33 courses with the subject COM, each shown exactly as we captured it from the college's catalog, with every element we hold. Where the wording looks broken, that is our reading of the catalog, not the college's text.
COM 101Principles of Oral Communication
Instructor Smith, Baugh, Pariyadath Examination and implementation of both classical and contemporary principles of effective oral communication. Individual presentations informed by readings, discussions, lectures, and examinations of key speeches. Satisfies the Literary Studies, Creative Writing, and Rhetoric requirements. Prerequisites & Notes (Fall and Spring)
Instructor Martinez A survey of the nature and processes of communication. Begins with basic concepts of communication, including language, nonverbal processes, perception, listening, and adaptation to audiences; then examines communication in specific contexts, including intrapersonal, interpersonal, small group, organizational, public, and mass communication. Satisfies the Literary Studies, Creative Writing, and Rhetoric requirements. Satisfies a Communication Studies Interdisciplinary minor requirement. Prerequisites & Notes This course is intended for students interested in the Communication Studies major or minor; it is required for the major (before the end of junior year) and minor. Non-majors or minors with interest in taking the course must ask permission from the department chair of Communication Studies (ammartinez@davidson.edu) before enrolling.
Instructor Smith A survey of methods in rhetorical analysis of oral, written, and visual discourses. Covers neo-classical criticism, Burkean dramatism, narrative, metaphoric, genre, and social movement criticism, and various ideological and post-structural methods, including feminist criticism and postmodern criticism. Satisfies the Literary Studies, Creative Writing, and Rhetoric requirements. Satisfies a Communication Studies major and minor requirement.
Instructor Martinez This course is designed to introduce students to the basic theoretical and practical principles of quantitative/scientific and qualitative/interpretive research methods we use to study communication problems and processes. We will focus on the critical analysis, evaluation, and use of quantitative and qualitative communication research methods by forming research questions, working with resources such as academic journals, popular culture, and the internet. The goals of the course are to assist students in acquiring the ability to understand communication research methods, critique and analyze the value of communication research studies, and to conduct basic research to answer communication questions and solve communication problems. Students will gain experience with common research formats and a culminating opportunity to develop their own research proposals. Satisfies Communication Studies major and minor requirement. Satisfies Social-Scientific Thought requirement.
Instructor Bailey This course will teach students how to navigate contentious issues during a time of upheaval and uncertainty and help them develop the skills and understanding to know when debate or deliberation is the best way to grapple with a complex-emotionally-charged subject. We will explore why anger and passion can sometimes be used as effective tools - when challenged properly - to effectively communicate across difference, as well as how to determine when disengagement is more effective than engagement, and vice versa. This course is designed for students ready to grapple with how to maintain critical thinking skills through discomfort. Satisfies Communication Studies major and minor requirement.
Instructor Bailey This course will teach students how to navigate contentious discussions concerning race in a browning America that swung from the first black president to the man who rose to national political prominence by pushing the idea the first black president wasn’t fully American. We will explore how media are handling and mishandling the use of race in the current political environment, how to honestly contend with the issue of race across political lines, and compare and contrast the coverage of race during the Obama-Trump era to contentious eras from the mid-20th century to the early 21th century. The class is being designed for a mix of liberal, conservative and independent-minded students Satisfies Digital & Screen Media major requirement. Satisfies Communication Studies major and minor requirement. Satisfies the Literary Studies, Creative Writing, and Rhetoric requirement
Instructor Martinez This course is based on the intergroup dialogue model where two facilitators of differing social identity groups encourage dialogue among class members about persistent social issues and conflicts related to race, racism, and its intersections with other social identities such as class, gender, sexual orientation, religion and immigration/migration background. The intergroup dialogue approach to teaching about race and racism in the United States is pedagogically unique. The class is balanced with approximately half of the students self-identifying as White and the other half identifying as Students of Color or racial minorities in the United States and at Davidson College. Classroom diversity, balance and size is critical for building the trust and safety necessary for a racially diverse class to deeply engage the topic of race and multicultural education as a practice. Through interactive activities, in-class dialogues, course readings, and self-reflective writing assignments, students will learn about important issues and perspectives facing the participating populations on campus and in the United States. This course is by permission only and a pre-registration survey must be completed before the instructors determine the final class roster. Satisfies a Communication Studies major and minor requirement Satisfies the Social-Scientific Thought requirement Satisfies the Justice, Equality, and Community requirement Prerequisites & Notes This course is by permission only
Instructor Spikes This class explore masculinities from a communication perspective that centers it as socially constructed, performative, contextual, cultural, and negotiated. We will examine how the discourse of masculinities changed over time, the time periods that heralded those discursive changes, how certain masculinities emerge as hegemonic, and how different identity markers affect the construction of masculinities. Satisfies Literary Studies, Creative Writing, and Rhetoric requirement Satisfies the Justice, Equality, and Community requirement.
Instructor Martinez Examination of the social construction of gender in both personal relationships and professional contexts. Areas to be explored may include culture, verbal and nonverbal communication, family dynamics and close relationships, education, organizational communication, and roles in media. Satisfies Communication Studies major and minor requirement. Satisfies Sociology major requirement Satisfies Gender and Sexuality Studies major and minor requirement. Satisfies the Justice, Equality, and Community requirement
Instructor Staff A theoretical, practical, and experiential study of the selective, systemic, and individual transactions that allow people to reflect and build personal knowledge of one another and create shared meaning. Readings, discussions, and exercises focus on connecting concepts and models to everyday interactions. Included are issues of diversity, personal identity, human perceptions, language use, mindful listening, conflict management, and nonverbal communication. Satisfies Communication Studies major and minor requirement. Satisfies the Social-Scientific Thought requirement
Instructor Pollard Study of how communication creates and sustains organizations and is coordinated and controlled to achieve collective outcomes. Such topics as leadership, globalization, workplace collaboration, diversity, and crisis communication will connect theoretical concepts and models to today’s changing world. Satisfies an interdisciplinary minor requirement in Communication Studies. Satisfies Literary Studies, Creative Writing, and Rhetoric requirement.
