Courses taught:

Undergraduate Courses

American Media and Social Institutions–a general education survey of media course that introduces students to key areas in the field of mass communication, including print and broadcasting history, issues of free expression, media law, and journalism ethics.

Principles of Health Communication (developed course)–a seminar in which students learn the history of health communication and its theories, the role of interpersonal communication, ethics, and diversity issues in health care, as well as evaluating public health campaigns and intended and unintended health messages.

Mass Communication and Society–An upper-level seminar addressing the interplay among media, context and society.

Children and Media (developed course)–Media messages profoundly shape children’s perceptions, attitudes, and behaviors. In this conceptual course, students explore media products created for and by children, examining the many ways that graphic novels, music, social media, videos, and other forms of media influence the way that kids see the world.  Topics include the history of the child consumer, children’s marketing, ethics in children’s media, constructions of gender, race, ability, and other positions of intersectionality, role-playing, identity, and video games, and other salient topics in this area.

Gender, Crime, and Media (developed course)–This course addresses origin and history of “rape myths” and crime-related legislation as contextually-situated, gender disparities in the “cultivation of fear,” sex trafficking, intimate partner violence, and other topics, as constructed in media messages about crime, criminals, victimization, and the prison system, positioned across the inequality of various social intersections.  Students reflect on their own crime awareness, attitudes, and experiences, explore other students’ perceptions of campus safety, and analyze crime reporting and entertainment media.  This course is taught through a Feminist lens, focused on engagement, experience and critical discussion.

Television, Culture, & History (developed course)–This course examines television as a cultural product, communication tool, “mirror on the world,” and as an agent for social change, exploring issues such as censorship, sponsorship, ethics, and the impact of context on content.

Seminar in Media Issues: Media & Disability (developed course)–Students explore fundamental issues about disability and media, tracing the shifting perceptions of people with disabilities through history.  Mainstream and alternative news coverage of disability issues, as well as depictions in entertainment media, will be addressed. Students also discuss advertising and disability, ethical issues, and stigmas of particular disabilities and groups, situated alongside other social intersections of race, gender, sexuality, age, and socio-economic class.

Women in the Media–Students examine how gender has been and continues to be constructed by written, verbal, and visual messages. Through a historical and contemporary look at women in journalism, advertising, film, television, and social media, we discuss the social intersections of race, class, (dis)ability, and gender, addressing salient topics that include women and sports, the victimization of women, gender and health messages, and the working mother in an increasingly global society.

Graduate courses

Qualitative Methods–This foundation course introduces students to qualitative research. Students learn how to apply theory to the research process, developing an understanding of the purpose and mechanics of different types of qualitative research methods.   In the course of the semester, students will critique existing work and conduct their own qualitative research, using the textual methods of narrative, discourse, semiotic, and framing analysis, as well as audience research: focus groups, ethnographic studies, and participant observation.

Healthcare Communication–Students will gain an understanding of the prominent literature in Healthcare Communication through readings, discussion, and analysis of the development of this field, the changing structure and economics of health care, the role of interpersonal communication in healthcare, intended and unintended health messages in news and popular media, disseminating health messages and its challenges with cultural and diversity issues, as well as key ethical concerns in researching Healthcare Communication.

Special Topics: Studies in Television (developed course)–This graduate level course examines television as a cultural product, communication tool, “mirror on the world,” and as an agent for social change, exploring issues such as censorship, sponsorship, ethics, and the impact of context on content. Integral to this course is the role that television has had and continues to have on constructing notions of gender, race, class, and difference.

Seminar in Applied Research–Students work on developing good writing habits as they conduct original research in their areas of interest. Throughout the semester, students will critique each other’s writing in a peer-workshop environment, as they edit and revise their own writing—building to a journal quality research paper presented to the class in a conference-like setting.