This fall, University of Kentucky WRD Professor Jenny Rice will be leading the course UKC 381: Argumentation - “Deliberation, Persuasion, and Bullshit in the Public Sphere." While the title of the course may seem provocative, the topic is serious. In the class, students can expect to examine the tactics and strategies used to argue key issues in the public sphere and what the legacy of…

For nearly two decades, the Jewish Studies program has drawn students and faculty from all over UK to teach and learn about Jewish culture, language, history, and beyond. In this podcast, I spoke with up-and-coming Jewish Studies Director, Jan Fernheimer, about what’s in store for Fall 2013, including a visiting scholar from Israel, a film series, and opportunities to connect with communities within and beyond the Commonwealth. 

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Most of us associate mapping with cartography, but that's not always the case. The Committee on Social Theory is presenting a graduate-level course on mapping this semester and Jenny Rice, assistant professor in the Division of Writing, Rhetoric and Digital…

Creative expression and disease aren't two topics that are often juxtaposed, but UKC 310: Art and Epidemics, will explore five diseases from a creative and technical angle: tuberculosis, AIDS, cancer, alcoholism, and the plague - through a variety of creative lenses, including film, short fiction, poetry, and art. Rita Basuray and Katherine Rogers-Carpenter will co-teach the fall 2013 course, looking at the parallels between scientific and creative writing, and where these forms diverge. 

This podcast was…

In May 2013, ten students will go to Costa Rica to do ethnographic writing for English 205: Advanced Composition. Steve Alvarez of WRD is taking the group to the town of Heredia for four weeks. The course meets the graduation requirement for writing, and will include service learning opportunities and plenty of cultural experiences. For more information about taking this class, please contact the instructor. 

This…

The words “hip” and “hipster” carry around a lot of baggage. Often, due to misconceptions, "hipster" is used as an insult meant to suggest some sort of failed or inauthentic attempt at being "hip." But what if that isn’t what “hip” is? What if “hip” isn’t some obsession with the fleeting but a more permanent state?

In the weeks and months leading up to the 2012 election, the University of Kentucky and the College of Arts and Sciences held events to help students become more engaged with the political process. One such event, as detailed in another article, was a collective viewing of the second of three Presidential debates this season.



Presented by the Department of Writing, Rhetoric and Digital Media and organized by…

Fall of 2012 was the perfect time to conduct a class about American electoral politics - so it was taken up as the topic for Currents, a class offered to incoming Freshmen. The course explores the 2012 election from a variety of academic perspectives - including, but not limited to, philosophy, economics, history, and, of course, political science. In this podcast, five Currents students shared their experiences with the class. 

The students interviewed are: Trevor McNary, a double major in…

WRD is offering a unique course in October. A&S 100-006, Composing with Visuals, focuses on the visual aspect of digital communication skills. Rachel Elliott, who is the instructor for the course, talks about the ways students will create visuals to explore identities, tell stories, and interpret information, and present findings via photography, film, and infographics. The course begins in mid-October 2012.

For more information about the course, or to enroll, please contact your advisor.…

The Division of Writing, Rhetoric, and Digital Media is excited to welcome professor Brian McNely to its faculty!

Professor McNely joins us this fall studying how people work and interact. He researches professional writing in digital environments, tracing the writing that people do in order to find out how they get things done, how they make meaning from the work they do, and how they share that meaning with others.

This podcast is part of a series highlighting the new…