Arts and Humanities Commons^™

Teaching About Teaching: A Philosophy Of Critical Literacy Through Phenomenological Ethics And Rhetorical Practices, Corina Lerma

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

This thesis presents a phenomenological approach to developing an alternative teaching curriculum for a first-year writing course anchored in rhetorical practices, but reflecting upon my experiences and understandings of phenomenological ethics and philosophy, which I believe can help envision the classroom differently and provides relevant theories to help develop more ethically aware rhetorical practices for first-year composition students. A phenomenological ethical approach that is grounded in experience, embraces ambiguity as an access point, and makes a call to responsibility and problematizes the ideas associated decontextualized and prescriptive teaching practices in higher education foregrounds the ethical implications and responsibilities we hold …

Rhetorical Conversations: Race, Class, And Gender In The Works Of Jacqueline Jones Royster And Shirley Wilson Logan, Tanya Robertson

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

This project is an examination of Jacqueline Jones Royster and Shirley Wilson Logan as knowledge-makers in the field of rhetoric and composition. There is a large gap in research on the contemporary African American women scholars who act as knowledge makers of rhetorical theory and rhetorical pedagogy. There is circularity in the notion that as Royster and Logan examine the history of the fieldâ??African American rhetorical practices, feministic rhetorical practices, English language studies and literacy, and classroom practicesâ??they are, themselves, having an impact on the field.

Implementing Mindfulness-Based Interventions In The First-Year Composition Classroom As An Embodied Multimodality, Patricia Flores Hutson

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

AbstractMindfulness is rapidly increasing its popularity amongst instructors and administrators in higher education (Bush, 2011; Egras, 2015; Egras and Hadars, 2019; Wenger, 2019). The simplicity of mindfulness makes it an inclusive practice that can be performed by every individual. Further, it is time and cost effective as it only requires a couple of minutes of class time. Studies focusing on implementing mindfulness specifically in writing and composition classes are scarce (Wenger, 2019; Consilio & Kennedy, 2019). This dissertation hopes to add to the growing research of mindfulness in higher education, specifically in writing classes, by exploring the ways in which …

Smartphones As The Tools For South Asian International Students To Navigate Academic And Non-Academic Sites In The U.S., Suresh Lohani

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

My dissertation is invested in investigating how south Asian students from a Hispanic serving institution situated on a U.S. Mexico border use smartphone technologies to enhance their navigation of everyday sites in the U.S. This would primarily look at how South Asian international students from Nepal, India, Bangladesh, and Bhutan make use of smartphones to navigate different physical and virtual spaces, both academic and non-academic, to grapple with various complexities of their U.S. lives. The dissertation examines their user experiences and localization practices as they strive to acclimate to the U.S. setting, which to them is both physically and culturally …

Centering Silence: Graduate Student Instructors Negotiating Quiet In The Writing Classroom, Natalie Elise Taylor

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

This IRB-approved project is a feminist qualitative study in which I seek to understand graduate student instructors' past and present, student and teacher, experiences with classroom silence. This research builds on the work of Mary Reda (Between Speaking and Silence), who, in interviewing quiet students about their reasons for being silent, sought to disrupt the overwhelmingly negative stories about classroom silence and quiet students that circulate amongst instructors. By having conversations with graduate student instructors about their relationship to student silence and their own silences, I further Reda's disruption. I am also influenced by Cheryl Glenn's positioning of silence as …

Reference Management Software In The Classroom: Student Awareness, Knowledge, And Usage, Javier Cortez

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

This research project examines the University of Texas at El Paso undergraduate students' general awareness, knowledge, and usage of reference management software (RMS). Moreover, an important aim of the project is to compare incoming and first-year college students (freshmen and sophomores) relationship to RMS against upper-level undergraduates (juniors and seniors). The project consisted of three phases, with a lecture on RMS and a pre-and post-lecture survey bookending the project. The principal investigator recruited 150 students from two different courses within the Rhetoric and Writing Studies program at UTEP. Six classes were surveyed: four sections of RWS 1301 and two sections …

Digital Literacy Readiness Of First-Year Composition Students, Stephen Jantuah Boakye

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

This is an inquiry into the digital literacy readiness of students of First-Year Composition (FYC). Using mixed methods, an online survey and interviews, the study maps out the digital literacy skills of FYC students and accounts for the people and places that contributed to the students' acquisition of those skills. As theoretical frameworks, the study used Eshet-Alkalai's (2002) digital literacy framework to account for the spectrum of students' functional digital literacy skills; Brandt's (1998) literacy sponsorship to scrutinize the persons who contributed to studentâ??s learning; and Hawisher and Selfe's (2004) technological gateways to make sense of the places that student …

Constructing Meaning Through Textual And Visual Elements In The First-Year Composition Classroom, Sebastian Ezequiel Martinez

