Research

My research agenda revolves around these core areas:

• intercultural and international communication
• migration
• collaboration
• social justice

Intercultural and International Communication

Coming from a multilingual background, I strive to study rhetoric and communication in intercultural and international contexts. I am particularly interested in studying international communication in writing classrooms. I have been a participant of the Trans-Atlantic & Pacific Project (TAPP) since 2017. TAPP, which started with Bruce Maylath’s and Sonia Vandepitte’s international collaboration, is a network of educators which includes 41 universities in 19 countries. The TAPP collaboration is an excellent opportunity for writing studies students to practice intercultural collaboration.

Migration

As an immigrant (international student in the US), I am particularly interested in understanding migration discourses. Given the growing number of people migrating worldwide and in the United States, it is imperative to turn our writing studies research lens to migrants and their needs. While having made some foray into migration studies, writing studies is still somewhat lagging behind on studies focused explicitly on migrants despite being strategically positioned to study communication contexts in migration. I primarily study immigration rhetoric and its impact on migrants’ lives. I strive to understand how organizations, including those in key positions of power, portray and communicate with migrants. Similarly, I seek to understand how migrants communicate with organizations before, during and after their migrations.

Collaboration

Collaboration has contributed to my own growth as a researcher and teacher. My participation in the Trans-Atlantic Pacific Project (TAPP), and the Building Digital Literacy (BDL) group has provided me with unique opportunities to collaborate with researchers across universities and countries on multiple projects. These collaborative endeavors have not only informed my research work but also my teaching. In classroom research, my interest in collaboration is often tied with intercultural and international communication.

Social Justice

My work in social justice is directly linked with my work in migration. Social justice emphasizes human rights and placing marginalized communities in a central position in research and design. I draw from the literature on social justice in writing studies to inform my research of communication surrounding migrants. In particular, I aim at using a social justice lens for quantitative studies involving migration.