News and Events

Publications and Awards

* Denotes a graduate student

2024

Patrice Buzzanell

February - Dr. Buzzanell's co-authored article, "“‘Well, I’m going to have a baby’: Navigating Safety, Stakeholders, and Strategy in Workplace Pregnancy Disclosures,” received the Central States Communication Association's 2023 Communication Studies Article of the Year Award.

March - Dr. Buzzanell was honored at Purdue University's Women's History Month Celebration, organized by the Office of Diversity, Inclusion, and Belonging and the Susan Bulkeley Butler Center for Leadership Excellence.

March - Dr. Buzzanell gave the keynote address at the 2024 Global Strategic Communication Consortium (GSCC) conclave on “Ethics and Futurism."

Marleah Dean Kruzel

March - Dr. Dean Kruzel was inducted in the Society of Behavioral Medicine's Fellows.

Rana Elhendi* and Patrice Buzzanell

March - Dr. Buzzanell and Elhendi's article, “'The rubber band is already broken': An extended case study of UNDP transformative resilience framework in the context of Palestine,” was published in Communication Monographs.

Erjona Gashi*

March - Gashi was awarded a Summer 2024 Dissertation Completion Fellowship from the USF Office of Graduate Studies, to assist her in the completion of her dissertation, “Uprooted, displaced, resilient: Kosovar women’s narratives of organizing for survival during the Kosovo War.”

Zane Austin Willard*

March - Willard's co-authored article, “Fashioning Zaya Wade in the Press: Authenticity, Black Femininity, and Transnormativity,” was published in the Journal of Communication Inquiry.

2023

Steven Wilson

January - Dr. Wilson was named as one of the top 1% of Communication scholars who have published nine or more articles in Communication journals between 2017 and 2021, in an study by Communication Education

September - USF's 2023 Faculty Outstanding Research Achievement Award

Jianing Li

June - Dr. Li's article, "Not all skepticism is 'healthy' skepticism: Theorizing accuracy- and identity-motivated skepticism toward social media misinformation," was published in New Media & Society

August - Dr. Li received the Thomas E. Patterson Best Dissertation Award for her dissertation, "False Beliefs and 'Healthy' Skepticism: Understanding the Multilevel and Enduring Challenges of Misinformation."

August - Dr. Li’s co-authored paper, “The power of a genre: Political news presented as fact-checking increases accurate belief updating and hostile media perceptions,” was awarded the 2023 Journal Paper of the Year Award from Mass Communication & Society.   

Mahuya Pal

June - Dr. Pal's co-edited book, Organizing at the Margins: Theorizing Organizations of Struggle in the Global South, was published by Palgrave Macmillan. 

November - Dr. Mahuya Pal received the 2023 Outstanding Edited Book Award from the Organizational Communication Division at this year’s NCA Convention for her book, “Organizing at the Margins: Theorizing Organizations of Struggle in the Global South.”

Rana Elhendi* and Patrice Buzzanell

May - Elhendi and co-author Dr. Buzzanell received one of three ICA 2023 Top Paper Awards in the Organizational Communication Division for their article, "'The Rubber Band is Already Broken’: An Extended Case Study of UNDP Transformative Resilience Framework in the Context of Palestine."

Sonia Ivancic

April - Dr. Ivancic (co-PI) and her colleague-collaborator at USF, Dr. William Schanbacher (PI), received a $34,810 Humanities Connections Planning grant. This grant, sponsored by the National Endowment for the Humanities, funded a one-year project between faculty, students, and community members on the design of new courses and experiential learning activities related to food studies.

June - Dr. Ivancic's co-authored article, "(Dis)Organizing Sexual Harrassment: Patterns of Bystander Communication," was published in Management Communication Quarterly.

Patrice Buzzanell

March - Dr. Buzanell's co-authored article, "Engineering Emotion Sustainably: Affective Gendered Organizing of Engineering Identities and Third Space," was published in Sustainability.

March - Received the 2023 Distinguished Alumni Scholar Award at Purdue University.

July - Received the 2023 Excellence in Reviewing Award from Human Resource Management. Award winners were selected based on recommendations from the Associate Editors as reviewers who stood out in terms of providing exceptionally high-quality reviews

November - Dr. Buzzanell was awarded the Charles H. Woolbert Research Award from NCA for the article, “Gaining a Voice: Feminist Organizational Communication Theorizing,” published in Management Communication Quarterly in 1994.

