Teaching Assistant Professor of Technical Communication
Department of Humanities
New York Institute of Technology
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Science writing/scientific writing
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Accessible pedagogy
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Sustainable writing groups
Scholarly and pedagogical interests
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Rhetorical theory
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Plants and botany
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Posthumanism/alterity
Education
PhD Rhetoric and Composition, 2018
University of South Carolina
Dissertation: Rhetoric and Plants
MA Literature, 2011
Northeastern State University
Teaching Experience
Technical Communication| junior-level | 2024-2025
A practice-based course in which students choose a household item and then compose a Customer Support Manual, including several specific genres of technical writing.
Writing for the Natural Sciences | junior-level | 2023
A practice-based course in which students run an experiment they have helped design, then spend the semester writing an IMRaD-style Lab Report on their findings. I personally developed this course from scratch to suit the stated needs of the College of Science and Engineering at my institution.
Advanced Writing | junior-level | 2020-present
A general writing course for students who are not offered a specialized junior-level writing course, or whose specialized course sections are full. I also adapted this course as a 4-week mini-session.
Writing for the Social Sciences | junior-level | 2022
A specialized writing course for students in the social sciences, including psychology, social work, anthropology, health and human performance, and education.
Composition 2 | freshman-level | 2020-2024
A writing-in-the-disciplines course in which students develop familiarity with academic writing in the humanities, the social sciences, the natural sciences, and the applied fields.
Composition 1 | freshman-level | 2012-present
A rhetoric-based course centered around the academic research paper, in which students choose a topic to pursue throughout a semester-long research project. Though the official titles of the courses change, I've taught versions of this course at the past three institutions I've been a part of.
Writing & Close-Reading | freshman-level | 2009-2019
A course centered around close-reading, with assigned texts ranging from poems to op-eds to excerpts from Foucault's Discipline and Punish. Like the one described above, I've taught a version of this course under more than one official title.
Institutional History
New York Institute of Technology | 2024-present
Teaching Assistant Professor
of Technical Communciation
Non-TT/multi-year renewable
University of Houston - Clear Lake | 2020-2024
Lecturer in STEM Writing
Non-TT/full-time
University of Houston | 2019-2020
Instructor
Adjunct
University of South Carolina | 2012-2018
Instructor
Graduate teacher; adjunct
Northeastern State University | 2009-2012
Instructor
Graduate teacher; adjunct
Publication Projects
In preparation:
Rhetoric and Plants
An investigation of the ways we talk and think about plants in common and, especially, in scientific language. This project is a revision of my dissertation manuscript, and addresses questions of consciousness and sentience (among others) in light of posthumanist understandings of both animality and materiality.
“’Actually satisfied:’ Developing a Scientific Writing Course.”
A pedagogical scholarship piece on the process of developing a scientific writing course that adopts lab-based writing instruction without the benefit of a co-requisite lab.
Forthcoming from Philosophy & Rhetoric:
“The Anthropomorphism Accusation: Plants, Science, and the Rhetoric of 'Human Terms'.”
An analysis of the rhetorical impact that the fear of anthropomorphizing a nonhuman creature has continued to have on the writing and thinking we perform on those nonhuman creatures.
Under advance contract at The Ohio State University Press:
“The Rhetorical Life of Maclura pomifera.” A Rhetorical Arboretum, eds. Joshua Trey Barnett, Jennifer Clary-Lemon, and Madison Jones.
A tracing of the rhetorical life of Maclura pomifera, which raises questions about the relationships between written and oral histories, evolution and cultivation, empiricism and generational wisdom, commodification and care. To tell the story of this tree, this project constructs an intersection of science studies, historiography, bow-making, gardening lore and memoir, ecological rhetoric, and conservation.
Selected Conference Presentations
Teaching Against the Tide: Scientific Writing for the Wary Scientist
RSA 20th Biennial Conference, 2024
The Language of Roots and Pollen: Toward Transformative Theories of Plant Communication (roundtable)
NCA 107th Annual Convention, 2021
Ten Years Non-Tenure: Gradding, Gradjuncting, and Adjuncting Across Three Institutions
SCMLA 78th Annual Conference, 2021
Beyond Peer Review: Setting the Conditions for Writing Groups that Persist
NeMLA 52nd Annual Conference, 2021
Plant Rhetoric
RSA 19th Biennial Conference, 2020
Transforming the Labor of the Dissertation through Director Participation in Writing Groups
CCCC Annual Convention, 2018
’Can they suffer?’: Anaesthetizing Plants through Anthropomorphism
Carolina Rhetoric 10th Annual Conference, 2017
Recent Service Roles & Projects
Convener, College of Human Sciences and Humanities
Organized and ran monthly meetings
Hiring committee for new Lecturer in STEM Writing
Committee member
Writing Program outreach and web presence
Website; updated presentation of the Minor on Professional Writing