Activist literacies book cover.My research engages with the ways that rhetorical practices and power intersect. I am especially interested how rhetoricians and activists understand the links between everyday rhetorical practices and transnational systems of power. 

My book, Activist Literacies: Transnational Feminisms and Social Media Rhetorics, was published October 20, 2022 by the University of South Carolina Press.

My ongoing research builds on the work I began in Activist Literacies to answer additional questions and explore new topics related to activism, disability, digital rhetoric, and globalization. That work fits into three broad themes.

First, I am working on three collaborative projects (a book chapter, a special issue, and an edited collection) about the future of transnational feminist rhetorical studies and the contributions this subfield makes to the field of rhetorical studies.

Second, I have two works in progress (a coauthored article and a second book) about disabled wisdom, crip community, and activist rhetoric. These projects focus especially on communities related to complex chronic diseases such as myalgic encephalomyelitis and Long Covid and their activism during the COVID-19 pandemic.

A third set of projects explores rhetorical education, student activism, and writing program administration in the context of contemporary globalization. One project engages with the globalization of higher education and the travel (and transformation) of disciplinary knowledge and practice in this context. A second project explores how students interested in gender and sexuality activism narrate their political participation and rhetorical education. Both of these projects draw on my experience as an assistant professor and writing program administrator at the American University of Beirut.

Publications

Book

Nish, Jennifer. Activist Literacies: Transnational Feminisms and Social Media Rhetorics. University of South Carolina Press. Oct. 20, 2022.

Articles and Book Chapters

Bastian, Heather and Jennifer Nish. “Toward Disruptive Agency.” College Composition and Communication. (forthcoming in 2023)

Nish, Jennifer. “Representing Precarity, Disavowing Politics: The Exceptional(ist) Appeal of Humans of New York.” Peitho, vol 20, issue 2, 2018.

Nish, Jennifer, Kimberly A. Williams, and L. Ayu Saraswati. “Marching and Crossing Borders: A Transnational Conversation.” Feminist and Queer Theories: A Transnational Reader, eds. L. Ayu Saraswati and Barbara Shaw. Oxford UP. 2020.

Nish, Jennifer. “Rhetorical Genres and Digital Activism in the Pixel Project’s 16 for 16 Listicles.” From Visionaries to Vloggers: Media Revolutions in the Middle East. Eds. Pamela Erskine-Loftus and Hadeel Eltayeb. Akkadia Press. (This book accompanied a museum exhibit on dissent for The Media Majlis at Northwestern University Qatar.)

Nish, Jennifer. “Spreadable Genres, Multiple Publics: The Pixel Project’s Digital Campaigns to Stop Violence against Women.” Genre and the Performance of Publics, eds. Mary Jo Reiff and Anis Bawarshi. Logan, UT: Utah State University Press. 2016.

Textbook

Sinno, Zane, Lina Bioghlu-Karkanawi, Dorota Fleszar, Najla Jarkas, Emma Moughabghab, Jennifer Nish, Rima Rantisi, Abir Ward. Shifting Narratives: A Reader for Academic Writing. Beirut: Educart, 2015.