Sonia Ivancic and David Dooling*

April - Dr. Ivancic and Dooling's article, "Navigating entangled shame: Examining the sociomaterialities of food assistance programs," was published in Communication Monographs.

David Dooling*

October - Dooling was awarded the Graduate Student Research Grant to fund his work, “‘Who Threw this Party?’: Examining the Tumultuous Organization of Pride Parades.”

Aubrey Huber, Chris McRae, L.D. Mattson*, Sasha Sanders*, Christina Magalona*, Simon Rousset*, Brooks Oglesby*, and Liahnna Stanley*

April - Dr. Huber, Dr. McRae, and alumni L.D. Mattson, Dr. Sanders, Dr. Magalona, Dr. Rousset, Dr. Oglesby, and Liahnna Stanley had their article, "Embodied fragments: embracing risk, failure, resistance, and pedagogical possibility," published in Text and Performance Quarterly.

Aubrey Huber and Chris McRae

March - Dr. Huber, Dr. McRae, and their colleagues' article, "Collaborative performances of and toward survival in the communication classroom and beyond: an inter-institutional performance forum," was published in Text and Performance Quarterly.

Ambar Basu, Parameswari Mukherjee*, and Bianca Siegenthaler*

March - Bianca Siegenthaler, Parameswari Mukherjee, Dr. Basu, and colleagues had their article, "The (mis)uses of community: a critical analysis of public health communication for COVID-19 vaccination in the United States," published in Human Communication Research.

Mahuya Pal and Beatriz Nieto-Fernandez*

March - Dr. Pal and alum Dr. Nieto-Fernandez's article, "Politics of Transnational Feminism to Decolonize Feminist Organizational Communication: A Call to Action," was published in Management Communication Quarterly.

Ambar Basu and Liahnna Stanley*

February - Dr. Basu and alumn Liahnna Stanley's article, "‘Chemical jail’: culture-centered theorizing of carcerality in methadone maintenance treatment and addiction recovery in the United States," was published in the Journal of Applied Communication Research.

Steven Wilson, Josephine Boumis*, Dennis DeBeck*, Patrice Buzzanell, Elizabeth Hintz*, and Timothy Betts*

February - Dr. Wilson, Josephine Boumis, Dennis DeBeck, Dr. Buzzanell, and alumni Dr. Hintz and Dr. Betts had their article, "A longitudinal analysis of involuntary job loss and communication resilience processes during the COVID-19 pandemic," published in the Journal of Communication.

Marleah Dean Kruzel

July - Dr. Dean Kruzel's co-authored article, “Factors that differentiate cancer risk management decisions among females with pathogenic/likely pathogenic variants in PALB2, CHEK2, and ATM,” was published in Genetics in Medicine

October - Dr. Dean Kruzel's article, "'It’s not if I get cancer, it’s when I get cancer': BRCA-positive patients’(un)certain health experiences regarding hereditary breast and ovarian cancer risk." (Social Science & Medicine, 2016), was selected to receive the NCA Health Communication division's Distinguished Article/Chapter Award for 2023.  

December - Dr. Dean Kruzel and co-authors' paper, "Applying the framework for developing and evaluating complex interventions to increase family communication about hereditary cancer," was published in PEC Innovation.

Jonathan Baker*, Brianna Cusanno*, and Marleah Dean Kruzel

June - Baker, Cusanno, and Dr. Dean Kruzel's article, "Dilemmas in patient-clinician communication about do-it-yourself hormone therapy: A qualitative study," was published in Qualitative Research in Health (a Social Science & Medicine journal).

Patrick McElearney

January - Dr. McElearney's article, "A performative and dialogic approach to teach group roles, group conflict, and conflict management styles," was published in Communication Teacher.

Diana Leon-Boys

January - Dr. Leon-Boys' co-authored article, "The Teenage Latina Genius on Television: Netflix's Ashley Garcia," was published in Women's Studies in Communication.

March - Dr. Leon-Boys' book, "Elena, Princesa of the Periphery: Disney's Flexible Latina Girl," was published by Rutgers University Press.

