The Department of Communication’s first-year graduate students recently presented their scholarship to an audience of faculty, staff, and fellow students at a research poster session. Poster sessions are a common platform at scholarly conferences, and this session provided an excellent opportunity for students to practice taking questions about their projects from audiences.
Capping off the course COM 501: Methods of Inquiry, the poster session allowed students to receive feedback on a project they developed over Winter quarter. For some, these projects may evolve into their theses or dissertation projects.
We are proud to showcase the outstanding work of our talented new cohort of MA and PhD students. Read on for more information on their projects from the students themselves.
Madelyn (Maddie) Douglas: “Frances Haugen and Counterfeit Parrhesia: Resisting Californian Ideology in Big Tech Whistleblowing”
Whistleblowing has commonly been theorized as parrhesia, “frank speech,” or speaking truth to power. However, big tech is a space where the act of whistleblowing overlaps with inherent power, that of Silicon Valley’s hegemonic “virtual class” and Californian ideology. In a rhetorical analysis, I examine Frances Haugen’s Facebook Files testimony as a highly publicized case of big tech whistleblowing. While parts of Haugen’s testimony appear parrhesiastic, other aspects of the text are heavily rhetorical and oppose parrhesia’s requirements. Is Haugen’s testimony bold parrhesia, rhetorical parrhesia, or something else entirely? I argue that it is not parrhesia at all—it may be read as apologia, a public self-defense, due to its placing blame on Facebook as a “bad apple” and its promotion of Californian ideology. This counterexample to the model of whistleblowing as parrhesia expands current theorizing on whistleblowing and may reveal new insights on counterfeit parrhesia and its relationship to apologia. I also reflect on how big tech whistleblowing might achieve bold, collective parrhesia.
Dionna Taylor: “From Stigma to Solidarity: The Power of Online Communities in Combating Health-Related Stigma”
My research interests fall along the intersection of health communication and online communities, and this paper aims to look at how online communities (like Reddit) serve as additional support for those who cope with health-related challenges. In short, my project explores how the stigmatization of a health-related concern impacts how people talk about their health-related concern online versus offline, and how discussion pertaining to stigmatized health-related concerns compares to discussion pertaining to non-stigmatized health-related concerns within an online context.
Brooke Fisher: “The Impact of the Everett Herald’s New Ownership on News Quality”
The Everett Herald assumed new ownership in March 2024, which is notable because it isn’t simply corporate owned once again. The outlet is now jointly owned by two private investment firms, which is a trend in newspaper ownership. This project will illuminate the impact of this new form of ownership on readership by assessing a tangible factor: the quality of news and reporting standards following the ownership transition.
Kennedy Carda: “Deny, Defend, Depoliticize: Political Violence, Media Spectacle, and the Illusion of Agency in the Case of Luigi Mangione”
This project examines the glorification of Luigi Mangione and the murder of UnitedHealthcare Brian Thompson. It will explore our current political climate and its relationship to the violent rhetoric that led to the celebration of the assassination of Brian Thompson. It will also examine the glorification of Luigi Mangione, exemplified in memes and merchandise such as T-shirts and votive candles. I argue that the media spectacle surrounding the alleged assassination of Brian Thompson by Luigi Mangione exemplifies how political violence is simultaneously celebrated, commodified, and depoliticized through consumer culture, presenting the illusion of political agency while undermining the potential for substantive political change.
