It is in an effort to ascribe personal effort towards both of these ordinary terms that I write, compose, create, listen, confer, collaborate, and teach. Neither one comes before the other, and neither one is more important than the other. As individual terms, they each ring their own note: to create is to confound existence, to manipulate space and time, to bend will and volition into life; to learn is to absorb the sun, to be with others and empathize, to eradicate fear and despair, to grow. Together these two terms provide an even greater possibility: perhaps "create learning" refers to how we might become lifelong artists of the mind with all its quintessential images.

But I refuse to represent myself as just the sum of parts, and it is the case that from day to day I have reinvent the idea of my work, my creativity, my learning. Some of the first questions remain. There will always be more to do.

Nevertheless, the obligatory labels must follow: I am an Assistant Professor of Rhetoric and New Media at Texas Christian University. My interests are in language theory, new media, multimodal composition, and the affective domain—all of which come together in the theorization and rhetorical analysis of image and the imagination. I am also a publishing poet, working mostly in the lyrical realm.

News/Announcements

I have a chapter in the forthcoming book (Jan 2010) What We Are Becoming: Developments in Undergraduate Writing Majors by Greg Giberson & Tom Moriarty.

My chapter is titled "Composing Multiliteracies and Image: Multimodal Writing Majors for a Creative Economy." Go to the Research section to see a summary.

My book about image and emotion is due out in paperback on Jan 10th, 2010. The link below will take you to SUNY's website where you can pre-order a copy.

Non-Discursive Rhetoric: Image and Affect in Multimodal Composition

Go to the RESEARCH section to get more information about it. You can also click on the cover itself to go to SUNY Press for a downloadable copy (or get a PDF preview here).