November - Dr. Leon-Boys was selected to participate in a Top Paper Panel at the 2023 NCA Conference for her paper, "Jane the Girl-Citizen-In-Transition: Girlhood and familial citizenship in Jane the Virgin."

November - Dr. Leon-Boys' book, "Elena, Princesa of the Periphery," was selected to receive the NCA Feminist and Gender Studies Division's 2023 Bonnie Ritter Book Award.

Navita James

March - USF's 2023 Global Education Faculty Award, awarded for promoting Global Education at USF and globally enhancing undergraduate courses.

Laurel Friedman

March - USF's 2023 Global Education Faculty Award, awarded for promoting Global Education at USF and globally enhancing undergraduate courses.

March - Honored for service to USF's UMatter program.

Bishop Lay*

March - Lay's short story, "The Fox," was published in the literary journal, beestung.

July - "The Fox" was published in the print anthology, "Best Microfiction 2023."

Mariaelena Bartesaghi

April - Dr. Bartesaghi's co-authored article, "Sharpiegate: Science, the state and professional vision in the constitution of weather," was published in the Journal of Applied Linguistics and Professional Practice

Jane Jorgenson

May - Dr. Jorgenson was awarded USF's Emeritus Professorship.

October - Dr. Jorgenson was inducted into the Oracle Council of the Organization for the Study of Communication, Language, and Gender (OSCLG). The award itself was presented by a department alum, Dr. Laura Ellingson.

Willow Craine*, Bianca Siegenthaler*, and Jared Worwood*

November - Craine, Siegenthaler, and Worwood received an NCA Top Paper award from the Organizational Communication Division for their paper, "'There's going to be a tipping point where I'm not gonna be able to work': Communicative Resilience amidst Precarity in the Careers of Individuals with Autoimmune Diseases."

Evgeniya Pyatovskaya*

November - Pyatovskaya reveived an NCA Top Paper award from the Feminist and Gender Studies Division for her paper, “Russian Women, Ukraine War, and (Neglected) Writing on the Wall: From the (Im)Possibility of Word Traveling to Fail(ing) Female Alliances,” co-authored with Dr. Julia Khrebtan-Höerhager from Colorado State University.

Zane Austin Willard*

April - Willard presented his paper,  “The Life and Death of Gay Promiscuity in When We Rise,” as part of the Top Papers in Gender Studies panel at the Southern State Communication Association convention.

October - Willard's article, “Fostering critical consciousness: Critical service learning and intersectional reflexivity in the first-year classroom,” was published in Communication Teacher. 

Ambar Basu

November - Dr. Basu received USF's 2023 Outstanding Graduate Faculty Mentor Award.

Keith Berry

November - Dr. Berry's contribution to the second edition of Handbook of Autoethnography, "Meditations on the Story I Cannot Write: Autoethnography, Reflexivity, and the Possibilities of Maybe," received the Best Book Chapter Award from NCA's Ethnography Division.

Chrissy Gesmundo*

September - Gesmundo was selected to receive the WLP/Bank of America East Tampa Award from USF's Women in Leadership & Philanthropy group.

Dennis Debeck*

May - Debeck and his co-authors's article, "An Integrated Health Belief Model: Predicting Uptake of the First COVID-19 Booster Vaccine," was published in Health Communication.

Erjona Gashi*

August - Gashi received a Waterhouse Family Institute Research Grant for 2023-24. This grant supported Erjona’s doctoral dissertation, tentatively titled “Mapping Narratives of War in Eastern Europe: Exploring Kosovar Women’s Communicative Organizing for Survival.” 

Kailin Regutti* & Madison Cerce*

October - Regutti & Cerce's paper, "Guiding creators how to tell stories about mental health: A content analysis of mental health framing in the Mental Health Media Guide," was published in JCMR.

Joshua Scacco

October - Dr. Joshua Scacoo and the Center for Sustainable Democracy was awarded a $150,000 grant through the U.S. Department of State to implement a two-week journalism and democracy program for 15 journalists, in partnership with USF and the U.S. Embassy and Consulates in Brazil.

2022

Mariaelena Bartesaghi

November - Dr. Bartesaghi's article, “'It's not enough to hold that power': The Gendering of Advice in Corporate Discourse," was published in Advancing Women in Leadership Journal.

November - Dr. Bartesaghi's article, "Considering Observation," was published in Constructivist Foundations.

