Tinder, Dating Sites, and Genre
Affiliated Project: Exploring Genre Through Rhetorical Analysis
Purpose: The purpose of this exercise is to get students articulating genre conventions, thinking about how to envision and analyze specific audiences, and working within a single genre given a very specific audience.
Description: Using the app tinder and various “niche” dating websites, you’ll illustrate the intersections between the rhetorical situation, genre, genre conventions, and audience analysis.
Recommended Time: Could be condensed into one 75 minute class period or extended across two 50 minute class periods; potentially even heavily redacted to one 50 minute class period.
Procedure:
Part One: Genre and Conventions
1) Navigate to this web article, “Against Chill” and scroll to the Parody Tinder profile.
2) Browsing through this image, ask students to articulate the rhetorical exigence related to Tinder profiles, and dating profiles on the whole.
3) Given that exigence, have students get into small groups and articulate the conventions of the dating profile as a genre. (If it makes you uncomfortable to use fake Tinder, you could also use FB or Twitter).
Part Two: Now that students have named an exigence and generated genre conventions, the second half attempts to bridge this rhetorical situation to different audiences.
1) Let students know that they will be conducting an audience analysis in relation to dating profiles. Show them these questions as a heuristic for viewing the video and conducting their audience analyses:
a. Who is this commercial specifically targeted at?
b. What does this demographic look like (age, gender, race, location, religious affiliation, education level)?
c. What do they drive?
d. How do they dress?
e. How do the vote?
f. What music do they listen to?
g. What’s their culture or way of life?
h. What beliefs and value systems do they have?
i. Are there any audiences excluded from this video?
2) Screen this video of a Farmers Only.com commercial.
3) Going through each of the questions, conduct this audience analysis together.
4) Next, have students generate a list of dating sites with very specific “niche” audiences
5) In their same groups from before, they should choose one of these “niche” dating websites with online advertising and conduct a similar audience analysis, attending to similar concerns as in the Farmers-Only commercial.
6) Re-convene the class and have each group review their dating website, the online adversiting, and their audience analysis