EDUCATION  |  EXPERIENCE  |  PUBLICATIONS  |  PRESENTATIONS  |  COURSES 

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EDUCATION

• Ph.D., Rhetoric, 1996, Carnegie Mellon University
• M.A., English, 1989, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
• A.B., English, 1983, Davidson College

PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE

• Professor, Department of English, University of Massachusetts Amherst (2012-present); also Director of Undergraduate Studies (2018-2023)
• Associate Professor, Department of English, University of Massachusetts Amherst (2006-2012); also Director of the University Writing Program (2007-2011)
• Associate Professor, Department of English, University of Wisconsin-Madison (2004-2006); also Director of Freshman Composition (English 100) (2004-2006)
• Assistant Professor, Department of English, University of Wisconsin-Madison (1998-2004); also Director of Intermediate Composition (English 201) (2001-2004)
• Assistant Professor, Department of English, New Mexico State University (1996-1998)
• Instructor, Departments of English (1991-1996) and Design (1993-1996) and the CMAP Summer Program (1992-1995), Carnegie Mellon University
• Instructor, Department of English, Laredo Community College, TX (1989-1991)

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SELECTED PUBLICATIONS

Books

• From Form to Meaning: Freshman Composition and the Long Sixties, 1957-1974. Pittsburgh, PA: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2011. Winner of the 2012 Outstanding Book Award from the Conference on College Composition and Communication. Winner of the 2011 Mina P. Shaughnessy Prize from the Modern Language Association. Reviews by S. E. Vie, Choice (November 2011); Lucie Moussu, English Studies in Canada, 38.2 (June 2012): 210-215; Lisa Mastrangelo and Wendy Sharer, College English, 75.1 (September 2012): 95-106; Jacob Babb, Composition Studies, 40.2 (Fall 2012): 145-148; Dana Nichols, Academe, 99.1 (January-February 2013): 47-48; Chris Warnick, Teaching English in the Two-Year College, 41.2 (December 2013): 192-193; John Scenters-Zapico, College Composition and Communication, 66.2 (December 2014): 351-367. Interview by Annette Vee, Enculturation (February 12, 2012). For chapter 1, click here.
• City of Rhetoric: Revitalizing the Public Sphere in Metropolitan America.  Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 2008. Reviews by Joan Farber McAlister, Rhetoric Society Quarterly, 39.3 (June 2009): 303-306; Richard Marback, Rhetoric Review, 28.4 (October 2009): 433-436; Jordynn Jack, College English, 72.2 (November 2009): 188-198; Samuel C. Shaw, Rhetoric & Public Affairs, 12.4 (Winter 2009): 668-670; David Coogan, JAC, 29.4 (2009): 843-848; Jenny Edbauer Rice, Quarterly Journal of Speech, 96.1 (February 2010): 103-106; Ron Davidson, Aether, 8.A (September 2011): 89-91. For chapter 1, click here.

Articles, Chapters, & Essays (see also my ScholarWorks, ResearchGate, Google Scholar, and Orcid sites)