Patrice Buzzanell

August - Dr. Buzzanell received the 2022 USF Outstanding Research Achievement Award for her publications, a signed book contract, receiving two top national and international awards, and a ranking in the top 2% of cited scientists in the world by a recent Stanford University study.

December - Purdue University's Title IX Distinguished Service Award. The award was presented in honor of the 50th anniversary of the enactment of Title IX, to individuals who have made significant contributions to the advancement of gender equity in education.

Dr. Buzzanell received the 2022 Distinguished University Professor Award from USF's Office of the Provost.

Kevin Hawley*

July - Hawley presented his co-authored paper, "Visual Peer Review: Examining Students' Parts of Speech Comments vs. Grade," at the 2023 Association for the Advancement of Computing in Education (AACE) EdMedia + Innovate conference in Vienna, Austria.

October - Hawley received both the 2022 Global Excellence Award and the 2022 Virtual Global Exchange Early Adopter Recognition from USF World. The Global Excellence Award was presented for Hawley's work in promoting global student sucess with study-abroad programs in Florence, Paris, and Barcelona.

November - Hawley and his colleagues were awarded a three-year, $297,000 National Science Foundation grant, to fund their project, "Using Behavioral Nudges in Peer Review to Improve Critical Analysis in STEM Courses."

Evgeniya Pyatovskaya*

April - Pyatovskaya's co-authored article, “Austria at the Crossroads of History: Choosing between Comfort and Conscience during the War in Ukraine,” was published in EuropeNow.

March - Pyatovskaya's co-authored article, ”The West thinks that Russians, suffering from sanctions, will end up abandoning Putin – but history indicates they won’t,” was published in The Conversation.

June - Pyatovskaya's co-authored article, "Putin’s propaganda is rooted in Russian history – and that’s why it works," was published in The Conversation.

June - Pyatovskaya (PI) and Dr. Patrice Buzzanell (co-PI) received a $5,450 grant from the Waterhouse Family Institute for their project, “Disruption, Resilience, and Change: Lessons of Asian American Nonprofit Organizing During COVID-19 Pandemic.” 

September - Pyatovskaya's co-authored article, "Giorgia Meloni - the political provocateur set to become Italy's first far-right leader since Muccolini," was published in The Conversation.

Pyatovskaya received both the Department of Communication Student Research Grant and the CAS Student Success Scholarship.

Aisha Durham

August - Dr. Durham’s essay, “Unmasking the Strongblackwoman in Mentoring,” was part of ICA’s forum, “Prying the Doors Open: Women of Color Mentoring in the Field of Communication," which won the 2022 Apex Award for Publication Excellence in Magazines, Journals & Tabloids - Electronic. 

Andrew Anderson* and Joshua Scacco

August - Anderson's and Scacco's article, "Information Environments and Support for COVID-19 Mitigation Policies," was published in American Behavioral Scientist.

Zane Austin Willard*

July - Willard's article, "Reframing performance’s ontology: hybridity in contemporary performance art’s ontology," was published in the International Journal of Performance Arts and Digital Media.

Ambar Basu and Parameswari Mukherjee*

May - Dr. Basu and Parameswari Mukherjee's article, "India's COVID vaccine gestures: from maitri to coloniality," was published in Communication and Critical/Cultural Studies.

Rachel Dubrofsky

November - Dr. Dubrofsky's book, “Authenticating Whiteness: Karens, Selfies, and Pop Stars,” was published with the University Press of Mississippi.

Lisa Spinazola and David Purnell*

May - Dr. Spinazola and Dr. Purnell co-edited “Narrating Estrangement: Autoethnographies of Writing Of(f) Family,” which was then published by Routledge.

Anjuliet Woodruffe*

May 4th - Dr. Woodruffe's article, "Conversations With My Son: A Poetic Autoethnography of Black Mothering Experiences," was published in Cultural Studies ↔ Critical Methodologies.

Colin Whitworth

February - Dr. Whitworth's article, "Bodies in dialogue: offering a model for queer oral history," was published in Text and Performance Quarterly.

Joshua Scacco

April - Dr. Scacco received the Judith S. Trent Award for Early Career Excellence in Political Communication from the 2022 Central States Communication Association's Political Communication Interest Group.

