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After the civil rights movement, affirmative action drove discussions of diversity on college campuses in the United States. Stakeholders of affirmative action saw that diversity for diversity's sake was not enough to justify programs and policies at academic institutions. Typically, discussions of policies and classroom inclusion strategies have been driven by faculty and institutions treating students as beneficiaries of these policies and strategies, but they are often not consulted and their perspectives are not included in instruction and policy development. This study explores student communication about diversity because the US is at a cultural-crossroads where racial, ethnic, religious, sexual orientation, gender, and disability diversity are under political pressure. From these voices, we discovered a struggle with defining diversity, conflict over labeling a campus as diverse, minimizing experiences of discrimination and bias, and a need for visible administrative support of diversity and inclusion. The results of this study provide insight into how we can improve communication about diversity on campus and beyond. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study examines narratives told by employees who experienced involuntary job loss. Results expand on previous narrative research investigating the American Dream master narrative and job loss as related to the neoliberal claim that those who work hard will be successful. The study investigated the master narrative's implications for job loss that if someone loses their job, they must be either flawed or a bad worker. Contributions include a new redeemed-resolved identity construction by individuals who narrated job loss as an opportunity to correct some flaw in either their character or work life and to emerge a better, changed worker. In addition, the study contributes analysis of an additional counterstory type that provides insight into the ways people reconstruct damaged identities throughout their job loss experience. As family, friends, and coworkers of those who lose their jobs, we can contribute to their well-being and facilitate their return to work by affirming their counter narratives, refusing to accept the master narrative, and helping them develop counterstories as needed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study explored frequencies of everyday talk in stepfamilies and the extent to which such frequencies of talk differed according to family relationship type. Participants included a parent, stepparent, and stepchild from 114 stepfamilies. Across relationship types, stepfamily members reported catching up, joking around, and recapping the day's events most frequently and interrogating family members least frequently. Significant differences in frequencies of everyday talk across different relational dyads emerged for all three members of the stepfamily system. However, relatively few differences emerged in stepchildren's reported frequencies of everyday talk with their stepparents and their nonresidential parents. Keywords: Conflict; Everyday Talk; Nonresidential Parents; Stepfamilies; Stepparent-Stepchild Relationships, Over the last decade, communication scholars have shown an increased interest in the everyday interactions that create, maintain, and alter personal relationships (e.g., Baxter, 2004; Dainton & Stafford, 1993; Duck, [...]

Abstract: This study explores female veteran's identity construction, maintenance, and reproduction. Participants included all members of one regional veteran organization, the Women Accepted for Voluntary Emergency Services in the Navy [...]

This incarnation of the editor for Communication Studies embarked on an interesting journey involving the creation of a mentorship review board (the term was coined by a departmental colleague, Kathryn [...]

Working adults (N = 210) read five workplace bullying narratives that varied in level of coherence and emotionality. Participants then completed a survey exploring the relationship between the way bullied targets tell their story and attributions made about the situation and involved parties. Results show coherent stories with little reference to emotion were viewed more positively than non-linear stories where the narrator discussed strong emotion. Finally, when the narrator discussed having strong emotional reactions they were perceived to be more at fault in the situation. This study advances our understanding of narrative telling and attributions in workplace bullying situations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study examined narratives targets of workplace bullying told about their difficult work experiences along with how co-workers were framed in these narratives. Three different narrative types emerged from their accounts: chaos, report, and quest narratives. Co-worker responses of support or lack thereof were related to the construction of various narrative forms and the level of narrative agency evident in target accounts. The study has important implications for the difference co-workers can make in a target’s ability to withstand bullying and narrate his or her experience. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]