Last summer I took an amazing trip to the Penn State University Archives, as well as to the Drexel University Legacy Center, to find records of Dr. Helen Octavia Dickens, the first Black woman certified in Gynecology in the United States. Thanks to the fantastic archivists I worked with, boxes of materials were waiting for…
The Rhetoric Society of America Conference took place in Denver this past May. It was truly a pleasure to see friends old and new and hear about fantastic ongoing projects. Below, amazing “old friends” I’ve known since graduate school (Jenell Johnson, Christa Olson, and Amy Wan). It’s so strange how none of us have aged…
A subset of the Chemical Rhetoric Group has been working on a project that has required lots of coding. Fortunately, we are all up for finding ways to make that process fun with a nod to St. Patty’s Day and a killer data management system (as you can see below). We should have used shades…
This week, members of our Rhetoric of Science graduate seminar had the fantastic opportunity to visit the Marriott Library’s Special Collections. Original Cataloger for Special Collections, Allie McCormack (pictured below in the front of the class), prepared an engaging and illuminating presentation about archival search engines, theory, and analysis, and she let us page through…
I’m so pleased to announce that Gia Almuaili has joined us here this fall as a Ph.D. student in the Department of Communication and that she has already gotten involved with Chemical Rhetoric Group projects. Gia, who is originally from Kuwait, received both her bachelors and her masters degrees in Strategic Communication from the University…
Our team’s newest publication is hot off the presses at Management Communication Quarterly. Please read the full article at: Cullinan, M. E., Maison, K., Parks, M. M., Krall, M. A., Krebs, E., Mann, B., & Jensen, R. E. (2022). “Seedlings in the Corporate Forest: Communicating Benevolent Sexism in Dow’s First Internal Affirmative-Action Campaign.” Management Communication…
Several weeks ago, Madison entered a Zoom room with her Ph.D. Committee Members and, about two hours later, she left the room having earned a Doctorate of Philosophy (aka, a Ph.D.). She defended her dissertation research beautifully, and her excellent committee members (featured below) offered her amazing feedback and a double dose of CONGRATULATIONS because…
The great thing about Zoom meetings is that you sometimes get a glimpse into the lives and furry companions of those on the other side of the screen. At our last CRG meeting, these adorable fluff balls contributed to the meeting by walking over and perching on the keyboards of Chemical Rhetoric Group members, making…
At the National Communication Association Conference in November, Madison Krall was elected to the position of ARSTM Secretary. ARSTM stands for the Association for the Rhetoric of Science, Technology, and Medicine, and I am very excited that Madison will be taking on a leadership role in this vibrant and growing group of scholars.
Starting in January, Melissa will begin her new position on faculty in the Department of Communication at Drexel University, where she will teach classes and do research focused on non-profit communication. This allows her to draw from her extensive background in environmental, health, and intercultural communication, as well as her experience working with the Peace…
The 2021 National Communication Association Conference was held in November in Seattle and members of the Chemical Rhetoric Group were there and busy. Dr. Megan Cullinan did a wonderful job presenting an analysis our group has been working on with artifacts we garnered from the Science History Institute’s Othmer Library of Chemical History Archives.
In a new publication headed by Madison Krall, the Chemical Rhetoric Group analyzes the contents of the Science History Institute’s extensive Witco Stamp Collection, which features postage stamps from around the globe that represent chemistry and related sciences from 1910-1938 (see below for some great digitized examples of collection artifacts). You can find an online-first…
Earlier this week, we gathered as many of our group as we could and had a meeting for the first time since March of 2020 (one of us was on Zoom from the east coast, one of us was driving to the meeting on Zoom and arrived in the middle for the physical meeting, and…
My new article, “Theorizing Chemical Rhetoric: Toward an Articulation of Chemistry as a Public Vocabulary,” has been published in the Journal of Communication! I learned so much in the process of writing this piece and am hoping that it proves useful for others who are interested in how chemistry and its concepts circulate and are…
At the end of April, we had a Chemical Rhetoric Group soiree, via Zoom. As you might imagine, the whole thing was very exclusive and very, very fancy in that it included science-themed party favors and a viewing of a new NOVA “Beyond the Elements” episode wherein we learned about some of the differences between…
The journal Science Communication recently published our article “Strategic Place-Making and Public Scientific Outreach in the American Chemical Society’s National Historic Chemical Landmarks Program.” More than any other piece we’ve written as a group, I think this one had us working together as an interconnected unit the most. It involved traveling to (and finding!) multiple,…
Utah always provides opportunities for fun and a break from research in the wintertime, even during a pandemic!
