Department of Communication Professor Receives National Awards for Outstanding Research

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Meredith Neville-Shepard, assistant professor of communication.

Meredith Neville-Shepard, assistant professor in the Department of Communication in the Fulbright College of Arts and Sciences, has received two awards for outstanding research from the National Communication Association.

The American Studies Division of NCA named Neville-Shepard the recipient of the 2023 Outstanding Article Award for her essay entitled, "'Better Never Means Better for Everyone': White Feminist Necropolitics and Hulu's The Handmaid's Tale." The article was published as lead essay in an issue of the Quarterly Journal of Speech, which is one of the most esteemed outlets in the field of rhetorical studies and—dating back to 1915—the oldest peer-reviewed journal in the discipline. In her work, Neville-Shepard critiques the rhetoric of popular feminism through an analysis of a critically acclaimed U.S. streaming series, exemplifying the American Studies Division's mission to draw "connections between communication texts and practices and American cultures."

The Philosophy of Communication Division of NCA also recognized Neville-Shepard's Quarterly Journal of Speech article with their 2023 Distinguished Journal Article Award. In her essay, Neville-Shepard engages historian and political philosopher Achille Mbembe's theory of necropolitics, a framework which locates modern power in the politics of death. The article award from this division acknowledges her scholarly contribution to political philosophy and theory.

Neville-Shepard will be recognized by each of these divisions when she travels to National Harbor, Maryland, in November to attend the 2023 National Communication Association Convention. During the convention, Neville-Shepard will also present some of her current research. Notably, her essay titled "Uniform Choices: Elastic Feminism and the Rhetoric of the 2020 Olympic 'PantyWar'" has been selected to appear on the Feminist and Gender Studies Division's "Top Papers" panel.

About the National Communication Association: The National Communication Association advances Communication as the discipline that studies all forms, modes, media and consequences of communication through humanistic, social scientific and aesthetic inquiry. The NCA serves the scholars, teachers and practitioners who are its members by enabling and supporting their professional interests in research and teaching. Dedicated to fostering and promoting free and ethical communication, the NCA promotes the widespread appreciation of the importance of communication in public and private life, the application of competent communication to improve the quality of human life and relationships, and the use of knowledge about communication to solve human problems. The NCA supports inclusiveness and diversity among our faculties, within our membership, in the workplace and in the classroom; the NCA supports and promotes policies that fairly encourage this diversity and inclusion.