My academic interests include the impact in all levels of relationships of the combination of problems: fear of speaking up and biased or filtered listening; the perpetuation of negative stereotypes and social mythologies; consistent reports of misunderstanding and unmet needs; the habitual use of silence, awkwardness and anger within loving, caring and intimate relationships; incomplete explanations for disrespectful or violent behavior, etc. Given this, I am interested in communication skill building, particularly realistic approaches to improving speaking and listening behavior in order to achieve interpersonal and social needs satisfaction.
I am also interested in the effect of emotional reaction on topic/conversation development, and the effect of information on emotional reaction...and topic development.
Consultant in the following areas:
Basic to advanced speaking and listening skills.
Addressing gossip (positive and negative perspectives)
Gender Issues in the Workplace.
Effective speaking and listening skill building in teams and small to large organizations.
Realistic managing of interpersonal problems in the workplace.
Creating constructive conversation climates
I received the 2000-2001 John Elliot Allen Outstanding Teaching Award Recipient from the Communication Studies Program! Portland State University's annual College of Liberal Arts and Sciences (CLAS) Outstanding Teaching Awards promote and reward outstanding teaching in CLAS. The John Elliot Allen Outstanding Teaching Awards are named after Professor John Eliot Allen who founded the geology program at PSU in the 1950's. His enthusiasm and expertise in the classroom excited students during his 40 plus years of activity on the PSU campus. Outstanding Teacher recipients are awarded $500 and a plaque presented at an annual June ceremony. Very cool!
SP 317U Communicating Violence and Children Syllabus
Course Description: Examination of theory and practice for the improvement of communication with children (primarily grades K-6), regarding issues of child abuse (emotional, physical, sexual, and domestic violence). Professional and interpersonal contexts are addressed. Multiple communication issues in relationship to children and violence include: cultural values and beliefs, stereotypes, media representations, language use, nonverbal communication, power, control and conflict.
Sp 410 Communicating Feminism
After feminist-bashing, I'm not a feminist, but ..... may be the most frequently stated message about feminism in this culture. In this course, we want to understand the motivations for speakers to state this and similar types of disclaimers, impression management and message qualifiers when speaking feminism.
I'm a feminist and ..... is perhaps the least frequently stated message about feminism in this culture. In this course, we also want to understand the motivations for speakers to state this and similar types of meta-messages, framing, and message qualifiers when speaking feminism. The endings of each of these sentence- starts are often the same message, for example:
I'm not a feminist, but I think women need to be earning the same as men for the same work.
I'm a feminist and I think women need to be earning the same as men for the same work.
Compare these to
I think women need to be earning the same as men for the same work.
Women need to be earning the same as men for the same work.
Communicating Feminism is a study of messages within a context. The four statements above illustrate that the meaning of a message goes beyond the specific message content. Messages are always situated within a context, usually more than one. It is the message context which provides the basis for meaning, that is, message construction, delivery, reception, interpretation, evaluation, acceptance, rejection, influence and power. In a social science course, we would study feminism within socio-political-psychological-etc. contexts. In a communication course, we study the exchange of ideas within those contexts. In a communication course, we use formal to informal rhetorical criticism to study message construction, message delivery and reception, emotional impact on topic development, speaking up, silencing (others and oneself), listening abilities, listening biases, etc.
The primary learning objectives in this course are for you to:
Communicate feminism and communicate about feminism
Understand the complexities of communicating feminism in private to public message contexts
Examine the advocacy and cooperative nature of feminism and feminist messages
Examine the adversarial nature of feminism and anti-feminism messages
Examine the advocacy or sustain support of sexism and sexist messages. For example, we will not argue the existence of women's oppression, but rather examine the motivations of speakers of messages containing arguments which attempt to prove it is over now ; that sexism is not a problem any longer; etc.
Expand your pre-message construction skills when it comes to considering your ideas about feminism
Develop and/or improve your articulation skills of feminism and feminist messages
Identify feminist-talk which is personally and politically interesting
Develop and/or improve your observation skills during and after interactions with others
SP 410 Communication in Virtual Teams
Motivation, knowledge and skills are standard elements of the competent group communicator. In this course, you will examine the manner and quality of these competency elements within virtual teams and groups. L ocal to global, private to public and academic to business organizations use teleconferencing, instant messaging, collaborative writing tools and other synchronistic and asynchronistic systems to make decisions, conduct business, promote team building, etc. in virtual groups and teams.
Course Learning Objectives:
1. Develop your understanding and proficiency in discussion of:
the communication perspective of virtual teams and groups
the growing interest and excitement regarding the practical uses of virtual teaming
the concerns that the technological capabilities have jumped ahead of our communicative abilities to competently use them within the virtual team environment.
2. Participation Skills- develop and/or improve your communication skills to:
complete the tasks associated with functioning as a competent study contributor
complete the tasks associated with working as a virtual team member
