Robert McDonald, PhD CV

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Assistant Professor Department of Communication Studies, University of Kansas

112 Concord Road
Lawrence, KS, 66049
romcd@ku.edu
254-681-2464 (cell)
Bailey Hall, 4A Lawrence, KS, 66045-7574
785-864-3633 (dept.)
785-864-1280 (office)

Education

Ph. D., Communication Studies, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, concentration in Rhetorical Studies, 2016

Dissertation Title: The Prophets of Incentives: Economic Tropes in Theory, Policy and Culture

Director: Christian Lundberg

Committee: William Balthrop, Lawrence Grossberg, Fredric Jameson, Michael Palm

M. A., Communication Studies, University of Texas at Austin, concentration in Rhetoric and Language,2010

Thesis Title: The Subprime Object of Ideology

Director: Dana Cloud Reader: Joshua Gunn

B. J. with High Honors, University of Texas at Austin, 2008, Journalism

B. A. with High Honors, University of Texas at Austin, 2008, Government

Works in Progress

Works Like a Charm: Incentive Rhetoric and the Economization of Everyday Life, book manuscript in progress

Refereed Journal Articles, Book Reviews & Invited Book Chapters

“Slavoj Žižek and Communication Studies.” In Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Communication.

Oxford University Press. DOI

“Metastasis and Retroactive Causality in Incentive Rhetoric,” Quarterly Journal of Speech vol. 104, no. 4 (2018), 400-21. DOI: 10.1080/00335630.2018.1519257

“From ‘Incentive Furie’ to ‘Incentives to Efficiency,’ or the Movement of ‘Incentive’ in

Neoclassical Thought,” Advances in the History of Rhetoric vol. 21, no. 2 (2018), 115-30. DOI: 10.1080/15362426.2018.1474045

“Democracy in Chains: The Deep History of the Radical Right’s Stealth Plan for America,” Journal of Cultural Economy vol. 11, no. 4 (2018), 371-5. DOI: 10.1080/17530350.2018.1463277

“Freakonomics as a Discourse of Perversion,” International Journal of Žižek Studies, vol. 11, no.2 (2017).

Awards, Honors and Acceptances

Rhetoric Society of America 2019 Summer Institute, Neoliberalism and Rhetorical Scholarship Workshop, College Park, MD, June 2019

College of Liberal Arts and Sciences Faculty Travel Award, January 2018 Hall Center for the Humanities Faculty Travel Grant, December 2018

Hall Center for the Humanities Faculty Colloquium, “The Cultural Lives of Neoliberalism,” University of Kansas, Fall 2016

Nominee, Outstanding Honors Instructor, KU Honors Program, Fall 2016

Rhetoric Society of America 2015 Summer Institute, Rhetoric and Economics Workshop, Madison, WI, June 2015

Royster Society of Fellows five-year endowed fellowship, Graduate School, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Outstanding Achievement in Service and Leadership Award, Department of Communication Studies, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, April 2013

Distinguished Leadership Award, Royster Society of Fellows, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, May 2012

Outstanding Master’s Student, Department of Communication Studies, University of Texas at Austin, May 2010

Laureate Paper, James L. Golden Outstanding Student Essay in Rhetoric for “Asiatic Modes of Resistance: SDS and ‘The New Radicals in the Multiversity,’” May 2009

Outstanding First-Year Graduate Student, Department of Communication Studies, University of Texas at Austin, May 2009

Academic Achievement Award, Department of Communication Studies, University of Texas at Austin, 2008-2009

Communication Studies Graduate Council NCA Annual Convention Travel Scholarship, September2008

Phi Kappa Phi Honors Society, inducted April 2009 Phi Beta Kappa Honors Society, inducted May 2008

Senior Fellow, College of Communication Honors Program, University of Texas at Austin, Fall 2006-Spring 2008

Teaching Appointments

Assistant Professor, Department of Communication Studies, University of Kansas

  1. Rhetoric & Social Influence, Fall 2018
  2. Honors Speaker-Audience Communication, Fall 2018
  3. Rhetoric & Popular Culture, Spring 2019
  4. Cases in Persuasion, Spring 2019

Lecturer, Department of Communication Studies, University of Kansas

  1. Rhetoric & Popular Culture, Fall 2016, Spring 2018
  2. Honors Speaker-Audience Communication, Spring 2016-Spring 2018
  3. Speaker-Audience Communication, Fall 2015-Spring 2016, Spring 2017

Instructor, Department of Communication, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

  1. Rhetoric & Public Issues, Fall 2013
  2. Rhetoric & Public Issues (Online) Fall 2015-Spring 2016
  3. Introduction to Media History, Theory and Criticism, Spring 2012
  4. Introduction to Public Speaking, Spring 2011, Summer 2012

Screening Coordinator, Department of Communication, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

  1. Introduction to Media History, Theory & Criticism, Fall 2013, instructor Neal Thomas

Graduate Research Consultant, Department of Communication, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

  1. Advanced Rhetorical Criticism, Fall 2012, instructor Carole Blair

Teaching Assistant, Department of Communication, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

  1. Rhetoric & Public Issues, Spring 2013, instructor Carole Blair
  2. American Independent Cinema, Spring 2013, instructor Richard Cante
  3. Public Speaking, Fall 2011, Fall 2012 instructor Christian Lundberg
  4. Introduction to Media History, Theory & Criticism, Fall 2011, instructor Michael Palm

Teaching Assistant, Department of Communication Studies, University of Texas at Austin

  1. Fall 2008-Spring 2009, Fall 2009-Spring 2010: Political Communication, instructor Sharon Jarvis
  2. Summer 2009: Communicating about Controversy, instructor Dana Cloud

Competitively Selected Conference Presentations & Responses

“Lacan contra Becker, or When Neoclassical Economic Theory Discovers Metonymy,” LACK Conference, Worchester, MA, May 9, 2019.