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Inspired by methods of meaning-making in comic books, this thesis answers the question of how First-Year Composition students make meaning out of textual and visual elements to understand the concepts of authorship and composition. The thesis begins with considering definitions of textual and visual elements in the context of how they are used as learning materials when paired together or when sharing characteristics. Following these definitions is a collection of scholarly examples about how visual elements have been used by students as rhetorical objects to aid in their understanding of course concepts. Teacher research was the chosen methodology for this …

Rethinking Metaphor In The Rhetoric Of Alzheimer's Disease, Evelyn Saru Jimmy

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

This dissertation examines the metaphors that early onset Alzheimer's blog authors use to make meaning of their experiences living with Alzheimer's disease (AD). To complicate the study, I also compare whether early onset Alzheimer's blog authors use the same metaphors with those who serve as caregiver to late-stage AD patients. This research project is situated within the overlap fields of Disability Studies (Dolmage, 2006; Lewiecki-Welson, 2003; Yergeau, 2014; Kerschbaum, 2014), Rhetoric of Health and Medicine (Segal, 1997: Price, 2011; Molloy, 2015) Rhetoric of Mental Health (Chrisman, 2008; Uttapha, 2017, Reynold, 2008), and Technical Communication (Meloncon, 2014). Following the principles of …

Zapatista Maya Literacies And Decolonial Civic Pedagogies, Juan Moisés García-Rentería

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Zapatista Maya Literacies and Decolonial Civic Pedagogies evaluates an educational outreach project led by an Indigenous grass roots mobilization in the high plateau of central México, the Zapatista movement. Using retrospective narrative inquiry and theoretically informed perspectives, this dissertation shows that the program of the Zapatista escuelita, Spanish for “little school,” is rooted in the Maya educational paradigm of nojptesel-p’ijubtasel, a cultural and political process of socialization at the heart of contemporary Maya peasant families. The research focus of this study offers rhetoric, composition, and literacy studies two interrelated points of insight tied to the overall Maya conception of the …

Rewriting The Graduate Experience: A Study Of The Writing Experiences Of University Of Texas At El Paso Graduate Students Across Disciplines, Jennifer L. Wilhite

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Graduate writing can manifest as a barrier to successful and timely degree completion as writing is the primary modality in which graduate programs use to evaluate depth of learning and quality of knowledge created. Native language status, inexperience with advanced academic genres, time away from the academy, and socialization struggles are factors that can aggravate writing challenges. The purpose of this qualitative study is to better understand the graduate writing experiences of twelve women returning to the academy. The study asks if writing manifests as a barrier to completing their graduate programs, ascertains what kinds of graduate-level writing supports they …

The Rhetorical Relationship Between 911 Call Takers And 911 Callers In Police Emergency Response Operations, Nadia Hamilton Morales

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

In this project, I interrogated the rhetorical relationship between 911 Call Takers and 911 callers in Garland, Texas in order to evalulate the quality of 911 emergency information transfer and its impact on 911 event final outcomes. I compiled a three-part data set that included transcriptions of 27 911 call audio recordings, 27 Computer Aided Dispatch Event Chronology Reports, and 27 Police/Incident Reports. My data set was specific to the following 911 event classifications: Disturbance/Weapon in Progress, Disturbance/Weapon Involved, Shooting, and Stabbing. My data sample came from 911 calls under these classifications made during the month of August 2020. Through …

Writing Inside And Outside The Rhetoric Of Containment: An Analysis Of Writing Strategies In First Semester Students Transitioning To The First Year College Composition Classroom, Brenda R. Gallardo

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Based on Bowden’s (1993) notion of containment, this study analyzes how containment—as well as other pedagogical restrictions and limitations—was manifested in the high-school-to-college transition of first year student writers. This study addresses the following questions of inquiry: How do participants’ experiences in high school affect them as writers in college?; What practices and strategies do students in the first year composition classroom apply to overcome containment in the college writing classroom?; and, How can instructors use pedagogy to overcome containment? This dissertation applies a qualitative design to gather data via interviews, questionnaires, and classroom observations. Via grounded theory, data gathered …

Motivation And The Young Writer: Reimagining John Dewey's Theory Of Experience, Billy Cryer

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Issues of motivation remain a perennial topic among teachers of English Language Arts and first-year college composition courses. While modern evidence-based research in educational psychology has yielded fruitful avenues for harnessing motivation in writing instruction, in recent decades, industrious composition scholars have also turned to history for insights on composition pedagogy. In this study, I also embark on a historical excavation to glean from our composition forebears regarding motivation in writing instruction. In particular, I examine how the educational writings of John Dewey were translated into the English classroom during the Progressive Era. More specifically, I seek to recover how …

