Mary Hocks
Associate Professor English- Education
Ph.D., University of Illinois, 1994
- Specializations
Rhetoric and Composition
- Biography
Dr. Mary Hocks is an Associate Professor of English at Georgia State University in downtown Atlanta. Dr. Hocks teaches in the undergraduate and graduate Rhetoric and Composition program, and she specializes specifically in digital rhetoric, visual rhetorics, and computers and composition studies. She is also a faculty affiliate with the Institute for Women’s, Gender and Sexuality Studies.
Dr. Hocks received her Ph.D. in English from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 1994, the first graduate of its new Center for Writing Studies. She worked at Spelman College as Director of the Comprehensive Writing Program and as Principle Investigator of a $400,000 Mellon Foundation grant to integrate multimedia into Writing Intensive classrooms. At Georgia State University, she was the founding Director of the Writing Across the Curriculum Program from 1998 – 2005.
Dr. Hocks has published articles in the journals College Composition and Communication, Pre/Text, Computers and Composition, Works and Days, Computers and Composition Online, and Writing Program Administration, the last of which won the WPA journal’s outstanding article biennial award. She has published books chapters in Webbing Cyberfeminist Practice, Virtual Publics: Policy and Community in an Electronic Age, Electronic Communication Across the Curriculum, Teaching Writing With Computers, and Feminist Cyberscapes.
Her book collection, Eloquent Images: Word and Image in the Age of New Media, appeared from MIT University Press in 2003 and was co-edited with the late Dr. Michelle Kendrick. Her co-authored Handbook of Technical Communication(with Dr. Laura Gurak) was published by Pearson Higher Education in 2009. Dr. Hocks also served as co-producer and is credited co-author (with Dr. Anne Balsamo) of Women of the World Talk Back, an interactive multimedia documentary based on original scholarly research and digital media design. This book-weight DVD was published and packaged with the print book Designing Culture from Duke University Press in 2011. Dr. Hocks is currently completing a book with Dr. Michelle Comstock about sonic literacy and rhetorical resonance.
Dr. Mary Hocks also released her first album Spinning the Sky in July 2008, working as Executive Producer, Composer, and Performer. This independent full-length album of original music (lyrics and music) was recorded and engineered at Hollow Reed Arts Studio in Asheville, NC.
- Publications
Books
The Technical Communication Handbook. With Laura J. Gurak. New York: New York: Pearson-Longman, 2009. 639 pages.
Eloquent Images: Word and Image in the Age of New Media. With Michelle R. Kendrick. Cambridge: MIT University Press, 2003. 328 pages. Re-released 2005 in paperback.
Articles and Chapters
“Cyberfeminism Intersects Writing Research: Studies in Digital Rhetoric.” InWebbing Cyberfeminist Practice: Communities, Pedagogies, and Social Action. Ed. Kristine Blair, Radhika Gajjala and Christine Tulley. Cresskill, NJ: Hampton Press, 2008. 235-253.
“Voice in the Cultural Soundscape: Sonic Literacy in Composition Studies.” With Michelle Comstock. Computers and Composition. Special Issue on Sound in/as Compositional Space. 23:3 (Fall 2006). Online.
“Understanding Visual Rhetoric in Digital Environments.” College Composition and Communication. 54:4 (June 2003): 629-656.
“Women Making Multimedia: Possibilities for Feminist Activism.” With Anne Balsamo. Virtual Publics: Policy and Community in an Electronic Age. Beth Kolko, Ed. New York: Columbia University Press, 2003. 192-214.
“Using Multimedia to Teach Communication Across the Curriculum.” WPA: Writing Program Administration. 25:1-2 (Fall/Winter 2001). 25-43.
“Toward a Visual Critical Electronic Literacy.” Works and Days. 17&18: 1 & 2 (Spring/Fall 1999): 157-172.
“Feminist Interventions in Electronic Environments.” Computers and Composition. 16:1 (1999): 107-119.“Designing Feminist Multimedia for the United Nations Fourth World Conference on Women.” In Feminist Cyberscapes: Essays on Gender in Electronic Spaces. Pamela Takayoshi and Kristine Blair, Eds. New Directions in Computers and Composition Studies Series. Gail E Hawisher and Cynthia L. Selfe. Eds. Stamford, CT: Ablex, 1999. 285-296.
Interactive Documentary (DVD)
Women of the World Talk Back [DVD-ROM]. With Anne Balsamo. In Designing Culture: A Work of the Technological Imagination by Anne Balsamo. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2011. Book-weight DVD packaged with print book. Co-producer and credited co-author of interactive documentary based on original scholarly research and digital media design.