Highlights from Past Doctoral Seminars

 View current seminar information here

2011 Summer Doctoral Seminar at Wayne State University
June 12 - 15, 2011 in Detroit, Michigan with distinguished guest scholar Dr. John Louis Lucaites

"VISUAL RHETORIC AND PUBLIC CULTURE"

Studies in visual rhetoric have rapidly expanded into a significant portion of rhetorical, critical, and cultural studies. The critique of visual texts - films, photographs, tattoos, bodies - has become a new focus for rhetorical analysis. This seminar examined various forms and theories of visual rhetoric in the context of public culture, ideology, and civic participation. How does "seeing" reflect and promote rhetorical practice and systems? How do images and iconic photographs teach ways to "see" and "be seen" as citizens in our liberal-democratic public culture? How do we negotiate power through performance of display, observation, and vision?

John Louis Lucaites is the Professor of Rhetoric and Public Culture in the Department of Communication and Culture and Adjunct Professor of American Studies, Cultural Studies, and the Hutton Honors College at Indiana University. His books include No Caption Needed: Iconic Photographs, Liberal Democracy and Public Culture, a study co-authored with Robert Hariman of Northwestern University, and Crafting Equality, co-authored by Celeste Michelle Condit of the University of Georgia. He has authored over forty journal articles and book chapters and, along with Robert Hariman, he hosts the blog www.nocaptionneeded.com, which has achieved an international audience with nearly 2,000 viewers each day. He has been awarded NCA's Marie Hochmuth Nichols Award, the Winans-Wichelns Award, and the Diamond Anniversary Book Award. He has also won NCA's Golden Anniversary Monograph Award three separate times. He is also the recipient of the AEJMC Tau Kappa Alpha, Frank Luther Mott Research Award for the best book on journalism and mass communication. For more information on Dr. Lucaites visit his university home page.

 

2010 Summer Doctoral Seminar

June 9 - 13, 2010 in Detroit, Michigan with distinguished guest scholar Dr. Lee Wilkins.

"THINKING DANGEROUSLY: TEACHING, RESEARCH AND PUBLIC SCHOLARSHIP
ABOUT COMMUNICATION, DISASTER AND RISK"

People need to communicate when a disaster strikes, whether it’s a hurricane, an airline crash, or an oil spill. Families talk to families, officials talk to voters and to each other, experts talk to citizens, and the media talk to everyone. But what affects how those needs are met — how do officials and publics know what they need, and how do the media know whether they are leading or misleading? This seminar offers an intensive look at how practice informs theory — and how theory helps build better practice — in a communication field of immense public, scholarly, and professional concern.

Lillian C. (Lee) Wilkins (PhD, University of Oregon, 1982) is a professor at the University of Missouri School of Journalism, with a joint appointment in the Harry S. Truman School of Public Affairs. She is author or co-author of a number of books on science, risk, and disaster communication as well as scholarly and practice-oriented volumes on media ethics — a field in which she also edits a leading journal, the Journal of Mass Media Ethics. Dr. Wilkins is a consultant for federal and nongovernmental agencies on risk communication issues and developed a series of workshops for journalists on covering disasters and terrorism. A former newspaper reporter and editor herself, she is frequently interviewed on risk communication and ethics issues by regional and national news media outlets. She also coordinates the “Preparing Future Faculty” program for the Missouri graduate school.

 

2009 Summer Doctoral Seminar
June 10 - 13, 2009 with renowned guest scholar Dr. Amy Villarejo

"QUEER MEDIA CULTURE"

Twenty-five years have passed since critic B. Ruby Rich designated a set of exciting and edgy films as "the new queer cinema."   Tom Kalin's Swoon,  Jennie Livingston's Paris is Burning, Todd Haynes' Poison, and other films of the early 1990s challenged the political and aesthetic rules of the filmmaking game, and provoked new forms of narrative and new image-repertoires for queer culture.  In the interval, we have seen the growth of multi-channel platforms and new media, and the corporatization and dispersion of public media spheres.  How do we confront the world of Logo, The L Word, and Project Runway alongside transnational independent productions such as Nina's Heavenly Delights or Out in India?  What modes of analysis are appropriate to changing social conditions of media practice?  This seminar pursued these broad questions through readings and screenings devoted to this quarter century of queer media culture. 

Dr. Amy Villarejo, Cornell University, led the 2009 Summer Doctoral Seminar.  Villarejo has a joint appointment in the Feminist, Gender, & Sexuality Studies Program and the Department of Theatre, Film & Dance (of which she is currently chair) at Cornell.  She is author of Lesbian Rule:  Cultural Criticism and the Value of Desire (Duke University Press, 2003), which won the prestigious Katherine Singer Kovacs Award for Best Book from the Society for Cinema and Media Studies in 2005.  She is author, co-author, or co-editor of a number of other books, from Queen Christina (with Marcia Landy, BFI, 1995) to Keyframes (with Matthew Tinkcom, Routledge, 2001), and Film Studies: The Basics (Routledge, 2007).  At present, she is completing a book on queer television entitled Ethereal Queer for Duke University Press.  Her books and essays address documentary cinema, social activist art, digital media, queer and feminist theory, experimental form, and the critique of globalization.

