Faculty News

David Domke named favorite professor
University of Washington graduating seniors selected communication professor David Domke as their favorite professor in an annual poll. Students can write in the names of anyone, rather than voting from a list of candidates.

In following with tradition, Domke gave a speech during Washington Weekend in which he spoke about the privileges of being a professor and student at the University of Washington, and how we all got here because someone -- and often, many someones -- injected hope into our lives. They told us we could succeed, could change the world, could make a difference. With this in mind, Domke is creating The Hope Covenant, by which students will receive academic credit for using their communication talents and ideas for social good. He will offer this in his undergraduate classes beginning in autumn 2008, with credit to the graduating class of 2008.  He asked those graduating students to join him by contributing their creative and positive ideas and skills on a daily basis.

Read the story that ran in The Daily here.

Posted: 5.07.08

NPR's national show, Weekend America, did a long segment, Caroling the Eagles, on an unusual bit of civic engagement Communication lecturer Cindy Simmons has been doing these past few years: listen to the show | read the transcript.

Posted: 12.31.07

Professor John Gastil's letter "Jury Duty in Japan" published in the New York Times.

Posted: 08.20.07

Ralina Joseph was a guest on Weekday on KUOW on Tuesday, February 6.

Click here for audio from her appearance...

Posted 02.21.06

Our Public Speaking Program Director, Professor Matt McGarrity, has won the Robert Henry Outstanding Professor Award! Read about it at the National Speakers Association Web site.

Posted 08.29.06

Professor John Gastil was a guest columnist for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer on November 6, 2003. He co-wrote a commentary titled "Voters need more reliable information."

( Full Text of the Gastil Article )

Distinguished Teaching Award: Lisa Coutu, a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Communication, is a recipient of the 2003 UW Distinguished Teaching Award.

The Dart Center co-hosted “Homeland Terrorism: A Primer for First-responder Journalists” with the University of Southern California Annenberg School for Communication’s Western Knight Center for Specialized Journalism. The June 2003 convention featured former Virginia Governor James S. Gilmore III and now chair of the Gilmore Commission and the keynote: “What are the critical questions that should be asked about Homeland Security in your community?” A few of the many participants at this important event were: Roger Simpson, Director, Dart Center for Journalism and Trauma; David Handschuh, New York Daily News staff photographer; John Miller, Commander, Counter-Terrorism Unit, LAPD; Joe Hight, Managing Editor the Oklahoman, Oklahoma City; and Stephen Prior, Director, National Security Health Policy Center.

The department had a substantial presence at the 2003 Institute for Teaching Excellence. ITE is a week-long teaching workshop for senior faculty; several of our faculty participated in earlier years (Valerie Manusov, Barbara Warnick and emeritus professor John Bowes). Leading sessions at this year’s workshop were David Domke and Lisa Coutu. Jerry Baldasty was director of the workshop and Kathleen Fearn-Banks was a participant. Don Wulff and the staff of Center for Instructional Development and Research (CIDR) were also extensively involved in this year’s workshop.

GEAR UP (Gaining Early Awareness and Readiness for Undergraduate Programs) promotes college attendance among “at risk” students. Communication professors Kathleen Fearn-Banks, John Gastil, David Domke and Jerry Baldasty taught 2003 GEAR UP classes this summer.

Dave Domke has been elected to a three-year term on the Standing Committee for Research for the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication.

Jody Nyquist will receive the Samuel L. Becker Distinguished Service Award at the next National Communication Association Meeting to take place in Miami November, 2003. This is a highly coveted award, and is based on a “communication scholar’s contribution to the discipline through his/her cumulative record of research, teaching and service.”

Leah Ceccarelli has been appointed to the faculty of the Program in Theory and Criticism. This is an interdisciplinary PhD program housed in the Department of Comparative Literature. We now have two faculty on this program’s faculty -- the other is Barbara Warnick.

Faculty Research

Kirsten Foot studies how people use the web for political participation. She is currently leading a study on the use of the web by political campaigns (http://politicalweb.info); she's also developed the September 11 Web Archive (http://september11.archive.org), which won the Yahoo@Internet Life Site of the Year Award in 2001 and has been Google's top-ranked site on September 11 for several months.

David Domke's research on the strategic communications of the Bush administration and the role of news media in the "war on terrorism" and related issues of racial profiling, civil liberties, and religious conflict, is forthcoming in leading journals and has been featured in several media outlets and public lectures.

Tony Chan has recently completed work on a book that chronicles the life, films and career of Anna May Wong (1905-1961), a cinematic legend and icon in Asian America and Hollywood. The book will be published in 2003 by Scarecrow Press.

Barbara Warnick is working on a study of campaign web sites in the 2002 elections; she is analyzing how candidates' sites are designed to communicate with "motivated undecided" voters; this study will examine how candidate campaign web sites might influence voter decisions.

Patricia Moy's recent book Malice Toward All? examines the influence media have on public opinion and on how the public views political institutions.

Leah Ceccarelli is studying how the public talks about and understands science, and how scientists influence the public and other scientists.

Ted Prosise examines presidential advocacy relating to nuclear weapons and other weapons of mass destruction, focusing on how presidents articulate their policies on nuclear weapons, and how does that influences or limits policy.

John Gastil's 1993 book Democracy in Small Groups has become recommended reading at the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization, NASA, and numerous non-profits in the United States and abroad. In 2000, he wrote By Popular Demand: Revitalizing Representative Democracy through Deliberative Elections (University of California). This book built upon his previous work by showing how small group discussions can be integrated into the electoral process and public institutions.

Lance Bennett's current research includes investigations of how press-government relations affect public information and civic culture, and how strategic communication campaigns shape news content, along with public political perceptions, identifications, and participation.

Philip Howard is editing a collection for Sage about the role of new media technologies in the contemporary economic, political and cultural life of the United States.

Valerie Manusov currently has three primary projects: exploring the symbolic value of nonverbal communication, editing a sourcebook for measuring nonverbal cues, and investigating an intercultural on-line dialogue for discussions of cultural identity (with Nancy Rivenburgh)