Last week, members of the Chemical Rhetoric Group met via Zoom to do some coding and celebrate the elements. Of course we dressed up. Below you will see (clockwise): -Me as boron: element number 5 (usually gray-ish in color, this metalloid produces bright green flames when set on fire). -Megan Cullinan as mercury: element number…
Last week, the Chemical Rhetoric Group convened via Zoom for a very exciting hat party to celebrate some great successes we’ve had recently. We used this opportunity to show off our most fabulous hats, share science-oriented puns, and–as you can see in this photo–put some very cute cats in hats. Stay tuned for the theme…
The Chemical Rhetoric group was incredibly honored this year to receive the Association for the Rhetoric of Science, Technology, and Medicine‘s Article of the Year Award for our article, “Mapping Nature’s Scientist: The posthumous demarcation of Rosalind Franklin’s Crystallographic Data.” Check out this beautiful plaque! Many thanks to ARSTM for the organization’s support.
On September 10, 2020, I was honored to give the keynote address for Rosalind Franklin University of Medicine and Science’s 5th Annual Women in Science and Healthcare (WiSH) Symposium. This was especially exciting in this particular year because the symposium was celebrating what would have been crystallographer Rosalind Franklin’s 100th birthday, and Rosalind Franklin’s niece,…
This fall, Dr. Melissa Parks began her tenure as a post-doctoral fellow at the University of California, Santa Barbara’s Humanities and Social Change Center. There she is working with an interdisciplinary team of scholars to explore issues of social change related to the environment, science, technology, and the broader culture. You can find out more…
At the beginning of the year, I learned that I had been awarded a 2020-2021 National Endowment for the Humanities Faculty Fellowship. I am so excited to have the support of the NEH as I work on my next book project. For more information about the project and the award, see the College of Humanities…
These past months have been strange and scary in so many ways. At least I have an awesome mask to wear made by the amazing Suchitra Shenoy Parker!
Right before everything shut down for the COVID-19 pandemic, the Chemical Rhetoric Group spent a wild day on-campus working through research projects. We planned, wrote, brainstormed, ordered lunch, and then wrote some more. You know, all of your typical Spring Break shenanigans.
We had a grand showing at this year’s NCA! Melissa Parks received the Benson-Campbell Dissertation Research Award from the Public Address Division, and our research team presented three competitively selected papers–two of which were highlighted on top paper panels (ARSTM and the American Studies Division).
We are excited that our article, “Medicalization’s Communicative Infrastructure: Seventy Years of ‘Brain Chemistry’ in the New York Times” is now published in the journal Health Communication and available here. In this piece, we trace the rhetorical strategies used across time and diagnoses to situate social conditions within the medical domain. This was a project…
Our article, “Mapping Nature’s Scientist: The Posthumous Demarcation of Rosalind Franklin’s Crystallographic Data,” is available here from the Quarterly Journal of Speech. We began the research for this piece at our 2017 Writing Retreat in Park City, UT, and it is so much fun to see it published after lots of hard work. We hope…
In mid-May I hopped a plane to Boston and made my way to Cambridge, MA to spend a week searching for archival documents concerning chemistry, women’s history, and reproductive health (not necessarily in that order).
