Classes -- Contains class websites for various courses I have taught in Speech Communication or Women's Studies at LSU, Arizona State, and the University of South Florida. It also contains teaching tips and strategies, syllabi, links, and other teaching goodies. The LSU courses include The Rhetoric of Cyberculture, and Contemporary Public Address. The Cyberculture site is cool because it has links to student websites and papers for the class.

       Pedagogy -- my teaching philosophy and includes many teaching resources, especially resources for how to teach theory.

       Soapbox -- In the 'old days' people who wanted to preach or make a public speech about something would haul a soapbox into the middle of the street, climb on, and start talking. I think soapboxes must have been more sturdy back then. Nowadays, we just use webpages. Here's my contribution to that tradition. I also have a journal and a Weblogs (or Blogs).

       Ode to Donna Haraway  --  This humonstroid page includes: an annotated bibliography of Haraway's writings; a bibliography of secondary sources; a page on artist Lynn Randolph's artwork; over 150 annotated links to related websites and full-text articles on line, including links to Haraway's latest work. People often email me asking me how to get in touch with Donna. She works at the history of consciousness program at UC Santa Cruz. The Haraway page has links to her work webpage.

       Link-o-rama to Over 50 Nifty Sites/Sights/Cites -- The obligatory link page: hop over to websites on feminist studies, cultural studies, technology studies, internet resources, progressive politics, and grrl stuff. Also check out the e-text page with links to academic journals and e-zines too.

       site map  --  For surfers who need organization in their lives.

     Voxygen is a compilation of interests in feminist cultural politics. It focuses on issues relating to generations X and Y, popular culture, and virtual culture. It is based on the premise that power is everywhere and nowhere, that the codes that have defined our voices and identities can be identified and rewritten, and that critical voices and fresh perspectives are as necessary as the air we breathe.

     Now more than ever, in a Farenheit 9/11 world, critical voices serve an extraordinarily important purpose.  With the publication of such frightening documents as Lynne Cheney's "Defending Civilization: How our Universities are Failing America and What Can be Done About It," the voices of radical dissenters are crucial. While I don't pretend that the professorial class is the vanguard leading the way to revolution, I do believe that as an educator I play a tiny but important part in teaching students to think past easy answers. Unfortunately, my website also demonstrates how easily I succumb to the pleasures of popular culture. There is no unencumbered position, and reworking social relations is never ending and never easy. But, to quote Gandolf, "All you have to decide is what to do with the time that is given you."

     Vox part of Voxygen comes from Latin for "voice," as in vox populi. I combined that with my interest in Gen X and Gen Y and that's how I got this title. I've called my website Voxygen since I first put it on the web.

06/25/08 -- Updated the Donna Haraway page. Took down dated class pages including Rhetoric and Civilization. Updated spyware page.
12/13/06 -- Switched to Blogger's Betablogger.
08/29/04 -- Added CMST 3167 -- Rhetoric and Civilization page
08/11/04 -- Added links to Pedagogy page on Learning Styles, Goals and objectives, and test writing. Added CMST 7900 Intro to Grad Studies in Communication to Courses page.
08/01/04 -- Added a page on battle techniques for fighting spyware!
07/29/04 -- Made my first blogspot archive and I added links to my blog!
06/07/04 -- Moved my blog to Blogspot!

     My first version made it to the web back in 1996. The splash page had pictures of Ursula all over it and I quoted a line from The Little Mermaid: "All I want is your voice." That's because at the time I was writing my dissertation on "woman's voice," whatever that is. I don't have anything left from that old version, but you can view the splash page of my second attempt, Voxygen v2.0.

     My next effort (v3.0) used tables more creatively and used a modified Frontpage theme. I liked how it looked, but I got bored with it fairly quickly.

     The present version (I guess that would be v4.0 now) came about when my friend decided to close up shop as a host. Since I had to move the whole site, I thought I might as well redesign.

     Design inspiration came from the Amsterdam artist, Unamore. The layout comes from designer, Ann-S-Thesia. I blatantly stole it, so she deserves credit. The font is Jules Writing, which I adore.

