalty does not apply for cases in which an application for Disruption to Studies is made and approved.

Extensions: Students who have experienced a disruption to their studies and would like to seek an extension must submit a disruption to studies notification via ask.mq.edu.au. Please email your tutor if you have any questions.

For this assessment, students are required to write a 2,000 word essay in response to one of the questions listed below. In their answers, students (a) must use the concepts offered in the relevant readings and (b) draw on example/s in order to develop and support their own argument.

• Drawing on Pierre Bourdieu's work and an example of your choosing, discuss how questions about either graffiti or kitsch are in fact all about questions of taste and distinction and the consecration of the social order.
• Discuss the importance of reproductive technologies in relation to kitsch. In your answer, you need to discuss Benjamin's and Olalquiaga's work on the aura, the original and the reproduction, the tactility of kitsch, and the democratisation of the image.
• Aboriginalist kitsch is enabled by white supremacism: it is an "assertion of rights of ownership in the intellectual and cultural sphere to match power in the political and economic sphere." B. Hodge and V. Mishra. Discuss.
• "Indigenous tourist wares were threatening because they blurred the boundaries, they rendered the other unrecognisable." R. B. Phillips. Discuss in the context of indigenous tourist art.
• "We are enveloped by the gigantic, surrounded by it, enclosed within its shadow. Whereas we know the miniature as a spatial whole or as temporal parts, we know the gigantic only partially. We move through the landscape; it does not move through us." Susan Stewart. Discuss gigantism and the miniature in the context of examples in the Australian landscape and kitsch culture.
• Art cannot exist without kitsch. Discuss in the context of the work of Marcel Duchamp and Jeff Koons.
• Kitsch and queer "are in a lascivious embrace. They constantly transmute." Craig Judd. Discuss.
• Queer kitsch brings into focus a concept of the self as "performative, improvisational, discontinuous, and processually constituted by repetitive and stylized acts." Moe Myer. Discuss.
• "Representational excess, heterogeneity, and gratuitousness of reference, in constituting a major raison d'etre of camp's fun and exclusiveness, both signal and contribute to an overall resistance to definition." Fabio Cleto. Discuss.
• "The audience's connection with celebrities, celetoids and celeactors is dominated by imaginary relationships." Chris Rojek. Discuss how celebrity kitsch is one of the key products of this imaginary relationship.
• Dick Hebdige outlines two forms of incorporation of subcultures by a dominant culture: the commodity form and the ideological form. Discuss these two forms of incorporation in the context of an actual subcultural style, with reference to bell hooks' essay on "Eating the Other."
• Construct your own essay question, with reference to the topics and readings of the unit, in consultation with your tutor.

Essays will be marked according to the following assessment criteria: 

1. Demonstrates a clear and effective grasp of the key concepts raised in the relevant readings
2. Identifies relevant examples and provides contextualised and forensic analysis
3. Develops a well-supported and well-researched argument 
4. Effectively re-evaluates practices of everyday life that are often dismissed as worthless or ephemeral 
5. Critiques relevant hierarchies of value 
6. Effectively uses writing skills to present academic research, including consistent and accurate use of in-text referencing.

Submission: Students will submit this task via the Turnitin link on the unit iLearn Site.

Late Penalty: Students who submit late work without an extension  will receive a penalty of 10% per day. This penalty does not apply for cases in which an application for Disruption to Studies is made and approved.

Extensions: Students who have experienced a disruption to their studies and would like to seek an extension must submit a disruption to studies notification via ask.mq.edu.au. Please email your tutor if you have any questions.