Dissertation Projects

Ph.D. Dissertations in English (Rhetoric and Composition)

This is a selected list of the most recent dissertation projects. Additional projects can be found under the English Dissertation section of Scholarworks

2018

Roger Austin

“The Reifying Center Archive Process: Sustainable Writing Center Archive Practice for Praxis, Research, And Continuity” 

Chair—Dr. Lynee Gaillet; Readers: Dr. Mary Hocks and Dr. Elizabeth Lopez

Kristeen E. Cherney

“Autism Literacy: A Rhetorical and Social Inquiry Through Archival Research

Chair—Dr. Lynee Gaillet; Readers: Dr. Ashley J. Holmes and Dr. Mary Hocks

Nathan Wagner

Rhetorical Being: A Metaphysics of Freedom and Essence

Chairs—Dr. Lynee Gaillet and Michael Harker; Reader: Elizabeth Lopez

Yunye Yu

Re-examining the Indirect Myth of Chinese Rhetoric on Social Media

Chair—Dr. Baotong Gu; Readers: Dr. George Pullman and Dr. Elizabeth Lopez

2017

Cristine Busser
“First-Year Writers and ‘Student Success’: A Framework for Supporting Multiple Pathways Through Higher Education”
Chair—Dr. Ashley Holmes; Readers: Dr. Lynee Gaillet and Dr. Michael Harker

Helen Cauley
“Influences of the Scottish Enlightenment in the Sherlock Holmes Stories of Sir Arthur Conan Doyleh Higher Education”
Chair—Dr. Lynee Gaillet; Readers: Dr. Ashley Holmes and Dr. Malinda Snow

Jessica Estep

“Take it to the Streets: Archives, Open Records, and Public Rhetoric”

Chair—Dr. Ashley Holmes; Readers: Dr. Lynee Gaillet and Dr. George Pullman

Donald I. Gammill Jr.
“Situating Polemics of Moral Imperative in Shifting Socio-Cultural Paradigms: Exploring Rhetorical Appeals in Two Baptist Archives.”
Chair—Dr. Lynee Gaillet; Readers: Dr. Michael Harker and Dr. Elizabeth Lopez

Steven Sams
“The Tyranny of Custom: Discovering Innovations in Forensic Rhetoric from Classical Athens to Anglo-Saxon England.”
Chair—Dr. Elizabeth Burmester; Readers: Dr. Edward Christie and Dr. George Pullman

Xiaobo Wang

“Transnational Babel Building: Revising Professional and Technical Communication and Writing Textbooks for World Citizens”

Chair—Dr. Baotong Gu; Readers: Dr. George Pullman and Dr. Ashley Holmes

2016

Ann Marie Francis
“Composition Assignments with Workplace Relevance: An Examination of Technical Communication Coursework and the Reading and Writing Demands of Professional Engineers”
Chair—Dr. Lynee Gaillet; Readers: Dr. Ashley Holmes and Dr. George Pullman

Valerie Robin
“The Value of Scholarly Writing: A Temporal-Material Rhetorical Analysis of Delivery in Google Documents”
Chair—Dr. Mary Hocks; Readers: Dr. Michael Harker and Dr. Ashley Holmes

Lindsey Spring
“Place, Space, and Gender at the State Normal School, Athens, Georgia, 1891-1932: A Narrative of Influences, Identity, and Disruption
Chair—Dr. Lynee Lewis Gaillet; Readers: Dr. Michael Harker and Dr. Ashley Holmes

Laura Williams

“Civic Crowd Funding Under Citizens United: Empowering Counterpublic Activists for a Commoditized Public Sphere”

Chairs: Dr. Mary Hocks and Dr. Ashley Holmes; Reader: Dr. George Pullman

2015

Jennifer Forsthoefel
“Contending with (Inter)Disciplinarity Spaces, Identity, and Specializations: A Disciplinary Critique of the Rhetorical Pasts and Futures for Composition Studies, Writing Center Studies, and Women’s Studies”
Chair—Dr. Beth Burmester; Readers: Dr. Mary Hocks, Dr. Michael Harker

Michelle Golden
“Speaches Seeming Fitt”: Courtesy and Renaissance Rhetoric in Spenser’s Faerie Queene
Chair—Dr. Paul Voss; Readers: Dr. Beth Burmester and Dr. Wayne Erikson

Lauri B. Goodling
“Civic Engagement 2.0: A Blended Pedagogy of Multiliteracies and Activism”
Co-Chairs—Dr. Lynée Gaillet and Dr. Ashley Holmes; Reader: Dr. Elizabeth Lopez

Laura Howard
“In Their Own Words: A Materialist and Archival Look at Contingency in Composition Studies”
Chair: Dr. Mary Hocks; Readers: Dr. Michael Harker and Dr. Baotong Gu