The Role Of Translation In Multilingual User Experience, Tetyana Zhyvotovska

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Examining the intersections of technical communication, user experience, and translation, this study focused on the contexts of a user experience (UX) research center as a site where these intersections occurred and on practices of multilingual users while encountering translated information. In order to explore translation practices in relation to UX and cover the gap in understanding multilingual UX, the study examined how multilingual users worked with translated content, how they acted and reacted to it, and what they experienced during this process. Based on the existing scholarship in translation and usability studies in technical communication, this Dissertation undertook empirical research …

The Rhetorical Mediator: Understanding Agency In Indigenous Translation And Interpretation Through Indigenous Approaches To Ux, Nora Karina Rivera

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

In 2018, I became involved in a collaborative community-based project to co-organize an event with the purpose of collecting resources to help in the professionalization efforts of Indigenous translators and interpreters. Drawing on Indigenous and decolonial theories, this interdisciplinary study examines the work done during this event through a user experience (UX) research lens that analyzes the various ways in which Technical and Professional Communication (TPC) and Translation and Interpreting Studies (TIS) can better support Indigenous language practices. The colonization of the Americas brought a layer of issues that continue to affect the way in which Indigenous communities conduct their …

Graduate School Application Accessibility For International Students, Estefania Castillo

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

The graduate school application is a time consuming, yet important, process that can often be complicated for students. However, this process is made even more complicated for international students who often face extra steps and other obstacles when applying to graduate programs in the US. Following my own experience of applying to a master's program as an international student, I set out to further explore how international students experienced and navigated this process. This research project explored the graduate school application process through the experiences of international students that were shared in testimonios through platicas, or open and friendly conversations. …

Ingo Websites, Image Circulation, And Visual Representations Of Development In African Countries: Exploring Local Perceptions, Ruby Pappoe

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

This project critically examines the visual and digital representations of African countries on Savethechildren.org, Oxfam.org, Mamahope.org, and Waterislife.com, using Ethnographic Content Analysis (ECA), Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA), and focus group interviews. Grounded in interdisciplinary conversations within rhetoric and composition, intercultural technical communication, postcolonial studies, and development studies, this project reveals how inequalities of the past continue to exist in both visual and digital forms on international NGO websites. It shows that although these organizations seek to promote development and social change in low- and middle-income communities in Africa, the online content they use not only engender but keep in constant …

Understanding The Digital Lives Of Transnational Students: A Case Study, Chowaing Chagra Belekeh

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

The proliferation and the fast-paced evolution of digital information communication technologies (ICTs) in contemporary times have arguably raised concern for us to comprehend what we do with these technologies and what these technologies do for us. The experience of engaging these technologies may not necessarily be the same for everyone—especially students who come from around the world to attain post-graduate degrees in the United States. This research focused on understanding the digital lives, choices, and experiences of transnational students who navigate and negotiate geopolitical borders and boundaries (physical)– in their quest for education. Using a case study analysis and collecting …

An Autoethnography Of A Non-Traditional Student Veteran A Journey Of Transition To The Present, Ruben Paquian

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

There is a lack of research on career military student veterans in higher education. I use a layered-account autoethnographic approach (Adams et al., 2011) to recount my experience as a career military student veteran. Having spent 30-years in uniform, I felt that my perspectives could help both student veterans and career military student veterans traverse through the world of higher education while providing staff and faculty a better understanding of how career military veterans see the world. In general, veterans have difficulty trying to keep their military identity separate from their student identity. Military identities are more engrained in veterans …

Virtual Agency: A Hermeneutic Examination Of The Network And Actors Within The Composition Classroom, Ronald Dean Straight

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

This Dissertation explores the visible and invisible rhetorical choices made in, around, and through the composition classroom and its community of practice, students, faculty, technologies, staff, and other undiscovered actors, through Actor Network Theory and Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis. The discoveries will better situate the impact of identities and actancy within composed, hybrid worlds. Students, society, the world is now collectively connected and able to communicate, acquire knowledge, and interact on a virtual world stage. The exigence for this dissertation's exploration is that Moore, et al. (2016) concluded that students did not make a connection between the technology they have access …

Towards A New Cholx Consciousness: The Visual Rhetorics Of Cholx Artistas As A Method For Social Justice Movements, Elvira Carrizal-Dukes

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

My dissertation study examines the Cholx subculture through the artwork of Chola artistas Paola Rascón and Vicko Alvarez Vega. Growing up, I interacted easily with Cholos and Cholas, but I also knew that in society there was an overall negative idea of Cholos and Cholas. My research advances Cholx consciousness as a method for social movements through the examination of the visual and written rhetorics by Chola artistas. For my dissertation study, I have drawn on theoretical frameworks from Chicana Feminism, Latino Critical Theory, and Social Justice Rhetorics as discussed by Dolores Delgado Bernal, Kendall Leon, Tara Yosso, Daniel Solórzano, …