August - Dr. Scacco received the 2022 USF Outstanding Research Achievement Award for his contributions and publications on political communication and its implications for leadership, governance, and democracy.

October - Dr. Scaccoo received the 2022 NCA Political Communication Division's Hart Outstanding Book Award for his book, "The Ubiquitous Presidency: Presidential Communication and Digital Democracy in Tumultuous Times."

October - Dr. Joshua Scacco (CO-PI) and Dr. Loni Hagen (PI), a faculty colleague in the School of Information, received a $55,320 grant from Cyber Florida for their “Online Information Environment Analysis” project.

Rebecca Todd*

March - Todd received a Gustav Friedrich Award and a Top Paper award from the 2022 Central States Communication Association's Communication Interest Group for her paper, "Engaging Toward Equity: Repositioning Precarity at the Forefront of Student Needs d/Discourse in Higher Education." Additionally, Todd received the CSCA Past Officers Graduate Student Debut Paper Award for the paper.

Melissa McCormick*

November - McCormick received an NCA Top Paper Award from the Instructional Development Division for her paper, "Do You Measure Up? A study of graduate student academic comparison, privacy management, and perceived program competition."

Melissa McCormick* and Aaron Nichols*

November - McCormick and Nichols received an NCA Top Paper Award from the Instructional Development Division for their paper, "Going Through it or Growing Through It: Reactive and Anticipatory Resilience in Undergraduate Students Following a Shift in Learning Modality."

Sonia Ivancic and David Dooling*

November - Dr. Ivancic and Dooling received an NCA Top Paper Award from the Organizational Communication Division for their paper, "Navigating Entangled Shame: Examining the Sociomaterial Realities of Food Assistance Programs."

David Dooling*

November - Dooling received an NCA Top Paper Award from the Ethnography Division for his paper, "Surviving Time: Witnessing the Fragments of Sexual Assault."

Maddison Russell*

November - Russell received an NCA Top Paper Award from the Interpersonal Communication Division for her paper, "Learning to Love My(Trans)self & You: The Implications of Multiple Goals Theory for Transgender & Gender Nonconforming Romantic Partners Who Communicate About GenderAffirming Identity Needs with Cisgender Partners."

Desiree Doyle*

November - Doyle received an NCA Top Paper Award from the Game Studies Division for her paper, "Transforming the Online Gaming Community One Woman at a Time: Applying Materiality to Illustrate Women’s Sexual Harassment Experiences."

Bianca Siegenthaler*, Jared Worwood*, and Willow Craine*

November - Siegenthaler, Worwood, and Craine received an NCA Top Paper Award from the Health Communication Division for their paper, "Patterns of Disruptions: Complexities of Discursive-Embodied Triggers and Resilience Responses of Individuals with Autoimmune Diseases."

Jared Worwood*

November - Worwood received the NCA's 2022 Outstanding Thesis Award for his thesis, "'I Thought that We Could Nurture the Nature Out of Our Son': Making Meaning of Parenting in the Narratives of Parents of Children in Residential Treatment," published in Theses and Dissertations in 2021.

Diana Leon-Boys

November - Dr. Leon-Boys was awarded the 2021-22 USF Outstanding Undergraduate Teaching Award.

Marleah Dean Kruzel and Lindy Davidson

October - Dr. Dean Kruzel's and alum Dr. Davidson's co-authored article, "Developing theory-driven narrative messages with personal stories: A step-by-step guide," was published in the Journal of the Psychological, Social, and Behavioral Dimensions of Cancer.

Steven Wilson

September - Dr. Wilson and co-author Dr. Sandi Smith were awarded the 2022 NCA Interpersonal Division's Gerald R. Miller Outstanding Book Award for their book, "Reflections on Interpersonal Communication Research," published by Cognella in 2019.

2021

Laurel Friedman

Dr. Friedman received the 2021 Undergraduate Teaching Award from USF's Office of the Provost.

Ambar Basu and Patrick Dillon*

December - Ambar’s edited book, "Post-AIDS Discourse in Health Communication: Sociocultural Interpretations," was published by Routledge. Co-Editor Dr. Patrick Dillon is a Ph.D. alumnus of the Department. The book has chapters written by current and former graduate students (Dr. Jaime Robb, Liahnna Stanley, Nivethitha Ketheeswaran, and Brianna Cusanno) and Department Affiliate Faculty colleague Dr. Nancy Romero-Daza. 

