Faculty

 

 


Thomas W. Benson


Edwin Erle Sparks Professor of Rhetoric

Office: 227 Sparks Building
Telephone: (814) 865-4201


Fax: (814) 863-7986

E-mail: t3b@psu.edu

Curriculum Vitae

 

 

 

 

 

EDUCATION:

 

A.B., Hamilton College, 1958
M.A., Cornell University 1961
Ph.D., Cornell University, 1966
RESEARCH ACTIVITIES AND INTERESTS:


I am a rhetorical critic and theorist interested in rhetorical criticism as social and cultural criticism. My current research interests include rhetorical criticism of film and political discourse.

I am editor of the series in Rhetoric and Communication of the University of South Carolina Press. I have served as editor of Communication Quarterly, The Quarterly Journal of Speech, and as founding editor of The Review of Communication and CRTNET (Communication Research and Theory Network), a listserv for students and scholars of human communication.

Publications include Reality Fictions: The Films of Frederick Wiseman (1989, 2002); Documentary Dilemmas: Frederick Wiseman's Titicut Follies (1991); American Rhetoric: Context and Criticism (1989); Rhetorical Dimensions in Media, 2nd ed. revised and expanded (1995); Landmark Essays on Rhetorical Criticism (1993); Rhetoric and Political Culture in Nineteenth-Century America (1996); and Writing JFK: Presidential Rhetoric and the Press in the Bay of Pigs Crisis (2004; winner of the Everett Lee Hunt Award). American Rhetoric in the New Deal Era, 1932-1945 is scheduled for publication in 2006.

 

COURSES:


CAS 412: Speech Criticism (Spring 2000 syllabus)
CAS 415: Rhetoric of Film and Television (Fall 2004 syllabus)
CAS 475: Studies in Public Persuasion -- American Rhetoric in the New Deal Era (spring 2005 syllabus)
CAS 500: Seminar in Historical Criticism of Rhetoric (Fall 2004 syllabus)
CAS 503: Seminar in Rhetorical Criticism (Fall 2003)
CAS 515: Seminar in Rhetoric and Media (Fall 2002 syllabus)
CAS 530: Political Communication and Media
CAS 415 and 499: International Program in Rome, Summer 2006

RESEARCH AREAS:

Rhetorical Criticism
Public Address
Presidential Rhetoric
Rhetorical Theory
Political Communication
Rhetoric of Film and Visual Rhetoric
Rhetoric of Technology

 

AWARDS:

 

  • Eastern Communication Association Scholar
  • Robert A. Kibler Memorial Award, Speech Communication Association
  • Meritorious Service Award, Eastern Communication Association
  • Presidential Citation, National Communication Association (1997)
  • Presidential Citation, National Communication Association (1999)
  • Presidential Citation, National Communication Association, for Outstanding Service to NCA and the Communication Discipline (1999)
  • Douglas Ehninger Distinguished Rhetorical Scholar Award, National Communication Association
  • Distinguished Scholar Award, National Communication Association
  • Distinguished Research Fellow, Eastern Communication Association
  • Outstanding Contributions to Communication Technologies Award, American Communication Association
  • Mentor Award, National Communication Association
  • Shorenstein Fellow, John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University
  • Everett Lee Hunt Award for Writing JFK

 

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