Registration was popping, as was the audience that gathered to hear the panel on which Ben spoke. We are excited to use the feedback we received for revisions! While in D.C., Ben visited the National Museum of American History to check out some of their science-oriented collections.
We had a great day-long writing retreat over finals week this semester. The new Gardner Building on campus, which overlooks the mountains and the football stadium, was a great place to work on our projects.
The Department of Communication at the University of Utah gathered last week to celebrate some of our accomplishments and have some flashy fun!
https://www.natcom.org/nca-inside-out/5-questions-withrobin-jensen
Right before heading into the spring semester, we braved the cold to spend one day at the downtown Salt Lake City library and one day at the Marmalade branch of the city library. It was great changing up our surroundings a bit and, of course, working on our research projects.
Last Friday night, Melissa Parks, Madison Krall, and Emily Krebs took over one of our lecture halls to analyze documents. From all accounts, they absolutely lit the place up with their on-point analysis and witty repartee, not to mention their array of post-its, highlighters, and La Croix. Way to teach us all how to live-it-up…
My current and former students are amazing! At the 2018 National Communication Association Conference in Salt Lake City, they earned a mind-boggling number of top paper recognitions. Melissa L. Carrion, my former PhD student and now an assistant professor at Georgia Southern University, won the Association for the Rhetoric of Science, Technology, and Medicine’s Article…
Scenes from our 2018 Park City Writing Retreat! Benjamin Mann, Melissa Parks, Kourtney Maison, Madison Krall, Emily Krebs and I spend these last few days analyzing primary sources, brainstorming, writing, re-writing, and accomplishing a ton of research goals. We also laughed, ate, and tried to figure out how to turn the malfunctioning fire alarm off…
On September 26, 2018, I spoke in Denver, CO on a National Communication Association-sponsored public panel concerning science communication. Other (amazing!) panelists included Leah Ceccarelli, Celeste Condit, Lisa Keranen, John Lynch, and J. Blake Scott. See the complete program here.
The Museum inside the Science History Institute is open to the public and offers a fantastic overview of chemical history in a beautiful space.
Earlier this year, I won a travel grant to visit the Othmer Library of Chemical History at Philadelphia’s Science History Institute. This allowed me to spend the last week in June combing through the library’s tremendous archives and exploring Old Town Philly. This is me taking up residence in the Othmer Library. The archives are…
The first is called Waiting for Babies, and you can listen here! Host Steven Mavros asks great, informed questions, and was such a pleasure to talk with. The second is called Beat Infertility, and you can listen here! Host Heather Huhman has one of the best radio voices I’ve ever heard, and her podcast was…
Melissa Parks and I attended a Riverdance 20th Anniversary Tour performance last weekend. We plan to integrate what we learned into our research on chemical rhetoric. These dancers are not kidding around. If you look very closely, you will actually see Melissa and I dancing in the cast below. There we are . . .…
Madison kept smiling under a pile of articles. We caught Ben deep in concentration.Melissa displays one of our manuscript plans on poster board.At this point, we probably needed a break!Kourtney and Robin celebrate an “as seen on TV” prize–the Futzuki–while Madison tries to keep working.Kourtney making use of one of our “as seen on TV”…
At the beginning of this week, the Chemical Rhetoric Group met in Park City to work on two different group projects. We went through a huge amount of primary data and enjoyed our time in the orange-and-yellow-colored mountains. More photos to come! Madison and Ben sort, organize, and code. We flowed our progress. And we…
Last week I headed to the University of Cincinnati for the 2017 Rhetoric of Health and Medicine Symposium. I had the pleasure of finally meeting the amazing Lisa Meloncon (pictured above); who has overseen the symposium since its start in 2013; catching up with my friend and extremely smart former advisee Melissa Carrion (also pictured above);…
Kourtney Maison, Ben Mann, Melissa Parks, and I brainstormed and strategized about moving forward with several different projects. Who says summer isn’t a great time to talk research turkey?!?
