About Laura

I’m a scholar, educator, and author with a long-standing interest in technology and human communication. My work resides at the intersections of rhetoric, applied linguistics, digital communication, and technology studies. I am Professor Emerita at the University of Minnesota, where I chaired the Department of Writing Studies and taught in the department’s BS, MS, MA, and PhD programs. Throughout my 30+ year academic career, my research attempted to answer questions such as these:

• • How and why did human languages first evolve?
  • Why do humans spend so much time persuading each other, and what oral and written techniques do we use to do this?
  • How do communication technologies—from papyrus to the printing press to the Internet—shape and influence languages, identity, trust, and public discourse?

In addition to research, I taught courses in areas such as technical writing; communication research methods (with an emphasis on qualitative case analysis and online research methods); communication modes and methods; trust and technology.

One of my early books, Persuasion and Privacy in Cyberspace, was the first book-length study to examine online communication and online social movements and among the first to study digital communication using rhetorical analysis. Since then, I’ve continued to research the ethical, cultural, legal, and social impacts of digital media, from early Internet forums to the platforms that shape our lives today.

To understand digital technology, it’s important to also be versed in older communication technologies. To that end, I’m interested in the evolution of human language and writing systems, from cave paintings to hieroglyphs to early alphabets to the printing press.

At Minnesota, I was able to engage in interdisciplinary research and collaborations with colleagues and graduate students in fields as diverse as computer science, law, and public health. I also worked with closer disciplinary fields such as journalism, mass communication, communication studies, English, digital humanities, and linguistics.

Technical writing is another area where I have made contributions, starting with hand-on experience writing software and user manuals. During graduate school, I worked several summers at IBM, converting UNIX manual pages to AIX. I’m the author of several technical communication textbooks, the most well-known of which is Technical Communication, with co-author John M. Lannon, now in its 16th edition.

Throughout my career, I’ve enjoyed presenting my work at conferences around the world and collaborating with scholars and students who are just as curious about communication and technology as I am. I’ve directed many PhD dissertations and masters’ theses, the process of which allows me to continue learning from my students.

I hope you enjoy my website, which is a mix of my academic and personal interests and thoughts. Thanks for visiting!