• “How Anne Frank Became a Writer: Revelations from the ‘Tales and Events’ Notebook.” Reading Research Quarterly, 60.1 e563 (2025): 1-19.
• “A Role for the Progymnasmata in English Education Today.” Les progymnasmata en pratique, de l’Antiquité à nos jours, eds. Pierre Chiron and Benoît Sans (Paris: Éditions Rue d’Ulm, Presses de l’École normale supérieure [ENS], 2020). 381-400.
• “Fear of Persuasion in the English Language Arts.” College English, 81.6 (July, 2019): 508-541. Winner of the 2019 Richard C. Ohmann Award of the National Council of Teachers of English. Interview here.
• “Quintilian: The Perfect Orator.” Encyclopedia of Communication Ethics. Ed. Ronald C. Arnett, Annette M. Holba, and Susan Mancino. Bern: Peter Lang, 2018. 397-401.
• “Afterword.” The Memoir of Ednah Shepard Thomas by Ednah Shepard Thomas. Ed. David Stock. Perspectives on Writing. Fort Collins and Boulder, CO: The WAC Clearinghouse and University Press of Colorado, 2017. 485-494. Available here.
• “Quintilian, Progymnasmata, and Rhetorical Education Today.” Advances in the History of Rhetoric, 19.2 (2016): 124-141.
• “Rhetoric and Argumentation.”  A Guide to Composition Pedagogies, 2nd ed.  Eds. Gary Tate, Amy Rupiper Taggart, Kurt Schick, and Brooke Hessler.  New York: Oxford University Press, 2014.  248-265.
• “March 1865: The End of Elegance.” Rhetoric Review, 32.4 (2013): 375-396.
• “The Lost Meadows of Northampton.”  The Massachusetts Review, 54.1 (2013): 115-144.
• “Finding a Place for School in Rhetoric’s Public Turn.”  Rhetoric and Social Change: The Public Work of Scholars and Students.  Ed. David Coogan and John Ackerman.  Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 2010.  211-228.
• “Rhetoric Revival or Process Revolution? Revisiting the Emergence of Composition-Rhetoric as a Discipline.”  Renewing Rhetoric’s Relation to Composition: Essays in Honor of Theresa Jarnagin Enos.  Ed. Shane Borrowman, Stuart C. Brown, and Thomas P. Miller.  New York: Routledge, 2009.  25-52.
• “Becoming Rhetorical: An Education in the Topics.”  The Realms of Rhetoric: Inquiries into the Prospects for Rhetoric Education.  Ed. Deepika Bahri & Joseph Petraglia.  Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 2003.  93-116.
• “The Very Idea of a Progymnasmata.”  Rhetoric Review, 22.2 (2003): 105-120.
• “Subjects of the Inner City: Writing the People of Cabrini-Green.” Towards a Rhetoric of Everyday Life: New Directions in Research on Writing, Text, and Discourse.  Ed. Martin Nystrand and John Duffy.  Madison, WI: University of Wisconsin Press, 2003.  207-244.
• “The Streets of Thurii: Discourse, Democracy, and Design in the Classical Polis.”  Rhetoric Society Quarterly, 32.3 (Summer, 2002): 5-32.
• “The End of Composition-Rhetoric.”  Visions and Revisions: Continuity and Change in Rhetoric and Composition.  Ed. James D. Williams.  Carbondale, IL: Southern Illinois University Press, 2002.  109-129.
• “Rhetoric as a Course of Study.”  College English 61.2 (November, 1998): 169-191.
• “Design Talk: Constructing the Object in Studio Conversations.” Design Issues 14.2 (Summer, 1998): 41-62.
• “The Space of Argumentation: Urban Design, Civic Discourse, and the Dream of the Good City.”  Argumentation 12.2 (May, 1998): 147-166.  (Reprinted in Readings on Argumentation.  Eds. Angela J. Aguayo and Timothy R. Steffensmeier.  State College, PA: Strata Press, 2008.)
• “Epistemologies of Style.”  Issues in Writing 8.2 (Spring, 1997): 134-157.
• “Learning to Link Artifact and Value: The Arguments of Student Designers.” Language and Learning Across the Disciplines 2.1 (April, 1997): 58-84.
• “Can Pictures Be Arguments?”  Argumentation and Advocacy 33.1 (Summer, 1996): 11-22.
• “Professional-Client Discourse in Design: Variation in Accounts of Social Roles and Material Artifacts by Designers and their Clients.”  Text 16.2 (April, 1996): 133-160.
• “The Search for an Integrational Account of Language: Roy Harris and Conversation Analysis.”  Language Sciences 17.1 (January, 1995): 73-98.  (Reprinted as “Is Ethnomethodological Conversation Analysis an ‘Integrational’ Account of Language?” in Linguistics Inside Out: Roy Harris and His Critics.  Ed. George Wolf and Nigel Love.  Amsterdam: John Benjamins, 1997.  182-207.)
• “Collaborative Argument Across the Visual/Verbal Interface.”  Technical Communication Quarterly 2.1 (Winter, 1993): 37-49.  (Co-authored with David Kaufer, Mark Werner, and Ann Sinsheimer-Weeks.)