Elizabeth Jamison
“1890-1969—Early History of the Advanced Placement Program: An Argument for Reform of the AP Language & Composition Exam”
Chair: Dr. Lynée Gaillet; Readers: Dr. Mary Hocks and Dr. George Pullman

Anne Melfi
“Understanding Indian Rhetoric on Its Own Terms: Using a Vedic Key to Unlock the Vedic Paradigm”
Chair—Dr. George Pullman; Readers: Dr. Beth Burmester and Dr. Keith Lloyd (Kent State University)

Mary Helen O’Connor
“The Rhetoric of Refugees: Literacy, Narrative and Identity for Somali Women”
Co-Chairs: Dr. Lynee Gaillet and Dr. Michael Harker; Reader: Dr. Elizabeth Lopez

Lara Smith Sitton
“Internships in Writing and English Studies Programs: Opportunities, Locations, and Structures”
Chair—Dr. Lynée Gaillet; Readers: Dr. Ashley Holmes and Dr. Michael Harker

2014

Marcia Bost
“Imagining a Twenty-First Century Strategy”
Chair—Dr. Lynee Gaillet; Readers: Dr. Michael Harker and Dr. George Pullman

Diana Eidson
“Labor, Literacies, and Liberation: A Rhetorical Biography of Stetson Kennedy”
Chair—Dr. Lynée Gaillet; Readers: Dr. Mary Hocks, Dr. Michael Harker; and Dr. James Darsey (Communication)

Orianna Gatta
“Comic Convergence: Toward a Prismatic Rhetoric for Composition Studies”
Chair—Dr. Mary Hocks; Readers: Dr. Michael Harker, Dr. George Pullman, and Dr. Gregory Smith (Communication)

Bradford Hincher
“Social Media and Freedom: Exploring Human Connections”
Chair—Dr. George Pullman; Readers: Dr. Mary Hocks and Dr. Ashley Holmes

Trent Mills
“Using Burke’s Dramatism to Unpack Intractable Conflict: Bush 43 and the Process of Peace in the Middle East”
Chair—Dr. Elizabeth Lopez; Readers: Dr. Michael Harker and Dr. Carol Winkler (Communication)

Laurissa Wolfram-Hvass
“A Rhetoric of Data: How a Technology Company Communicates Research”
Chair—Dr. George Pullman; Readers: Dr. Elizabeth Lopez, Dr. May Hocks, and Dr. Beki Grinter (Georgia Tech)

Jin Zhao
“The Shapes of Cultures: A Case Study of Social Network Sites/Services Design in the U.S. and China”
Chair—Dr. Baotong Gu; Readers: Dr. George Pullman and Dr. Ben Miller

2013

Jeremy Godfrey
“Between Tactics of Hope and Tactics of Power: Liminality, (Re)Invention, and The Atlanta Overlook
Chair—Dr. Elizabeth Lopez; Readers: Dr. Baotung Gu and Dr. Tomasz Tabako (Department of Communication)

Sarah Higinbotham
“The Violence of the Law: Aesthetics of Justice in Early Modern England”
Chair—Dr. Michael Galchinsky; Readers: Dr. Benjamin Miller and Dr. Austin Sarat (Amherst College, William Nelson Cromwell Professor of Jurisprudence and Political Science; Associate Dean of the Faculty)

Mike Keleher
“Mixed Classes, Mixed Pedagogies: A Study of Intercultural Collaborative Learning in a College Developmental Writing Course”
Chair—Dr. Beth Burmester; Readers: Dr. Mary Hocks and Dr. Jennifer Esposito (College of Education)

Chrystal Todd Wright
“Through Her Own Eyes: Environmental Rhetoric in Women’s Autobiographical Frontier Writing”
Chair—Dr. Lynee Gaillet; Readers: Dr. Mary Hocks and Dr. Mary Lamb

2o12

Shae Alexis Anderson
“From the ‘Hood to the Classroom: A Rhetorical Perspective on Teaching Secondary English to the Urban Student”
Chair—Dr. Mary Zeigler; Readers: Dr. Elizbeth Lopez and Dr. Christine Gallant

Juliette Cross Kitchens
“The Postdisciplinarity of Lore: Professional and Pedagogical Development in a Graduate Student Community of Practice”
Chair—Dr. Mary Hocks; Readers: Dr. Beth Burmester, Dr. Martha Singer

James Hammond Shimkus
“Teaching Speculative Fiction in College: A Pedagogy for Making English Studies Relevant”
Chair—Dr. Beth Burmester; Readers: Dr. Mary Hocks, and Dr. Scott Lightsey

Jeanne Law Bohannon
“Here in the To-Day, Forgotten in the To-Morrow:” Re-covering and Re-membering the Feminist Rhetorics of 19-Century Actress and Author Adah Menken”
Chair—Dr. Mary Hocks; Readers: Dr. Lynée Gaillet and Dr. Michael Harker