“Structure, Sign and Theatre in the Discourse of Derrida and Psychoanalysis,” National Communication Association Annual Convention, Salt Lake City, November 8, 2018.

“On An American Utopia,” National Communication Association Annual Convention, Dallas, November16, 2017.

“Henry Spearman and Neoclassical Prosopopœia,” Economics, Communication and Society Pre- conference, National Communication Association Annual Convention, Dallas, November 15, 2017.

“Neither Nudges nor Liberty: Evaluating the Subject of Behavioral Economics in Social Policy,” American Studies Association Annual Meeting, Chicago, November 9, 2017.

“Metaphor and Metonymy in Gary Becker’s The Economic Approach to Human Behavior,” National Communication Association Annual Convention, Philadelphia, November 11, 2016.

Respondent, “Critical/Cultural Approaches to Economics,” National Communication Association Annual Convention, Philadelphia, November 10, 2016.

“Approaching Gen(d)eral Equilibrium: Equal Pay Legislation and the Language of Incentives,” National Communication Association Annual Convention, Las Vegas, November 20, 2015.

“Neoliberalism? ‘As if!’” National Communication Association Annual Convention, Chicago, November22, 2014.

“Unemployment, Economies of Enjoyment and Truth at Mi-Dit,” International Žižek Studies Conference, University of Cincinnati, April 4, 2014.

“Plato’s Stepchildren: Deleuze in Rhetoric and Composition,” National Communication Association Annual Convention, Washington, D.C., November 21, 2013.

“On The Bonds of Debt: Borrowing against the Common Good,” Value at Risk: Speculative Capital and the Politics of Debt—A Symposium, George Washington University, November 20, 2013.

“Idols of the Marketplace,” National Communication Association Annual Convention, Orlando, November16, 2012.

“Alterity, the Market, and Perverse Enjoyment,” International Žižek Studies Conference, SUNY Brockport, April 29, 2012.

“Finitude’s Wake: Temporality and the Subject in Late Capitalism,” National Communication Association Annual Convention, New Orleans, November 18, 2011.

“The Limits to Communicative Capitalism: A Discourse on Discursivity,” National Communication Association Annual Convention, New Orleans, November 17, 2011.

“The Fin(anci)al Frontier,” National Communication Association Annual Convention, San Francisco, November 17, 2010.

“Negotiating Knowledge and Risk: An Ethnographic Account of Financial Work,” Scholar to Scholar Presentation, National Communication Association Annual Convention, San Francisco, November16, 2010.

“Speaking (Ill) of the Dead: Deliberation, Decorum, and Political Death,” coauthored with Dr.

Bryan McCann, National Communication Association Annual Convention, San Francisco, November16, 2010.

“The Subprime Object of Ideology,” National Communication Association Annual Convention, San Francisco, November 15, 2010.

“Alan Greenspan and the Objects of Financial Ideology,” National Communication Association Annual Convention, November 14, 2010.

“Twilight of the Postmodern Economic Paradigm,” Rhetoric Society of America Biennial Conference, Minneapolis, May 31, 2010.

“Why Not to Blair: The Taste of Hugh Blair and What Not to Wear,” National Communication Association Annual Convention, Chicago, November 15, 2009.

“Asiatic Modes of Resistance: SDS and The New Radicals in the Multiversity,” National Communication Association Annual Convention, Chicago, November 15, 2009.

“‘Before the U.S. Turns into France’: Class Anger and American Capitalism,” National Communication Association Annual Convention, Chicago, November 14, 2009.

“T.I.N.A. Fashion: What Not to Wear, Post-feminism, and the Logic of Consumption,” National Communication Association Annual Convention, Chicago, November 12, 2009.

“Asiatic Modes of Resistance: SDS and the NLF,” 1968: A Global Perspective, University of Texas at Austin, October 12, 2008.

University and Departmental Service

Undergraduate Committee, Department of Communication Studies, University of Kansas, 2018- 2020

Dissertation committee—Matthew Kay, Department of Communication Studies, University of Kansas,2018-present

E. C. Buehler Teaching Fellowship Award Committee, Department of Communication Studies, University of Kansas, 2018

Comprehensive exam committee—Matthew Kay, Department of Communication Studies, University of Kansas, 2017

Departmental Senator, Graduate and Professional Student Federation, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, 2013

Director, Royster Advanced Mentoring Program, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Fall 2012-Spring 2013

President, Graduate Student Association, Department of Communication Studies, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Fall 2012-Spring 2013

Secretary, Graduate Student Association, Department of Communication Studies, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Fall 2011-Spring 2012

Covenant Scholars/Royster Society of Fellows Graduate Mentoring Coordinator, 2011

Professional Memberships and Service

American Studies Association Rhetoric Society of America National Communication Association

  • Chair, Top Paper Panel, Rhetoric & Communication Theory, 2016
  • Reviewer: Critical/Cultural Studies; Rhetoric & Communication Theory; Economics, Communication & Society
  • Nominating Committee Member, Rhetoric & Communication Theory Division, 2014
  • Secretary Nominee, Rhetoric & Communication Theory Division, 2017
  • Recruitment Committee, Economics, Communication & Society Division, 2018-19

Other Work Experience

Associate Editor, The Daily Texan, University of Texas at Austin, Summer 2007

Senior Student Associate, Fine Arts Library, University of Texas at Austin, Fall 2004-Summer 2008

Professional References

  1. Christian Lundberg, Associate Professor, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
  2. V. William Balthrop, Professor, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
  3. Fredric Jameson, Knut Schmidt-Nielsen Professor of Comparative Literature, Duke University