Book Reviews

• Review of The Two Cultures of English: Literature, Composition, and the Moment of Rhetoric by Jason Maxwell (Fordham UP, 2019). ALH Online Review, 22 (2020): 1-4.
• Review of Lincoln’s Last Speech: Reconstruction and the Crisis of Reunion by Louis P. Masur (Oxford UP, 2015). Presidential Studies Quarterly, 46.2 (2016): 491-492.
• Review of The Genuine Teachers of This Art: Rhetorical Education in Antiquity by Jeffrey Walker (U of South Carolina P, 2011). Rhetoric Review, 31.4 (2012): 479-483.
• Review of Local Histories: Reading the Archives of Composition, eds., Patricia Donahue and Gretchen Flesher Moon (U of Pittsburgh P, 2007) and Beyond the Archives: Research as a Lived Process, eds., Gesa E. Kirsch and Liz Rohan (Southern Illinois UP, 2008). Rhetoric Review, 29.1 (2010): 96-101.
• Review of Sizing Up Rhetoric, eds., David Zarefsky and Elizabeth Benacka (Waveland P, 2008). Rhetoric Review, 28.1 (2009): 94-99.
• Review of The Viability of the Rhetorical Tradition, eds., Richard Graff, Arthur E. Walzer, and Janet M. Atwill (State U of New York P, 2005). Rhetoric Review, 25.4 (2006): 445-459.
• Review of Rhetorical Education in America, eds., Cheryl Glenn, Margaret M. Lyday, and Wendy B. Sharer (U of Alabama P, 2004). Rhetoric Review, 25.2 (2006): 215-220.

Textbooks

• Other Words: A Writer’s Reader.  Dubuque, IA: Kendall Hunt Publishing Co., 2009. (Read Table of Contents and Introduction.)

Dissertation

• The Rhetoric of Design: Argument, Story, Picture, and Talk in a Student Design Project. Pittsburgh, PA: Carnegie Mellon University, 1996.

