LGBTQ Studies, feminist and queer theory, television studies, friendship studies and rhetoric, critical trauma studies and rhetoric, and Appalachian studies
David holds a B.A. in English and Humanities from Milligan College and an MAIS in Women and Gender Studies and an MA in English literature, both from Mason. They are also currently a doctoral candidate in the Writing and Rhetoric Program at Mason, where their dissertation research looks at the rhetoric of trauma and friendships in Post 2010 television.
They began their role in Women and Gender Studies in 2013 where they served as the graduate assistant for the program. In addition to this role, they served in LGBTQ Resources from 2014-2015 as a graduate assistant and in 2016 was hired on full time as the program coordinator for Women and Gender Studies. Beginning in 2019, David was hired on as full time faculty and has since become the associate director of Women and Gender Studies and is now in a joint appointment with the School of Integrative Studies. In their current role, they teach 6 courses a year, supervise all of the staff in the program, coordinate the course schedule and catalog revisions, keep the space open, and advise our undergraduate students.
Their current research focuses on arguing for a rhetoric of trauma through the creation of friendships in television. Currently, they are focusing on representations of trauma in 13 Reasons Why, Private Practice, and The End of the F***ing World and how the spectator is conditioned to identify with the main character's trauma while ignoring and even chastising the trauma of other characters. Furthermore, friendships created during these instances become central not only to the plot, but more importantly to what rhetorics of trauma that TV perpetuates.
WMST 100: Global Representations of Women
WMST 200: Introduction to Women and Gender Studies
WMST 208: Introduction to LGBTQ Studies
WMST 300: Masculinities in the Media and Literature
WMST 300: Race, Gender, and the Late Twentieth Century
WMST 300: Gender, Sexuality, and Friendships
WMST 318: Race, Gender, Sexuality, and the Environment
WMST 330: Feminist Theories of Gender, Sexuality, and Race
WMST 375: Gender, Race, Sexuality, and TV
WMST 402: Queer Theory
INTS 347: Gender Representation in Popular Culture
ENGH 101: Composition
B.A. Milligan College
M.A. George Mason University
MAIS George Mason University
Doctoral candidate in Writing and Rhetoric, George Mason University
2019 College Composition and Communication, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania “Can TV be a Form of Social Justice?: Integrating Television into the Writing Classroom”
2019 Southwest Popular Culture and American Culture Conference, Albuquerque New Mexico “Who Owns the Narrative?: Gender, Friendship and Narrative Capital in 13 Reasons Why”
2018 College Composition and Communication, Kansas City, Missouri "The Feminist (Un) Consciousness of Writing Studies: An Analysis of a Decade of Research Trends in Four Major Writing Studies Journals" Co-presenter with Robyn Russo, Thomas Polk, and Lacey Wooton
2018 Southwest Popular Culture and American Culture Conference, Albuquerque New Mexico "This is Man: The Rhetoric of Silence and Masculinity in This is Us"
2017 Southwest Popular Culture and American Culture Conference, Albuquerque New Mexico "The Queerness of Straight Masculinity in Dawson's Creek"
2016 Southwest Popular Culture and American Culture Conference, Albuquerque, New Mexico “Lucy Audley’s Deadly Secrets: Power, Violence, and Masculinity in Mary Elizabeth Braddon’s Lady Audley’s Secret”