Estefania Olid-Pena
“The Art of Future Discourse: Rhetoric, Translation, and an Interdisciplinary Pedagogy for Transglobal Literacy”
Chair—Dr. Beth Burmester; Readers: Dr. Lynée Gaillet, and Dr. Annette Cash (Modern and Classical Languages)

Jeannie Parker Beard
“Composing on the Screen: Student Perceptions of Traditional and Multimodal Composition”
Chair—Dr. Mary Hocks; Readers: Dr. Beth Burmester, and Dr. George Pullman

2011

James T. Davis II
“Two New Heuristics in Response to Formulaic Writing: What Lies Beyond Oversimplified Composition Instruction”
Chair—Dr. George Pullman; Readers: Dr. Lynée Gaillet, and Dr. Renée Schatteman

Cara Minardi
“Re-Membering Ancient Women: Hypatia of Alexandria and her Communities”
Chair—Dr. Lynée Gaillet; Readers: Dr. Beth Burmester and Dr. George Pullman

Peter Rorabaugh
“The Sermonic Urge: Postsecular Sermons in Contemporary American Fiction”
Chair—Dr. Chris Kocela; Readers: Dr. Martha Singer, Dr. Randy Malamud, and Dr. Paul Schmidt

Zipora (Tsipi) Wagner
“Secular Understanding and Shattering the Myth of the American Dream: A Chronological Analysis of Changing Attitudes and Depictions of Murder within the Twentieth-Century American Literary Canon”
Chair—Dr. Beth Burmester; Readers: Dr. Matthew Roudané and Dr. Chris Kocela

Victoria E. Willis
“From Orators to Cyborgs: The Evolution of Delivery, Performativity, and Gender”
Chair—Dr. George Pullman; Readers: Dr. Martha Singer, and Dr. Calvin Thomas

2010

Cantice G. Green
“Writing and Wellness, Emotion, and Women: Highlighting the Contemporary Uses of Expressive Writing in the Service of Students”
Chair—Dr. Lynée Gaillet; Readers: Dr. Mary Lamb, and Dr. Nancy Chase

Alice J. Myatt
“Human-Computer Interface Design for Online Tutoring: Visual Rhetoric, Pedagogy, and Writing Center Websites”
Chair—Dr. Mary Hocks; Readers: Dr. Beth Burmester and Dr. George Pullman

Jennifer M. Randall
“Early Medieval Rhetoric: Epideictic Underpinnings in Old English Homilies”
Chair—Dr. George Pullman; Readers: Dr. Eddie Christie, and Dr. Scott Lightsey

2009

Timothy R. Blue
“Mentor-Teaching in the English Classroom”
Chair—Dr. Beth Burmester; Readers: Dr. Nancy Chase, Dr. Jeffrey Berman (Distinguished Professor, SUNY-Albany), and Dr. Martha Singer

Tanya R. Cochran
“Toward a Rhetoric of Scholar-Fandom”
Chair—Dr. Lynée Gaillet; Readers: Dr. Baotung Gu and Dr. Mary Hocks

Letizia Guglielmo
“Feminist Online Writing Courses: Collaboration, Community Action, and Student Engagement”
Chair—Dr. Lynée Gaillet; Readers: Dr. Baotung Gu and Dr. Beth Burmester

Carola Mattord
“Lay Writers and the Politics of Theology in Medieval England from the Twelfth to Fifteenth Centuries”
Chair—Dr. Scott Lightsey; Readers: Dr. Lynée Gaillet and Dr. Malinda Snow

2007

Gordon Alan Harrison
“Communication Strategies as a Basis for Crisis Management Including Use of the Internet as a Delivery Platform”
Chair—Dr. George Pullman; Readers: Dr. Thomas McHaney and Dr. Baotong Gu

Marc Pietrzykowski
“Winning, Losing, and Changing the Rules: The Rhetoric of Poetry Contests and Competition”
Chair—Dr. George Pullman; Readers: Dr. Martha Singer and Dr. Lynée Gaillet

Sheldon Scott Kohn
“The Literary and Intellectual Impact of Mississippi’s Industrial Institute and College, 1884-1920”
Chair—Dr. Thomas McHaney; Readers: Dr. Pearl McHaney and Dr. Beth Burmester

Elizabeth Tasker
“Low Brows and High Profiles: Rhetoric and Gender in the Restoration and Early Eighteenth Century Theater”
Chair—Dr. Lynée Gaillet; Readers: Dr. Beth Burmester and Dr. Tanya Caldwell

2006

Gregory Flail
“The Sexual Politics of Meat Substitutes”
Chair—Dr. George Pullman; Readers: Dr. Murray Brown and Dr. Calvin Thomas

Shannon Warren Wisdom
“Peer Review in the Contemporary Corporation”
Chair—Dr. Lynée Gaillet; Readers: Dr. George Pullman and Dr. Baotong Gu