I am an Associate Professor of English at the University of Waterloo and Chair of the Conference on College Composition and Communication: the largest international organization of composition, rhetoric, and communication scholars in the world. I am also a member of the Executive Committee of the National Council of Teachers of English. Additionally, I have recently become Lead Editor for Genocide Watch, an international organization that works to "predict, prevent, stop, and punish genocide and other forms of mass murder." Genocide Watch works to "raise awareness and influence public policy concerning potential and actual genocide" with the "purpose of building "an international movement to prevent and stop genocide" (https://www.genocidewatch.com/).
My book, CounterStories from the Writing Center, co-edited with Wonderful Faison, recently received the International Writing Centers Association's 2023 Outstanding Book Award. My other books include I Hope I Join the Band: Narrative, Affiliation, and Antiracist Rhetoric, The Everyday Writing Center: A Community of Practice (co-authored with Geller, et al), Performing Anti-Racism Pedagogy in Rhetoric, Writing and Communication (co-edited with Vershawn Ashanti Young). I teach undergraduate and graduate courses in writing and rhetoric. In addition to writing and writing centre studies and critical pedagogies, my particular interests include rhetorics of race and class, critical race theory, critical whiteness studies, and political rhetoric (the discourses of dissent).
I have been the recipient of a 2021 Arts Award for Teaching from the UW Faculty of Arts and an Outstanding Performance Award for Excellence in Teaching and Research from the University of Waterloo in 2015. I am most proud, however, of having been the 2017 recipient of the Federation of Students Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching Award (Ontario Undergraduate Student Alliance).
Territorial Acknowledgement
The University of Waterloo is located on the traditional territory of the Attawandaron (Neutral), Anishnaabeg, and Haudenosaunee peoples. The University of Waterloo is situated on the Haldimand Tract, land promised to Six Nations, which includes six miles on each side of the Grand River.
Body Acknowledgement
I am a citizen of the United States and a Permanent Resident of Canada, where I now reside, teach, research, and write. I recognize that I move through the world as a raced-white subject whose body, language, and history are privileged in both the nations I call home – not by virtue of any inherent quality they might possess but through the social operations of white supremacy. I acknowledge that the idea of whiteness and materiality of white supremacism are progenitors of systemic, institutional, symbolic, and individual racism. I hear Peoples of Colour and Indigenous Peoples who are subjected to racist violence as they cry out, “I can’t breathe.” I acknowledge my culpability for white supremacy and my responsibility as a white person to oppose and resist racism enacted in my name. I commit myself to this resistance and stand ready both to hold myself and to be held accountable by others for making this commitment actionable.