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PAPERS PRESENTED

• “Fear of Persuasion: What We’re Not Teaching.” Invited address to Northeast Media Literacy Conference (online, January 13, 2023).
• “Back to the ‘Q Question’: A Defense of Quintilian’s Moral Project for Rhetoric.” International Society for the History of Rhetoric (New Orleans, LA, July 25, 2019).
• “Argumentation in Political and Academic Contexts: What Disciplinary Traditions and Contemporary Research Tell Us.” Invited address to University of Rochester Writing, Speaking, and Argument Program (Rochester, NY, October 19, 2018).
• “Fear of Persuasion in the English Language Arts.” University of Massachusetts English Department Faculty Colloquium (Amherst, September 18, 2018).
• “A Role for the Progymnasmata in English Language Arts Education Today.“ Les progymnasmata en pratique, de l’Antiquité à nos jours (Université Paris-Est Créteil, January 19, 2018).
• “Writing in the Unbundled University.” Conference on College Composition and Communication (Houston, TX, April 8, 2016)
• “Senior Year Writing: The Third Tier of College Composition.” Conference on College Composition and Communication (Tampa, FL, March 19, 2015).
• “The Academic Revolution: How ‘English’ Became Specialized Literary Research at UW-Madison.” Rhetoric Society of America (San Antonio, TX, May 26. 2014).
• “American Baccalaureate: The Story of the Bachelor’s Degree in U.S. Higher Education.”  Invited address to the English Department, University of Tennessee, Knoxville (Knoxville, TN, September 18, 2013).
• “The Claims of the Personal and Civic in 21^st Century Academic Discourse: A Defense of ‘General Writing.’”  Invited address to the English Department, University of Illinois at Chicago (Chicago, IL, April 26, 2013).
• “Whither Goeth the American Baccalaureate? Writing, ‘Gen Ed,’ and the Major After the Great Recession.”  Invited address to the English Department, University of Pittsburgh (Pittsburgh, PA, November 13, 2012).
• “Writing and Learning in College: What We Know from Research, What Works in Classrooms and on Campus.” Keynote address for Faculty Development Day, Mount Saint Mary College (Newburgh, NY, January 19, 2012); also Keynote address for Academic Development Day, Stonehill College (Easton, MA, October 12, 2010)
• “The Writing Bubble: What Will We Teach When It Bursts?” Western States Rhetoric and Literacy Conference (Las Cruces, NM, October 22, 2010).
• “Local History and the WPA: Tending the Past while Forging the Future.”  Conference on College Composition and Communication (Louisville, KY, March 20, 2010).
• “Beyond Rubrics: Dynamic Criteria Mapping at UMass Amherst and Beyond.”  Re-envisioning Assessment Conference (Southbridge, MA, November 1, 2008).
• “March, 1865: The Limits of Symmetry.”  University of Massachusetts English Department Faculty Colloquium (Amherst, October 21, 2008).
• “A Fourth Genre of Classical Greek Rhetoric?”  Rhetoric Society of America (Seattle, May 24, 2008).
• “The Powers and Perils of Liminality: Freshman Comp at UW-Madison, 1967-1970.”  Conference on College Composition and Communication (New York, March 24, 2007).
• “Facing ’Chaos and Old Night’: The 1969 Abolition of Freshman English at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.”  With Rasha Diab and Mira Shimabukuro.  Rhetoric and Composition Colloquium of the UW-Madison English Department (Madison, WI, April 14, 2006).
• “An Apology for the First-Year Writing Course Taught by English Department GTAs,” in panel Alternative Models for Writing Programs: A Critical Conversation,” Modern Language Association (Washington, DC, December 28, 2005).
• “An Incomplete Recovery: The Absence of the Progymnasmata in 20th Century Revivals of Rhetoric,” International Society for the History of Rhetoric (Los Angeles, July 13, 2005).
• “Reductions of the Already Reduced: The Neglect of Qualifiers, Rebuttals, and Backing in Appropriations of the ‘Toulmin Model’ in Contemporary Composition Pedagogy” (co-authored by Melvin Hall), Ontario Society for the Study of Argumentation (Hamilton, ON, May 21, 2005).
• “Putting On Our Janus Faces: Why Addressing the Public Need Not Mean Denigrating the Academic,” Conference on College Composition and Communication (San Francisco, March 18, 2005).
• “Agency By Lot: Towards an Alternative Model of Politics for Civic Education,” UW-Madison Center for the Humanities (Madison, February 4, 2005).
• “Helping Student Arguers Represent Opposing Positions Fairly: A Rogerian Perspective,” UW-Madison Teaching and Learning Symposium (Madison, May 18, 2004).
• “A Century of Change: The Politics of First Year Composition at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1900-2000,” Conference on College Composition and Communication (San Antonio, March 26, 2004).
• “Quintilian as Rhetor,” International Society for the History of Rhetoric (Calahorra, Spain, July 17, 2003).
