For this assignment, you will be looking at social identity in posts from the r/UofT and r/UTM Reddit forums.The posts can be found on the main Quercus page under Module 4. Read through all of the posts first, then answer the questions below. Submit your answers in a word or pdf document, refer explicitly to the line numbers whenever you bring up examples.Question 1: Find three instances where expressions of affective and epistemic stance index a particular student identity (e.g., “the struggling student”, “the over-achiever”, “the advice-giving student,” etc.). Then, pick three lexical items which you think might serve to index a student identity but not by virtue of them being expressions of affective or epistemic stance, but rather by the lexical choice as opposed to other possible lexical choices, and briefly explain why. [3 points; around 200 words]Question 2: Find two instances where the author’s student identity intersects with their gender identity. Briefly motivate how that identity is indexed through the use of affective and epistemic stances. Next discuss for what discursive purpose the gender identity is indexed. [5 points; around 200 words]Question 3: How do the students construe the identity of the institution (UofT) and its parts (instructors, TAs, administration, etc.). In other words: what characteristics does the institution have in the view of these writers? Motivate your answers with examples from the text. How do the student writers think of the agency of themselves (as students) and the institutions? Again, motivate your answer with examples from the text. Finally, choose two memes and describe how they support the textual descriptions of the student and institutional identities. [8 points; around 400 words]
