Graduate

LIT 6934 / Contemporary Rhetorics (Fall 2010)

This course surveys the influence of postmodern philosophies on rhetorical theory and pedagogy; focusing particular attention on how 21st century "post-critical" movements adopt, adapt, transform, and reject some of the seminal postmodern terms, questions, arguments, and missions. The course opens by reviewing Kant's aspirations for the Modern University (and the Enlightenment program to which it was, as remains, committed).

This mission is then called into question via pre-postmodern thinkers Heidegger and Levinas. We then turn to examine the canonical postmodern theorists and disciplinary integration of these theorists, noting especially the works of Susan Jarratt, James Berlin, and Victor Vitanza. The course concludes examining six important books by Collin Brooke, Gregory Ulmer, Graham Harman (supplemented with readings from Bruno Latour and Jennifer Edbauer), Thomas Rickert, Byron Hawk, and D. Diane Davis. More detailed information is available on the course information page.

ENC 6336 / Historical Rhetorics (Fall 2009, Scheduled Fall 2011)

This course narrates the death of (sophistic, epistemic, ethical, metaphysical) rhetoric, from its origins in Ancient Greece to its flourishing in Ancient Rome to its decline and disintegration in Ramism. Along the way, there is comprehensive exposure to the major figures in the classical and medieval periods; Gorgias, Plato, Aristotle, Isocrates, Cicero, Quintilian, St. Augustine and Ramus are among the classical and medieval rhetors addressed in the course. Furthermore, students familiarize themselves with core rhetorical tropes and strategies and with contemporary secondary perspectives (including the work of Susan Jarratt, Bruce McComiskey, and Victor Vitanza). More detailed information is available on the course information page.

ENC TBA / New Media Production (Scheduled Fall 2012)

Beyond familiarity with the ethical and epistemological implications of new media, 21st century rhetoricians require intimate working knowledge of new media communicative tools and techniques. These tools and techniques include: html, css, javascript, rss, blogging, podcasting, vblogging, wikis, and Flash. This course provides students with a rhetorically-oriented introduction to using these tools. Additionally, course readings and discussions will address how the "newness" of these tools refigure the ways we conceptualize the relationships between writers, audiences, and media. More detailed information is available on the course information page

Undergraduate

ENC 3310 / Expository Writing as Digital Citizenship (Spring 2009, Fall 2009, Spring 2010, Summer 2011)

This course is an attempt to reimagine writing instruction, moving away from 20th century models based on print scholarship and toward 21st century models of digital citizenship. My premise: the purpose of the contemporary university has to be more attentive to maximizing new communicative tools, including blogs, wikis, aggregators, bookmarks, and networking technologies.

More detailed information is available on the course information page.

This course is in the process of being transformed into an elective for USF's undergraduate Technical and Professional Writing Major.

ENC 4218 / Visual Rhetoric (Fall 2010, Spring 2011)

This upper-division undergraduate seminar has two primary aims. First, it aims to introduce students to design concepts, color theories, and principles of data visualization. Second, it provides students with an extended opportunity to familiarize themselves with visual composing technologies such as InDesign, Prezi, and Premier. More detailed information is available on the course information page.

ENC 3416 / New Media (Spring 2011).

This upper-division course provides students with an extended exposure to W3C standards-compliant (x)html and css through a number of projects ranging from aesthetic to professional service learning for non-profit organizations. The course opens with a theoretical exploration of what "new media" means, drawing up a range of readings that includes Walter Ong, Marilyn Cooper, Gregory Ulmer, Geoffrey Sirc, and Paul D. Miller (aka DJ Spooky that Subliminal Kid). It is buttressed by recent work in R/C on standards-compliant (x)html and css by Karl Stolley. More detailed information is available on the course information page.