• “A Proposal for Place-Based Cultural and Political Theory, Or, Why We Need to Adjust the Socio-Spatial Dialectic Once Again,” Rhetoric and Composition Colloquium (Madison, January 31, 2003).
• “The Streets of Thurii: Rhetoric, Democracy, and Design in the Classical Polis,” Rhetoric Society of America (Las Vegas, May 23, 2002).
• “Residents, Owners, Citizens: The Writers of 1230 North Burling St.,” Conference on College Composition and Communication (Chicago, March 21, 2002).
• “The Matter of Argumentation: Using the Material Topics to Teach Writing,” Conference on College Composition and Communication (Chicago, March 23, 2002).
• “Writing as Civic Deliberation: Lessons from the Jury Project,” Writing as a Human Activity Interdisciplinary Conference, The Writing Program and the Gevirtz Graduate School of Education, University of California, Santa Barbara (Santa Barbara, October 6,2001).
• “The Writing Space of the Inner City: The Case of the Cabrini-Green Public Housing Project,” Conference on College Composition and Communication (Denver, March 16, 2001).
• “City of Rhetoric: Discourse, Democracy, and Design in the Redevelopment of an Urban Neighborhood,” invited lecture sponsored by the Center for the Study of Public Scholarship, the Department of African-American Studies, and the Postcolonial Studies Group, Emory University (Atlanta, March 5, 2001).
• “Analyzing Arguments through the Material Topics,” Third International Workshop on Argumentative Text Processing (Verona, Italy, September 6, 2000).
• “Classical Models for the Teaching of Writing,” European Association for Research on Learning and Instructions, Special Interest Group on Writing (Verona, Italy, September 7, 2000).
• “Between Community and Society: The City as Scene of Rhetorical Education,” American Society for the History of Rhetoric (Chicago, November 3, 1999).
• “The Student as Juror: An Alternative Approach to the Teaching of Public Writing,” Western States Composition Conference (Tempe, AZ, October 23, 1999).
• “The Rupture of Expertise: Professionalism and the Humanities at Century’s End,” Rhetoric and Composition Colloquium of the UW-Madison English Department (Madison, WI, September 17, 1999).
• “Classical Rhetorical Education: Lessons from a Neglected Part of the Tradition,” Conference on College Composition and Communication (Atlanta, March 26, 1999).
• “Rhetoric and the City: A Proposal to Recontextualize ‘Civic’ Discourse,” Conference on College Composition and Communication (Chicago, April 3, 1998).
• “The Space of Argumentation: Rhetoric and Urban Design,” Ontario Society for the Study of Argumentation (St. Catharines, ON, May 15, 1997).
• “Orders of Time in the Writing of a ‘Lay’ History: Dorothy Spruill Redford’s Somerset Homecoming,” Modern Language Association (Chicago, December 27, 1995).
• “Rhetorical Practices in University Public Relations: An Observational Study,” Carnegie Mellon University Rhetoric Colloquium (Pittsburgh, October 12, 1995).
• “Making Academic News: An Observational Study of Rhetorical Practice and Media Choice in University Public Relations” (co-authored by Jolene Galegher), Conference on College Composition and Communication (Washington, DC, March 24, 1995).
• “A Rhetoric of the Visual: Some Considerations for Research and Theory,” Penn State Conference on Rhetoric and Composition (State College, PA, July 15, 1994).
• “The Interaction of the Visual and Verbal Arts at Chartres: Revisiting a Rhetorical ‘Complex,'” Rhetoric Society of America (Norfolk, May 21, 1994).
• “Representing Rhetoric: Word, Image, Building, and Ritual in a 12th Century Architectural – Oratorical Complex,” Group for Research into the Institutionalization and Professionalization of Knowledge-Production (Minneapolis, April 15, 1994).
• “Moving from Representation to Action: Critical Moments in the Early Stages of a Graphic Design Project,” Conference on College Composition and Communication (Nashville, March 19, 1994).
• “The Interaction of Visual and Verbal Rhetoric in a Twelfth-Century ‘Text’: An Analysis of the Sculptural Program on the West Façade of Chartres Cathedral,” Carnegie Mellon University Rhetoric Colloquium (Pittsburgh, October 14, 1993).
• “Patterns of Coordination and Communication Among PR Professionals” (co-authored by and presented with Jolene Galegher), Penn State Conference on Rhetoric and Composition (State College, PA, July 9, 1993).
• “Design as Social Negotiation: Situating Visual Artifacts in Contexts of Use,” Penn State Conference on Rhetoric and Composition (State College, PA, July 8, 1993).
• “Talking About Drugs: Argumentative Logic in Schools and Communities,” Conference on College Composition and Communication (San Diego, April 1, 1993).
• “Civic Writing,” Texas Joint Council of Teachers of English (Corpus Christi, TX, October, 1990).

