About Me

I research and teach digital and technical communication at Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT...not ITT) in Chicago, IL, where I’m an associate professor of digital writing & rhetoric. I also run both a physical lab, known as the Digital Communication Research and Instruction Lab, and complementary virtual lab, known as Gewgaws Lab, that design and investigate open source technologies in communication. In December 2010, I received the Dean’s Award for Excellence in Teaching from IIT’s College of Science and letters.

Although my research is technological in nature, my educational background is in classical and contemporary rhetoric.

I’ve published articles on topics ranging from social media to the Semantic Web. My article “Integrating Social Media Into Existing Work Environments” was the most-downloaded article from the Journal of Business and Technical Communication in 2010; for that, SAGE/JBTC have released the article as open-access in perpetuity. I have also published a book on standards-based web design with Greenwood Press. I’m currently working on a series of articles and the early stages of a book project on open source writing and revision/version control.

Although my research is technological in nature, my educational background is in classical and contemporary rhetoric: I earned a PhD from the rhetoric and composition program at Purdue University in 2007.

My teaching responsibilities are primarily in IIT’s graduate program in Technical Communication and Information Design (MS & PhD) and Information Architecture (MS). I regularly teach graduate courses in web design, web application development, knowledge management, and instructional design.

Although time is always in short supply, I do enjoy picking up the occasional web design and development project—especially if it fits with my research or teaching.