ENC TBA / Rhetorical Theory

This proposed elective for USF's undergraduate Technical and Professional Writing Major would introduce core rhetorical figures and concepts. Broken into three stages, the first 1/3 of the course would focus on debates between Plato, Aristotle, Isocrates, and Gorgias in Ancient Greece. The second 1/3 of the course would focus on the rhetorical theory of Kenneth Burke. The final 1/3 of the course would examine contemporary movements in the field, paying particualr attention to Sullivan and Porter's feminist research ethics, Edbauer's concept of rhetorical ecologies, and D. Diane Davis' and my own articulations of (meta)rhetorical ethics.

ENC 3310 / Expository Writing as Internet Invention Citizenship (Summer 2010)

This six-week, intensive summer course engaged Gregory Ulmer's project for an avant-garde, eastern-influenced, theoretically inclined form of "writing-as-digital-poetics," what Ulmer terms "electracy."

ENC 3310 / Expository Writing as the History of Education (Fall 2008)

This course grounds writing instruction be examining a wide range of thinkers from a number of eras in an attempt to trace the complex (and at times contradictory) history of higher education. To enter a university is to encounter a new culture, one with its own languages, customs, values, and procedures--this course works to enculturate you into the world of the university while paradoxically equipping you with the tools to question, critique, or resist any such enculturation.

Teaching Philosophy

In a few words, my teaching philosophy generally involves opening spaces for students to articulate and explore interesting questions and then figuring out how, while honoring my institutional and disciplinary obligations, to get the hell out of their way. Drawing upon the work of Thomas Rickert, Byron Hawk, and my own experiences, I call this approach "post-pedagogical." While postmodern theories and critical methods have certainly influenced curriculum in English Studies, I am not yet sure they have influenced pedagogy--both in terms of the assignments we develop, the spaces we occupy, and the ways we inhabit (in a Heideggerian-Levinasian sense) our teacherly identities.

Purdue

ENG 505t / Technology Practicum for FYC Instructors

Technical mentoring provides new graduate instructors with computer-mediated instruction to benefit both their pedagogy and their professional development. As technical mentor, I help students meet the multimedia expectations in Purdue's first-year composition goals, means and outcomes. My duties include developing and running tutorial sessions for groups of 10 to 20 students on a wide range of activities, including image manipulation, professional portfolios, video editing software, electronic research methods, and various social authorship technologies.

ENG 505b / Mentoring Practicum for FYC Instructors

This course introduces new graduate instructors to a broad range of rhetorical and composition theory. The course attempts to ground theoretical readings in daily classroom practices. My duties included preparing lectures and class activities, facilitating class discussion, and observing and reviewing developing instructors.

ENG 420 / Professional Writing

This course provides the rhetorical and compositional abilities and technical knowledge necessary for today's networked professional writing environments. This includes both classical concepts (the constitutive dynamics of kairos, the importance of ethos) and contemporary technologies (electronic research tools such as del.icio.us and social authorship software such as Bootcamp and Google Office). Given the importance of delivery, I particularly stress visual rhetoric and document design in terms of adapting content to context, and audience expectations. Additionally, I stress collaboration through extensive electronic peer-review, team-based projects, and service learning.

ENG 419 / Multimedia Writing

This course emphasizes the intersection between core rhetorical concepts and multimedia composition. I emphasize the importance of standards-compliant web design in terms of site usability, accessibility, and sustainability. The semester culminates in a team service-learning competition to design a website for a non-profit organization (invoad).

ENG 203 / Research Methods

I taught this introductory course to Purdue's Professional Writing major inconjunction with Wayne Booth's The Craft of Research. The course emphasized a number of different quantitative and qualitiative research methods.

ENG 106 / First-Year Composition

Built upon the "You Are Here" syllabus approach, this course focuses on the importance of kairos, audience, and context in the composing process. I have developed or co-developed three different approaches to teaching this course: one exploring issues surrounding contemporary intellectual property law, one investigating the historic purposes of Universities, and one exploring the rise and significance of the weblog.