2009 Seminar Participants

Front row: Katie Brewer Ball (New York University), Chris Gullen (Wayne State), Debbie James Smith (Wayne State), Kareem Khubchandani (Northwestern), Amy Barber (University of Wisconsin-Madison), Elizabeth Venell (Emory University), Jimmy Draper (University of Michigan-Ann Arbor), Andy Scahill (University of Texas-Austin), Jane Fader (Wayne State).
Back Row: Damon Young (University of California-Berkeley), John Wolf (Syrracuse University), Erika Thomas (Wayne State), Laura Dixon (University of Texas-Austin), Patrick Santoro (Southern Illinois University-Carbondale), Amy Villarejo (visiting scholar, Cornell University), Jim Cherney (Wayne State), Kiana Green (University of Southern California), Julia HImberg (University of Southern California), Joe Paszek (Wayne State), Hollis Griffin (Northwestern University).

Student-produced Video Promo

 

2008 Summer Doctoral Seminar
May 28 - June 1, 2008

Engaged Communication Research
Dr. Larry Frey, University of Colorado-Boulder, led the 2008 Summer Doctoral Seminar on Engaged Communication Research.  Frey holds research interests in group interaction, applied communication (communication and social justice, communication and community studies, and health communication), and communication research methods (quantitative and qualitative).  His research seeks to understand how participation (especially by those who are under-resourced and marginalized) in collective communicative practices makes a difference in people's individual, relational, and collective lives.  He is the author/editor of 14 books, 3 special journal issues, and more than 60 published book chapters and journal articles.  His is the recipient of 12 scholarship awards, including the 2000 Gerald M. Phillips Award for Distinguished Applied Communication Scholarship from the National Communication Association (NCA); the 2004, 2003, and 2000 Ernest Bormann Research Award from NCA's Group Communication Division for, respectively, his edited texts, Group Communication in Context: Studies of Bona Fide Groups (2nd ed.), New Directions in Group Communication, and The Handbook of Group Communication Theory and Research.  Most recently he edited the Handbook  of Applied Communication Research.

Seminar participants took part in an exciting tour of Detroit that focused on community activism and social change projects. A podcast featuring some reflections from the tour, as well as thoughts on the seminar as a whole is available for listening.

2007 Summer Doctoral Seminar
May 14 - 18, 2007

"Intergroup Communication: Its Ubiquity and Dynamics"
  with Professor Howard Giles

The Department of Communication at Wayne State University held their second annual Summer Doctoral Seminar in May 2007.  This year's seminar leader was Howard Giles (Ph.D.) from the University of California-Santa Barbara, who is one of the most prolific and accomplished communication researchers in the World.  Dr. Giles designed the Summer Doctoral Seminar around his new theories on inter-group communication (see Harwood & Giles (Eds.) (2005), "Intergroup Communication: Multiple Perspectives") as a way to expose this year's seminar participants to new and innovative ideas in the field.  This year's seminar participants were competitively selected and came from a variety of Ph.D. programs across the USA, incuding Rutgers, Cornell, University of Nebraska, University of Missouri, and, of course, Wayne State.  The Summer Doctoral Seminar was designed not only to expose the Ph.D. students to new ideas in the field of communication but also to allow them to develoop professional friendships and working relationships that can be of benefit for the life of their career.  Thus, in addition to a rigorous four-day schedule of in-class meetings, participants were also able to socialize outside of the seminar through planned activities to become familiar with each other and to experience the vast array of cultural and social events that define the Wayne State and metro Detroit experience. 

2006 Summer Doctoral Seminar
May 17 - 21, 2006

From May 17 to May 21, 2006, a group of scholars from across the U.S. gathered in Detroit to commence the inaugural Wayne State University Doctoral Summer Seminar on Digital Media Policy. The scholars, with backgrounds in several different disciplines, including American Studies, Communication, and Journalism among others, brought their unique experiences with media policy and generated shared knowledge and understanding of the impact of the “new” media on current U.S. and worldwide media regulatory policies under the guidance of Dr. Thomas McCain and Dr. Robert Avery, two distinguished communication scholars known for their solid research and academic backgrounds. From the conference, a new understanding and definition of the public interest was found, and many talking points were generated as paramount to the continued growth and success of the Information Age. It is the hope of the members of this seminar that their ideas be considered and shared and expanded.


*Members pictured above from left, back row:  Janet Kwami (Oregon), Tariq Elseewi (Texas), Neil Butt (WSU), Anup Kumar (Iowa), Dr. Robert Avery (Utah),  Dr. Thom McCain (Ohio State), Chris McKinley (Arizona), John Wirth (Minnesota), Allison Perlman (Texas), John Arnold (WSU).  front row: Jessica McCabe (WSU), Anna Maria Flores (WSU), Mikaela Marlow (UC - Santa Barbara), Inkyu Kang (Wisconsin)* Not pictured: Nick Bowman (Michigan State University), Serena Carpenter (Michigan State University), Eun-a Park (Pennsylvania State University)

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Power Point Presentations created by Professor Thom McCain.
1.  Communication Infrastructures
2.  Perspectives for Understanding Communication Media and the Public Interest
3.  Communication and the Future
4.  Teaching Our Way to a New Way of Thinking
5.  Media Literacy