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COURSES TAUGHT

Graduate

• History of Higher Education in the United States (English 891EW), University of Massachusetts Amherst, 2021
• Writing in Colleges and Universities: Histories of Composition-Rhetoric in the U.S. (English 891PC), University of Massachusetts Amherst, 2012, 2014, 2019
• Introduction to Rhetorical Theory (English 891TT), University of Massachusetts Amherst, 2007, 2009, 2010, 2012, 2014, 2016, 2023
• Rhetorics of Place, Space, and Geography (English 891RP), University of Massachusetts Amherst, 2015
• Rhetorics of the Public Sphere (English 891BC), University of Massachusetts Amherst, 2008, 2010
• Theory and Practice of Written Argumentation (English 900), University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1999
• Introduction to Composition Studies (English 700), University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1999, 2001, 2003
• Research Methods in Composition and Rhetoric (English 703), University of Wisconsin-Madison, 2005
• History of Rhetoric, I (English 704), University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1998, 2000, 2004
• History of Rhetoric, II (English 705), University of Wisconsin-Madison, 2003
• Writing Program Administration in the 21st Century (English 706), University of Wisconsin-Madison, 2006
• The Virtues of Writing: Value and Evaluation in Composition Studies (English 706), University of Wisconsin-Madison, 2002
• Rhetoric of Science (English 555), New Mexico State University, 1998
• Argumentation: Theories, Practices, and Pedagogies (English 549), New Mexico State University, 1997
• Proseminar for New Ph.D. Students (English 610), New Mexico State University, 1997
• Rhetorical Invention (English 547), New Mexico State University, 1997
• Writing in the Workplace (English 512), New Mexico State University, 1997
• Modern Rhetorical Theory (English 519), New Mexico State University, 1996
• Internship in Tech. & Professional Communication (English 597), New Mexico State University, 1996, 1998
• Rhetoric in Social Interaction (English 771), Carnegie Mellon University, 1995

Undergraduate

• Writing, Identity, and English Studies (English 494EI), University of Massachusetts Amherst, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2019, 2022, 2023, 2024, 2025
• Advanced Expository Writing: Family & Community History (English 450), University of Massachusetts Amherst, 2024
• Advanced Expository Writing: The Long Essay (English 450), University of Massachusetts Amherst, 2020
• Rhetoric, Writing, and Society (English 388), University of Massachusetts Amherst, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2023, 2024, 2025
• Expository Writing (English 350), University of Massachusetts Amherst, 2011, 2012, 2013
• College Writing (Englwrit 112), University of Massachusetts Amherst, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2017
• College in Three Dimensions: Space, Time, & Purpose (FFYS 191Eng15), University of Massachusetts Amherst, 2024
• A Semester in the Life: Writing Your Way Into College (FFYS 197ENGL9), University of Massachusetts Amherst, 2017, 2019
• Orange is the New Black: A Semester in the Life (FFYS 197CR4), University of Massachusetts Amherst, 2014
• Rhetorical Analysis of Nonfiction Prose (English 550), University of Wisconsin-Madison, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2004
• Writing and Reasoning: The Jury Project (English 236), University of Wisconsin-Madison, 2000, 2001, 2004
• Intermediate Composition (English 201), University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1998, 1999
• Advanced Composition (English 311), New Mexico State University, 1998
• Advanced Technical & Professional Communication (English 318), New Mexico State University, 1996-1997
• Argumentation: Theory & Practice (English 374), Carnegie Mellon University, 1995
• Language in Design (English 373), Carnegie Mellon University, 1993-1996
• Communication Planning & Design: Seminar/Studio (English 498/Design 462), Carnegie Mellon University, 1993
• Summer Seminar in English: Argument (CMAP), Carnegie Mellon University, 1992-1995
• Strategies for Writing: Argument (English 100), Carnegie Mellon University, 1991
• The American Novel, 1865-present (English 322 Honors), Laredo Community College, 1991
• Survey of World Literature, I (English 371), Laredo Community College, 1990
• Introduction to Literature (English 322), Laredo Community College, 1989-1991
• Fundamentals of Grammar and Composition (English 312, 313, & 602), Laredo Community College, 1989-1991
• Composition and Rhetoric (English 321), Laredo Community College, 1989-1991

For full CV (PDF), click here.

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