Amy Pason
I am currently an Associate Professor in the Department of Communication Studies at University of Nevada, Reno.
I am a critical rhetorician, and my research focuses on forms of rhetoric produced by social movement or (counter)public groups. My aim is to understand how particular rhetorical forms function to accomplish social change goals, and how those forms are enabled or constrained given particular socio-political contexts. Recognizing that advocacy does not occur in a vacuum, I particularly attend to how activist discourses clash with or are contested by dominant discourses or meaning systems. My approach to rhetorical criticism is as a scholar-activist, in which the telos of my rhetorical practice is to illuminate the possibilities and limitations for agency and effective advocacy as a means to propose directions for future advocacy. In this, I have analyzed direct actions part of Occupy Homes and peace movement activism; blogs, autobiographies, and camps of the peace movement (specifically with Cindy Sheehan); and food reviews related to Occupy Wall Street's Kitchen. I am currently working on projects related to foreclosure narratives and Plowshares anti-nuclear direct action. My scholar-activism is most focused on issues of academic labor in universities. In this work, I integrate feminist and democratic theory.
I have also been working on interdisciplinary issues of advocacy and deliberation more broadly in relation to criminal law and policy.
I typically teach courses in public speaking, argument, persuasion theory, and rhetoric of dissent/social movements. I also teach social science methods and writing courses.
I am a critical rhetorician, and my research focuses on forms of rhetoric produced by social movement or (counter)public groups. My aim is to understand how particular rhetorical forms function to accomplish social change goals, and how those forms are enabled or constrained given particular socio-political contexts. Recognizing that advocacy does not occur in a vacuum, I particularly attend to how activist discourses clash with or are contested by dominant discourses or meaning systems. My approach to rhetorical criticism is as a scholar-activist, in which the telos of my rhetorical practice is to illuminate the possibilities and limitations for agency and effective advocacy as a means to propose directions for future advocacy. In this, I have analyzed direct actions part of Occupy Homes and peace movement activism; blogs, autobiographies, and camps of the peace movement (specifically with Cindy Sheehan); and food reviews related to Occupy Wall Street's Kitchen. I am currently working on projects related to foreclosure narratives and Plowshares anti-nuclear direct action. My scholar-activism is most focused on issues of academic labor in universities. In this work, I integrate feminist and democratic theory.
I have also been working on interdisciplinary issues of advocacy and deliberation more broadly in relation to criminal law and policy.
I typically teach courses in public speaking, argument, persuasion theory, and rhetoric of dissent/social movements. I also teach social science methods and writing courses.
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Papers by Amy Pason
They note challenges to engaging with labor in scholarship and practice and call for normalizing discourse about class and labor in relation to the university. The authors suggest directions for future scholarship and activism in local institutions and professional associations.
anti-government confrontations – at Bunkerville, Nevada, in
2014, and the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in Oregon in
2016 – to understand how the public makes sense of the relationship between First and Second Amendment rights. Using the
concept of non-judicial precedents and drawing on legal scholarship following District of Columbia v. Heller (2008), we find that
public meaning-making mirrors concerns raised by legal scholars
about using First Amendment logics to understand Second
Amendment rights, conflating the two in meaning and practice.
Discourse surrounding these armed confrontations focused on
whether guns were needed to protect speech rights, the rhetoric
of patriotism, and the contested constitutional primacy of
speech versus guns. We argue that this case study demonstrates
the need for communication scholars to problematize the logics
that intertwine the First and Second Amendments, especially as
the nation confronts the normalization of the use of guns in
political protest, conflict, and insurrection.
They note challenges to engaging with labor in scholarship and practice and call for normalizing discourse about class and labor in relation to the university. The authors suggest directions for future scholarship and activism in local institutions and professional associations.
anti-government confrontations – at Bunkerville, Nevada, in
2014, and the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in Oregon in
2016 – to understand how the public makes sense of the relationship between First and Second Amendment rights. Using the
concept of non-judicial precedents and drawing on legal scholarship following District of Columbia v. Heller (2008), we find that
public meaning-making mirrors concerns raised by legal scholars
about using First Amendment logics to understand Second
Amendment rights, conflating the two in meaning and practice.
Discourse surrounding these armed confrontations focused on
whether guns were needed to protect speech rights, the rhetoric
of patriotism, and the contested constitutional primacy of
speech versus guns. We argue that this case study demonstrates
the need for communication scholars to problematize the logics
that intertwine the First and Second Amendments, especially as
the nation confronts the normalization of the use of guns in
political protest, conflict, and insurrection.
The theories of social movements and counterpublics are related, but distinct. Social movement theories tend to be concerned with enacting policy and legislative changes. Scholars flying this flag have concentrated on the organization and language (for example, rallies and speeches) that are meant to enact social change. Counterpublic theory, on the other hand, focuses less on policy changes and more on the unequal distribution of power and resources among different protest groups, which is sometimes synonymous with subordinated identity groups such as race, gender, sexuality, and class.
Nonetheless, contributors argue that in recent years the distinctions between these two methods have become less evident. By putting the literatures of the two theories in conversation with one another, these scholars seek to promote and imagine social change outside the typical binaries.