Helloooo

My story as a student, teacher, researcher, and writer has always been interdisciplinary. After pivoting from secondary education to professional writing, I ended up in the wine media world in Atlanta as a sommelier, digital communications specialist, and culture writer. For my dissertation, I developed a phenomenological ethnography through personally interviewing thought leaders in the American wine industry about their goals to make wine more accessible and diversified. Learning from these narratives emphasized the strength of interdisciplinarity for me, as I have gotten to see how education through diverse perspectives creates profound thinkers and a resilient community.

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These interdisciplinary experiences have led me to seek a more holistic, authentic relationship with the narratives that shape my environment and especially the stories of underrepresented communities. When it comes to wine, food, and terroir, many of the stories that reveal truths about these relationships come from Indigenous worldviews, yet Indigenous voices are often ignored in favor of dominant, capitalistic narratives. In my research, I’ve come across a spectrum of Indigenous scholars whose perspectives reveal insightful methods of deconstructing systems of knowledge and power. As I explore the application of these theories to my rhetoric and composition pedagogy, my goal is to highlight the voices of Indigenous scholars and researchers. I feel immense gratitude for my experiences writing, teaching, and learning at various institutions across my home state of Georgia, so I am committed to acknowledging and amplifying Indigenous perspectives as the original stewards of these lands.

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The power of narrative has driven my teaching philosophy throughout my decade-long career as a communications instructor. For my students, I continuously emphasize the importance of listening to others’ narratives and confidently expressing our own narratives to strengthen rhetorical effectiveness. Teacher-scholar Emily Legg argues that stories are “unobservable” and that their existence as both “material and etheric” becomes “the making of knowledge.” This worldview positions knowledge as fluid, thus emphasizing the importance of communication and the power of rhetorical strategy. Cindy Tekobbe, professor of critical feminist science and technology, argues that knowledge represents an “amassed knowing, a constellation of collected experience through the sharing of stories.” With this perspective in mind, I approach my role as a communications teacher as guiding students through the use of rhetoric and composition as technologies to enhance their humanness - their abilities to express themselves, communicate with others, and gain knowledge. This principle has helped ground my pedagogy in the humanities and liberal arts education as the world of communication evolves to integrate new technologies and cultural practices.

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One of my biggest takeaways from studying diverse knowledge systems has been the importance of open access to alternative methods of thought in order to comprehensively understand how our human roles intersect with evolving tools and technologies that shape our disciplines. As Walter Ong argues, writing itself is a technology that has shaped our ways of thinking and cultivating knowledge. Ong also reminds us to interrogate these thought frameworks, especially as new technology begins to dominate various cultural systems. Abundant Intelligences, an Indigenous-led interdisciplinary program pursuing research on artificial intelligence (AI), supports this sentiment, arguing that interdisciplinary methods and diverse perspectives are imperative because, otherwise, “deeply problematic assumptions about how people behave and interact with each other and their environment is encoded into the foundations of our sociotechnical systems.” My experience with AI began at a small liberal arts institution in rural Georgia where our business program encouraged interdisciplinary experimentation with generative AI in order to keep pace with surrounding institutions. My colleagues and I formed the university’s first interdisciplinary AI research coalition where we explored the concept of generative AI as a humanities technology. Experiencing the juxtaposing situation of gaining AI literacy in my own work while implementing experiential learning strategies in my classes inspired the development of my current research framework where I explore interdisciplinary communication technologies through an experiential, human-centered lens.

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I have carried this mindset with me as I have relocated from Georgia to Massachusetts to teach writing at Northeastern University, taking an interdisciplinary approach to helping students express and maintain their humanity as they pursue careers in science, business, and technology. This approach works well with Northeastern’s overarching goal of integrating technical and human literacies to develop well-rounded professionals in interdisciplinary fields. During my year at Northeastern teaching business communication, advanced interdisciplinary writing, and first-year composition, I’ve seen how this institution’s ethos of humanics and experiential learning go hand-in-hand, as focusing on what students learn from inimitable experiences helps them embrace the humanness of their narratives, inspiring them to take human-centered approaches to their tech-oriented careers.Teaching and researching at Northeastern continues to provide me with an ideal interdisciplinary environment where I can focus on what matters to me most: meaningful student learning. As I continue my work here, I am excited to keep exploring active, experiential learning strategies to help students connect with their humanity, develop curiosity towards diverse narratives, and cultivate lifelong learning practices.

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