The Rhetoric Of Low Carbon Energy Technology Scientists And Engineers, Nicolas Cesar Hernandez

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Scholars in the burgeoning field of Energy Communication have successfully contributed to communication studies and environmental communication practice. However, energy communication scholars have largely focused on energy of media coverage, corporate communication and decision making in the context crisis. While rich and informative, this tendency has left quotidian aspects of energy communication rather understudied. As such, this Thesis contributes to the understanding of the internal, non-untechnical rhetoric of low carbon energy technology (LCET) scientists and engineers (herein LCET professionals). Textual analysis was used to examine LCET professionals' internal rhetoric at professional trade conferences and through long form, semi-structured interviews. Wind …

The Representation And Shaping Of The Hispanic Identity And The Assignment Of Power In Three Types Of Hsi-Related Discourse: Hea Amendments, Utep President Diana Natalicio Convocation Speeches, Academic Articles, Julie Ann Rivera

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

This Dissertation examines the impact of Hispanic-Serving Institution (HSI) related written discourse on the representation and shaping of the Hispanic identity and the assignment of power. Performing a critical discourse analysis of three types of written HSI-related discourse: amendments to the Higher Education Act (HEA), academic articles, and UTEP President Diana Natalicio convocation speeches, I look below the surface of the discourse to draw out implications for Hispanic students and HSIs. My analysis merges Norman Fairclough's method of Critical Discourse Analysis, known for its focus on the relationship between language and society, with Lloyd Bitzer's The Rhetorical Situation, which will …

The Negative Impact Of Copy-Pasting Within Memoranda: A Rhetorical Analysis Of The Army's Sharp Program Memoranda, Lionell Manlutac

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

This research used the framework of the coding system of grounded theory to analyze the United States Army's Sexual Harassment and Assault Response and Prevention (SHARP) Program memoranda. A rhetorical analysis framework was used to point out the need to incorporate social justice into technical communication. The analysis of the copy-pasted information shows that the author lacks an authorial voice and writing to a general audience, which creates a lack of exigency in creating a safe and healthy work environment.

Unveiling Veiled Voices: Understanding The Experiences Of Muslim Women Who Wear The Hijab In Public Spaces, Mohammed Sakip Iddrisu

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

In view of the invisibility of Arab(ic)-Islamic rhetorics and the dominance of scholarship on Christian rhetorical traditions in rhetorical studies alongside an increased visibility of public rhetorics about Islamic women in American politics, this research explores the experiences and performances of veiled Muslim women in public spaces. While much of rhetorical scholarship on public spheres focuses on public talk or the circulation of public texts, in this study, I, together with six veiled Muslim women in El Paso, Texas, explore how veiled Muslim women navigate the hijab's visibility as a marker of difference with strangers-simultaneously performing and provoking performative public …

Clashes In The Contact Zone: Student, Faculty, And Administrative Resistance To Intersectional Pedagogies In The Writing Classroom, Gina Marie Lawrence

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

This Dissertation is a study of rhetoric and composition instructors around the country who use intersectional pedagogy as a way to introduce students to issues of class, race, sexuality, and gender in order to work toward a more just society. Instructors using this approach often encounter resistance from students and administrators, and this project will help instructors respond to this resistance in thoughtful, rather than reactionary, ways.

Community College Writing Program Administrators: Implementing Change Through Advocacy, Lizbett Tinoco

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

This Dissertation, Community College WPAs: Implementing Change Through Advocacy, examines the work and role of Writing Program Administrators (WPAs) at community colleges. Defining the role and the work of WPAs is very complex, and even more so at community colleges since these institutions are very diverse places in regards to programmatic structure and student population. The scholarship of writing program administration has typically excluded community colleges; as a result, my research focuses on including these narratives. Unlike a lot of WPA narratives that often describe WPAs as "composition wives" (Schuster, 1991; Hesse, 1999) who do much of the dirty work …

Rethinking Multimodality In First-Year Composition: Applying Theories Of Digital Rhetoric, Procedural Rhetoric, And Electracy To Multimodal Assignments, Jennifer Falcon

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

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Literacies Of The Disaster Zone: New Media Genres And Participatory Rhetorics After The 2010 Gulf Of Mexico Oil Spill, R. J. Lambert

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

On April 20, 2010, explosions at the British Petroleum (BP) Macondo Project in the Gulf of Mexico initiated what would become the world's largest accidental release of oil into the ocean. This ecological disaster, a unique combination of natural and human causes, is one of many significant traumas over approximately the last two decades that various stakeholders have documented, participated in, and responded to largely through the expanding and increasingly ubiquitous media of the internet, computers, cell phones, and other networked communicative technologies, which both enable and constrain the variety of responses to traumatic events.

This Dissertation improves our understanding …