🎙️ Episode 2: “Black Visual Rhetorics, Design, and Becoming the Scholar You’re Meant to Be”

Guest: Dr. Ja’La Wourman, Assistant Professor of English, Howard University Host: Dr. Amanda Patterson Partin

✨ Episode Summary

In this vibrant conversation, Dr. Ja’La Wourman joins La Rhetórica to share her path from military life and world travel to her current role as a rising voice in Black cultural and technical communication. She reflects on the power of mentorship, the transition from graduate student to faculty, and what it means to find authenticity in academic spaces.

Dr. Wourman’s passion shines as she discusses her current reading and writing — exploring Black design, visual rhetorics, and the art of becoming.

📚 What She’s Reading

• The Black Experience in Design — A powerful anthology highlighting Black design perspectives across the diaspora.
• Atomic Habits by James Clear — For balancing personal growth and academic discipline.
• Articles and artwork from the Harlem Renaissance, connecting design, aesthetics, and Black creative expression.
• The newly released Routledge Handbook of Social Justice and Technical Communication featuring contributions from leading Black women scholars in the field.

✍️ What She’s Writing

Dr. Wourman is currently developing an article that introduces a framework for understanding Black Visual Rhetorics, using the Harlem Renaissance as a foundation for exploring aesthetics, design, and cultural expression. She also discusses her involvement in the Black Technical and Professional Communication (TPC) Resource Guide and her vision for future collaborations that push the boundaries of what counts as “technical communication.”

🎙️ Podcast Notes — Episode 1: Navigating the Academy with Dr. Codi Renée Blackmon

Episode Summary: In this debut episode of La Rhetorica, Dr. Amanda Patterson Partin (Anie) sits down with Dr. Codi Renée Blackmon to talk about what it really means to survive and thrive in academic spaces as a woman of color. Together they unpack microaggressions, invisible labor, mentorship, and the beauty of finding community in a field that wasn’t built with us in mind. This is a conversation about care, courage, and the power of showing up.

🌱 Key Topics:

• The invisible labor and “emotional tax” of women of color in academia
• Mentorship that heals, not just advises
• Navigating microaggressions and gaslighting in graduate programs
• The labor of belonging and the necessity of community
• The radical act of rest and refusal in academic spaces

📚 Books & Resources Mentioned:

• Dr. Bettina L. Love — We Want to Do More Than Survive: Abolitionist Teaching and the Pursuit of Educational Freedom 🔗 Buy on Bookshop.org Essential reading for understanding how education can be a site of both harm and healing—and what abolitionist teaching looks like in practice.
• bell hooks — Talking Back: Thinking Feminist, Thinking Black 🔗 Bookshop.org Link The inspiration for Season 1 of La Rhetorica, this book explores what it means for Black women to speak truth to power in spaces designed to silence them.
• Audre Lorde — Sister Outsider 🔗 Bookshop.org Link A foundational collection on voice, resistance, and the intersections of identity.
• Sara Ahmed — On Being Included: Racism and Diversity in Institutional Life 🔗 Bookshop.org Link