Amsterdam Laughing

     My husband and I went to Amsterdam over spring break in 2004. On our last full day we decided to take a walking tour along the canal. We followed a map in a guide book that told about the architecture and history of the buildings along the canal. During this walk, we met a woman artist who goes by the name Unamoure. Friendly and wise, she was the best surprise we had in Amsterdam. Finding her was like accidentally finding hidden treasure.

     The woman ushered us into her gallery while saying, "It's so gray and dreary outside. Come inside and see Amsterdam's colors." Her gallery was breathtaking. She introduced us to her paintings, explaining each of their stories. When she showed me "Amsterdam Laughing," I spontaneously broke out in happy giggles. I've never done that in response to a painting before. She explained how the squiggly blue lines are the Amstel river, but the rest of her story was simply about the goodness and love and vibrant happiness of Amsterdam.

     Sometimes things are supposed to happen. Sometimes you go to places for one reason and you find that your purpose was really something very different than you expected. I think the purpose of my trip to Amsterdam was to meet this woman.

     Currently I am an ssistant professor at Baton Rouge Community College. My struggles with writing blocks wore me out emotionally and spiritually and  teaching at BRCC is be a good compromise between my desires and failings as an academic. It is certainly better than the six week stint I did teaching first grade in August of 2006.

     I was an assistant professor in the Communication Studies department at Louisiana State University, where I taught all kinds of fun and interesting things, which I talk all about on my classes page. My areas of interest in rhetoric include feminism, rhetorical theory, public address, cultural studies and, more recently, cybercultural studies. I taught at LSU from 2000 - 2006.

     When I first came to LSU in 1999, I ran the Women's Center for a while. What else can I say about that? It's an under-funded program in a state that de-prioritizes education and women's issues. I didn't last long in that position, but I learned a whole lot about real world feminism. I also like to do community work on women's issues, queer issues, and anti-racism though I don't really have much time to spare these days.

     I earned an MA and a PhD in Communication from the University of South Florida in Tampa in 1997. When I started at USF, the department was a terminal master's program. Now, when I go back, I don't even recognize it anymore. But I learned a lot there. At USF I studied rhetoric, communication, feminism, and cultural studies. So many people taught me so many cool things in there that I can't even begin to recount them.

     I taught as an instructor in Women's Studies at South Florida for three years while I was finishing my PhD. The Women's Studies department at USF is one of the oldest in the country. It was a good intellectual home for me for a while. I spent a long time working on a feminist philosophy journal called Hypatia, so I learned tons about feminist theory at a very exciting time when feminism was stuck in the essentialism debates and when third wave feminism was breaking ground. As an instructor I got to do all kinds of neat things, like teach the undergraduate capstone course, work on the curriculum, help develop the graduate program, and take my students to Disney for field trips. The students that I had in my women's studies classes -rocked-. They taught me a lot about feminism and about teaching.

     During my last year there, the department celebrated its 25th anniversary by bringing in Rebecca Walker, author of To Be Real: Telling the Truth and Changing the Face of Feminism, as the keynote speaker for the big anniversary bash. I got to chauffer her around and then introduce her at the dinner. I got a teaching award from the students at the dinner. It's one of my best memories. When I picked Rebecca Walker up at the airport, she didn't have any luggage with her, so she asked me to take her to the mall so she could buy some underwear. Then she made a joke that I could tell all my friends I saw her underwear. I told her that it wasn't so special since the entire country had already seen her in her underwear in the movie Primary Colors, which had just been released.

     I left Florida ten years to the day after I got there.

     My favorite Disney character is Heimlich from A Bug's Life. Heimlich spent the entire movie eagerly anticipating the day he would get his wings and turn from a caterpillar to a butterfly. On the day he actually chrysalised, his wings were tiny and he was too fat to get off the ground. So his friends held him up while he flapped his wings and he proudly proclaimed: "Look at my beautiful wings! I'm flying!" There's something about spirit and attitude there I need to learn, I just know it.

     I waited a long time to be a butterfly. And now that I have wings, I'm just too fat and my wings are pretty small, but I have some very cool people who help me to fly, so I count myself very lucky.