Aubrey Huber

November - Dr. Huber's book, "Communicating Social Justice in Teacher Education: Insights from a Critical Classroom Ethnography," was published by Routledge

Navita James

November - Dr. James received the 2021 NCA Women's Caucus Francine Merritt Award. The Women’s Caucus offers the Francine Merritt Award to someone who has made a difference in the field of communication through her/his mentoring, service, advocacy, teaching, and scholarship.

Statement by the NCA Woman's Caucus: The Women's Caucus mission is “to advocate for women's improved status, voice, and opportunities in the discipline. In doing so, we are committed to exploring the diversity and complexities of women's lives in terms of their academic and professional experiences.” We feel Navita's life work is exemplar of this kind of a difference.

Anjuliet Woodruffe*

November - Dr. Woodruffe received the 2021 NCA Donald P. Cushman Memorial Award. The Donald P. Cushman Memorial Award honors the top-ranked student-authored paper from all NCA units that competitively rank papers for programming at the NCA Annual Convention.

November - Dr. Woodruffe received the 2021 NCA John Warren Top Student Paper Award. The John Warren Top Student Paper Award honors Dr. Woodruffe's "Conversations with My Son: A Poetic Autoethnography of Black Mothering Experiences."

November - Dr. Woodruffe received an NCA Top Paper Award from the Ethnography Division for her paper, "Conversations with My Son: A Poetic Autoethnography of Black Mothering Experiences."

Aisha Durham

November - Dr. Durham received 2021 NCA Marsha Houston Award. The award honors Dr. Marsha Houston, noted African American feminist communication scholar, who was instrumental in helping raise and duly ensure recognition of the collective academic voices of African American women and other women of color in conventional feminist communication. This award is given to a junior to mid-level career woman scholar whose scholarship and research, teaching, service and advocacy to academe and their local communities (especially as it pertains to activism) embodies critically examining social justice issues, diversity/inclusion, equity. 

November - Dr. Durham received the 2021 IAANI Ellis-Bochner Autoethnography and Personal Narrative Research Award for her publication, “Wounded: Diagnosis (for a) Black Woman.” Dr. Durham received her award from the International Symposium on Autoethnography and Narrative (ISAN) during the January 2022 conference. A copy of her book chapter is available online.

Patrice Buzzanell

June - Dr. Buzzanell received the 2021 ICA Steve Chaffee Career Achievement Award.

November - Dr. Buzzanell received the 2021 NCA Samuel L. Becker Distinguished Service Award.  The award is presented to the person judged to have made the greatest contribution to the association and to the profession during their career and is generally, but not necessarily, given to a person who has made a number of contributions during their career. 

November - Dr. Buzzanell received an NCA Top Paper Award from the Organizational Communication Division for her paper, "Identity through Affective Solidarity: Understanding the Communicative Construction of Identity in Online Men’s Rights Spaces."

Steven Wilson

November - Dr. Wilson received the 2021 NCA Mark Knapp Award in Interpersonal Communication. The Mark L. Knapp Award in Interpersonal Communication recognizes career contributions to the study of interpersonal communication.

Kasandrea Sereno

Dr. Sereno was awarded the 2021 Undergraduate Advising Award from USF's Office of the Provost.

David Dooling*

November - Dooling received an NCA Top Paper Award from the Ethnography Division for his paper, "Strutting Toward the Grave: Narrating the Heteropatriarchal Lifespan."

Rachel Dubrofsky

November - Dr. Dubrofsky received an NCA Top Paper Award from the Performance Studies Division for her paper, "Authenticity as a Strategy of Whiteness."

Steven Wilson, Johnathan Baker*, Eric Viera*, Ryan Richter*, Joshua Scacco

November - Dr. Wilson, Baker, Viera, Dr. Richter, and Dr. Scacco received an NCA Top Paper Award from the Communication and Military Division for their paper, "Analyzing News Media Framing of The Military-Civilian Divide."

Joshua Scacco

August - Dr. Josh Scacco's co-authored paper, “Securing the guardrails of democracy? Accountability and presidential communication in the 2020 election,” was published in the Quarterly Journal of Speech's "Forum: Division, discord, and democracy: A forum on the 2020 U.S. Presidential Campaign."