Please note: For questions about add codes or courses, please contact the Writing Program Advisor, Audrey Youngblood (ayoungblood@hfa.ucsb.edu).
People
Amy Propen teaches courses in rhetoric and professional writing, including Writing About Sustainability, Multimedia Writing, and Technical Writing. Her research interests focus on visual-material and environmental rhetorics, posthumanism, animal studies, and rhetoric as advocacy. Her recent book, Visualizing Posthuman Conservation in the Age of the Anthropocene, was published with The Ohio State University Press in 2018. Her new book, At Home in the Anthropocene, is a follow-up to Visualizing Posthuman Conservation and was published in 2022 with The Ohio State UP.
- Lecturer
Kevin Rutherford teaches a variety of courses, including Writing 1E, 2, 2E, 50, 50E, 105C, 105CD, 105M, 105R, 107B, and 109F.
Bob Samuels teaches Writing for Public Discourse (105PD), Writing for the Social Sciences (109SS), Writing for the Teaching Professions (109ED), and Rhetoric and Writing (105R).
Beth teaches Approaches to University Writing (Writ 1), Academic Writing (Writ 2), Writing for the Teaching Professions (109ED), Rhetoric and Writing (105R), and Writing for the Humanities (109HU). She also teaches Theory and Practice of Writing Center Consultation (160) for those who are interested in tutoring writing. She has a PhD in Composition and Rhetoric from Miami University, and her research interests are focused on affect theory, pedagogy, and teacher development.
A graduate of UCSB’s PhD Program in Comparative Literature, John joined the Writing Program after defending his dissertation, Sonic Alterities, with distinction in August of 2022. John completed doctoral emphases in Writing Studies and Translation Studies and currently teaches Writing 2 and Writing 105. His Writing Studies capstone examined sound and the rhetoric of classroom space from antiquity to the virtual. An avid interdisciplinarian, John has also taught and designed courses in nuero-humanities, sound studies and African American music and literature.
Kenny Smith is co-chair of the Writing Placement Committee along with Madeleine Sorapure and Sarah Hirsch. He also teaches introductory composition (Writing 1 & 2), writing and the philosophy of language (Writing 105P), and scientific communication courses (Writing 109ST, Writing 105SW, and Writing 159A). His research focuses on how literacy skills transfer from the classroom to the outside world, particularly in regard to the interpretation of scientific texts and journalism. When not playing video games and reading all the things, he has been known to listen to a considerable amount of music, especially if it has synthesizers and a catchy beat.
Madeleine Sorapure teaches Multimedia Writing, Document Design and Production, Digital Portfolio, and Digital Storytelling. She is co-director of the Multimedia Communication track of the Professional Writing Minor and author of articles on the rhetoric of data visualization, multimodal composing and pedagogy published in Kairos, Computers and Composition, Big Data & Society, Journal of Business and Technical Communication, and elsewhere. She is also an associate dean in the Division of Undergraduate Education.
Amanda Stansell teaches Writing 2LK with Sociology, 109ED, 109CS, and the E sequence. She is also co-director of the Science Communication Track with the Professional Writing Minor.
Christian Thomas is a continuing lecturer in the Writing Program and the Associate Director of the Center for Digital Games Research. He teaches Rome: The Game (WRIT/ARTHI W6R), How Games Tell Stories (INT 36GS), Writing about Film (WRIT 109F), Multimedia Writing (WRIT 105M), Writing for Public Speaking (WRIT 105PS), Writing and the Research Process (WRIT 50), and Academic Writing (WRIT 2).
Lauren Vallicella teaches Writing 1, Writing 2, and Writing for the Humanities (109HU). A graduate of UCSB, Lauren participated in the doctoral emphasis in Writing Studies while completing her PhD in Theater and Dance. Her research interests include intersections between literature and dance in the early twentieth century, affect and empathy in the classroom, and choreography (writing with the body) as rhetoric.
Vickie Vértiz's writing is featured in the New York Times magazine, the Los Angeles Review of Books, KCET Departures, and the San Francisco Chronicle, among many others. Her book Palm Frond with Its Throat Cut won the 2018 PEN America literary prize in poetry. Vértiz teaches creative nonfiction, writing for Chicanx Studies. Her research interests include drag culture, feminist and queer art, film, and performance, experimental writing, and writing for community engagement. She earned an M.F.A. from UC-Riverside in nonfiction, a Master’s degree in public affairs from UT-Austin, and a B.A. in political science from Williams College.
Nicole Warwick teaches Writing 1, 2, 105R, and 109ED. She also serves as a TA Supervisor in the Writing Program. Her research treats graduate student experiences in TA preparation programs with additional interests that include narrative study, alternative rhetorics, and minor transnational theory.
Martha Webber teaches Writing 1, 2, 105PD, 107B, and 107WC for the program. She has a PhD in English with a specialization in Writing Studies from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (and even an AA in Fashion Design). Her research on nonprofit organizations and literacy sponsorship has been published in Reflections: A Journal of Community-Engaged Writing and Rhetoric. Her creative writing, including short humor, has appeared in journals including Slackjaw, Paper Darts, and Bending Genres.
Alison Williams primarily teaches media communications, including 107P, 105C, 107M, 107DJ, and 107V, as well as Writing 2. Alison comes to UCSB with a career in public relations and marketing for entertainment and advertising, and she holds an MFA Creative Writing and MA English from Chapman University. Her own writing has been published in literary, scholarly, and mainstream publications.
Kali Yamboliev teaches a range of academic writing courses, including lower-division courses like Writing 1, Writing 2, and Writing 50 and upper-division courses in the 105 and 107 series, including Writing for Business, Writing for Public Relations, Magazine Writing for Publication, and Science Writing for the Public. She has also worked in translation, editing, and publishing for the past ten years, and is currently a co-editor for Starting Lines, the Writing Program’s anthology of student writing. Her research interests center on the rhetorical strategies politicians, the media, and the public use to create ideas of ethnic and national belonging, with a focus on anti-immigrant rhetoric in Italy, both historical and contemporary.
Genggeng Zhang teaches Writing 2 and 109ST for the program. Genggeng received her PhD in Applied Linguistics from Penn State University. She is interested in discipline-specific and multilingual writing, academic literacy development, and computer-assisted writing pedagogy. Her work has appeared in the Journal of English for Academic Purposes, English for Specific Purposes, and the Journal of Second Language Studies.