Really bummed to be a Northwestern alum right now.

New adult milestone unlocked: getting generic holiday messages from your mortgage lender in addition to your dentist.

Amen.

one of the coolest things about ChatGPT is how you can actually just never use it. you can fill your whole entire life with simply not once using it. it's incredible.

all I need in the world

I've spent the last 6 mos working with faculty on a curriculum overhaul for our comm program. Today, the documents go to our curriculum committee! This would probably feel like a bigger moment if I wasn't also the chair of our curriculum committee.

I'm excited to finally have this book in my hand. My chapter is about how digital maps resist a simple cancel culture narrative when statues fall, like this to Confederate soldiers. Let me know if you want to read it. It seems...prescient at a time when history is a central battle.

@carpresearch.bsky.social is hosting a webinar to help launch @alessandronai.bsky.social and colleague's new book. Join us at 9am (Eastern) to learn about attack politics and their impacts. Register here: www.eventbrite.com/e/the-psycho...

"Today's models were taught to be convincing before they were taught to be right."

It is fucking insane that we had a decade of people complaining about the dangers of cancel culture, and now literally hundreds of thousands of people are being purged from government jobs for ideological reasons, but that is not cancel culture.

I know y'all know I hate Microsoft Teams with every fiber of my being. But, seriously. Whoever just called me and didn't tell me who you were [or what you wanted], Teams just lists "Wireless Caller" so I literally am not calling you back since I don't know who you are.

Platforming Cancel Culture, a new edited collection with Routledge, is available to pre-order! My chapter asks whether taking down Confederate statues is cancel culture and ways activists intervene digitally to remember differently. Get the book for your libe! www.routledge.com/Platforming-...

This long post is worth reading as we reckon with AI generated writing in the classroom and beyond.

"There is 'a fundamental mismatch' between what AI can do and what citizens expect from government, she said." YES. www.washingtonpost.com/business/202...

"When every learner is placed on their own “optimised” track, where is the shared experience of learning –– the chance to debate, to disagree, to collaborate, and to co-construct knowledge with peers?" www.unesco.org/en/articles/...

Yes. This 100%.

This. 100%.

Hey #TeamRhetoric! I'm revising my syllabus for my undergrad course on digital rhetoric. Do you have any readings on circulation (broadly construed) that are accessible and informative? I want students to think about the importance and challenges of studying how rhetoric circulates.

Judge’s order to stop the dismantling of the Department of Ed is from a lawsuit filed by @aft.org Higher ed faculty….join your local @aaup.bsky.social who fights alongside @aft.org to protect education.

Worth a read. Not a lot in here will be surprising to rhetorical critics and others who have studied public memory, but I do love seeing these arguments make their way to the public. www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/202...

Just wanted to take a second to personally thank folks who came to the #CARP5 conference. It was wonderful to be in community with you last weekend, and thanks for sharing your work! @carpresearch.bsky.social

Thanks, Florian! Panelists @hendrikmichael.bsky.social, Eric Shiraev, Holger Mölder, and @keohaneja.bsky.social discussed timeless tropes and new attacks on women in politics.

As a reminder, you can follow the conference livestream on our YouTube channel: www.youtube.com/live/TwKlBgm... #CARPV

We're welcoming scholars to George Mason's Arlington campus this week to talk about gender, power, and character assassination. See the conference schedule here: communication.gmu.edu/research-and...

I heard Fareed Zakaria talk about how American universities were the envy of the world back in 2008 at the Chicago Council. They definitely won't be after all this. www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/202...

"The university will end the cafeteria’s pernicious diversity, equity, and inclusion program, otherwise known as 'Taco Tuesday.'" www.mcsweeneys.net/articles/cha...

I'm still very excited to welcome so many wonderful scholars to NoVa at the end of the month for @carpresearch.bsky.social's 5th biennial conference. schar.gmu.edu/news/2025-02...

1. I had no idea this was how the White House Press Pool worked. Fascinating. 2. This is an absolute travesty. www.washingtonpost.com/politics/202...

Just got my first email from an adjunct asking whether they are 'allowed' to teach something related to people of color working in the design field. Sigh.

I assigned Lucaites and Condit's essay on conceptions of the ideograph <equality> during the Civil Rights movement for ideology day in my rhetoric class. We sure have a lot more to discuss than I had in mind when I built this syllabus 6 weeks ago.

Mundane observation amidst the horrors: week 3 of the semester is a bit early for the 'emails I've pinned to the top of my inbox to deal with later' to completely obscure my view of my inbox.

Research universities are often the largest employers in their region. They are often the primary health care providers to communities. This funding shift will not only reduce US research leadership, it will put working people out of work and reduce healthcare access.

I am stoked that this book is in production now! (And I'm even stoked-er that my essay on mapping statue removal is the first chapter after the intro! For real, though, I'm really proud of this essay.) www.routledge.com/Platforming-...

I taught my first rhetoric class tonight where students read a Karlyn Kohrs Campbell article since her passing. It hit me in the gut pretty strongly.

Check this out! 👀

This is tomorrow! Join us to chat civil discourse in the classroom, which is, ahem, more important than ever.

Mundane rumination amidst the horrors: At this stage in my career, I cannot believe that I used to be the kind of person who left my email open all day. Now, in order to accomplish anything, I check my email at 9am, 1pm, and 5pm, respond then, and leave it closed the rest of the day.

I wrote about Trump's executive orders on beautiful architecture in the Southern Communication Journal back in 2023. They're back with a vengeance: this time with added detention and AI. www.washingtonpost.com/entertainmen...

I had a lovely time celebrating the kickoff of my university's centennial celebration. As part of the celebration, we got a bobblehead of our university's president. This is me on the record saying no matter what else I achieve in my life, please don't ever ever turn me into a bobblehead.

Hi all! I'm speaking at a webinar on how to use Braver Angels style debates in your classes. We'll talk assignments, rubrics, FAQs. 1/31 on Zoom. If you're interested in building more civil dialogue in your courses, this is for you!

Hey #TeamRhetoric! What are your favorite journal articles/book chapters on memes? Looking for stuff for a grad audience, but this will probably be their first rhetoric class ever!

Remember that time I got called for jury duty four days after my previous summons? Sometimes I hate living in DC.

Now, to prep to teach my first ever graduate course. A course in visual and verbal rhetoric, no less. Feeling over whelmed with all of the amazing things I want to teach these designers.

Grades. Filed. Semester. Donezo.

If service takes up 90% of your time, in part b/c male colleagues won’t do it (but someone must) yet doesn’t “count” for anything, what do we expect? Women are still living in the crappy 20th c academy men had built, some of us never even make full for these reasons

I got my first 'can I see the syllabus for your spring course' email today. (This syllabus does not yet exist, obviously.) I think that means we as #TeamRhetoric must do a collective shot.

Welcome to BlueSky, @carpresearch.bsky.social! Give the lab a follow for more on character assassination, political communication, and rhetoric!

#NCA2024 ers! Let's unionize! (Not really like all of us. Although I'm down if you are.) But come talk about academic labor union organizing on Friday at 2:30pm in a roundtable on unions and comm scholarship. Maurepas 3rd floor Sheraton.

For those who will be at NCA bright and early, Jarrod Atchison, Mike Lee, and I and others will be discussing civic debating on college campuses on Thursday at (barf) 8am in the Regent Rm (4th flr Marriott). Come talk with us about civility, debate, and intellectual inquiry.

It's super fun to log on and have a whole bunch of new followers! Welcome, #TeamRhetoric!