Instructor Bailey “Tell me a story,” is one of the most powerful invitations in human communication, and narrative forms - from podcasts such as “Serial” to everyday newspaper and web reporting - communicate information through compelling storylines and characters. Yet narratives also can mislead and misrepresent, depending on their point of view, factual veracity, research support, sourcing and ethics. This course will draw on analysis of a variety of narrative journalism forms as well as hands-on work and visits from top practitioners in considering the elements and standards of good journalism and the role and influence of narrative in media and culture. Satisfies Communication Studies major and minor requirement Satisfies Literary Studies, Creative Writing, and Rhetoric requirement
Instructor Drew This course will give students practical experience in television news producing: finding stories, conducting interviews, shooting video, writing scripts, and editing elements to produce final pieces. Both live television and documentary-style coverage will be considered and practiced. The class will discuss investigations, the use of social media in journalism, and legal and ethical considerations when news gathering and reporting. Coursework will include case studies of recent and current national news coverage and conversations with journalists reporting those stories. Satisfies English major and minor requirement.
Instructor Bailey Students wanting to better understand our contentious political era have a unique opportunity to explore how politics intersects with criminal justice efforts. Students will learn the basics of solid, ethical journalism and on-the-ground reporting. That will include reporting on issues such as race, inequality, health care, hyper-partisanship and interviewing city, county, state and national-level officials to craft pieces for potential publication online, The Davidsonian and other local media outlets. Satisfies Communication Studies major and minor requirement Satisfies Digital and Screen Media major requirement Satisfies English major requirement Satisfies Literary Studies, Creative Writing, and Rhetoric requirement Satisfies Justice, Equality, and Community requirement
Instructor Martinez This course will evaluate mass media and its role in contemporary society using sociological lenses of conflict theory. Specifically, we will use Fisher’s capitalist realism lens in learning about the boundaries placed on self and society within a capitalist system that produces alienation and mental illness. This course will evaluate how mainstream (“old”) and online (“new”) media perpetuate these boundaries and reinforce capitalist realism. In part of doing so, we will collectively develop new strategies for organizing online society to challenge rather than reinforce capitalist realism. Additionally, we will learn about the first set of digitally-instigated social revolutions that took place in the early 2010s across the Arab World, known as the “Arab Spring.” Beyond performing a case study of these revolutions, we will apply what we learned from these social movements to contemporary social movements that have also been promoted by the internet and digital medias. In particular, we will assess what lessons can be drawn from the Arab Spring to apply to 1) the 2019 protests in India against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), and 2) the 2020 Black Lives Matter protests against the murders of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor. Finally, we will study canonical critiques of the political economy of mass media - the “propaganda model” popularized by Herman & Chomsky in “Manufacturing Consent” - and apply these ideas to contemporary society, online media and social movements. We will end the semester by gaining an understanding of how digitally-instigated social movements provide new hopes for overcoming capitalist realism. Satisfies Communication Studies major and minor requirement Satisfies Sociology major requirement Satisfies Social Science requirement Satisfies the Justice, Equality, and Community requirement
Instructor Pariyadath This course explores issues related to the intercultural communication process. We will consider the important role of context (social, cultural, and historical) in intercultural interactions. We will examine the complex relationship between culture and communication from three conceptual perspectives: the social psychological perspective, the interpretive perspective, and the critical perspective. It is through these three conceptual perspectives that we will strive towards a comprehensive picture of intercultural communication. From applying these approaches to the study of intercultural communication, we will also come to appreciate the complexity and dialectical tensions involved in intercultural interactions. This learning process should enhance self-reflection, flexibility, and sensitivity in intercultural communication which students will likely find useful whether interested in studying or working abroad or simply wanting to become better informed intercultural communicators in our increasingly diverse nation and world. Satisfies Communication Studies major and minor requirement Satisfies the Justice, Equality, and Community requirement
Instructor Staff Explores the distinction-theoretically, historically, and in contemporary public discourse- between persuasion and propaganda. Surveys and provides background in the various meanings and applications of the terms persuasion and propaganda in theory and practice. Through both scholarly research and case studies, it helps students become more sophisticated and critical consumers of persuasion and propaganda in the “marketplace of ideas.” Satisfies Communication Studies major and minor requirement Satisfies a Literary Studies, Creative Writing, and Rhetoric requirement
Instructor Bailey Students will be taught how to use journalistic skills and ethics to better harness the power empathy adds to storytelling on extremely sensitive subjects such as race, politics, gender, etc. The best defense against unethical news products is to understand how to produce real journalism that meets the highest journalistic standards. To that end, students will analyze a variety of subjects from multiple disciplines through the lens of journalistic ethics. They will be responsible for helping shape and guide class discussion on designated books and articles. They will conduct a semester-long project researching and writing about a difficult story that concerns their family, or a broader vexing-societal issue. Satisfies Digital and Screen Media major requirement. Satisfies Communication Studies major and minor requirement. Satisfies the Literary Studies, Creative Writing, and Rhetoric requirement Satisfies the Justice, Equality, and Community requirement.
Instructor Baugh, Horowitz In a moment when histories, cultures, and communities are being actively erased from official narratives, and mediated propaganda has accelerated due to advanced AI, scholars, community leaders, and community archivists continue to draw from memory studies to preserve knowledge, stories, and histories in community archives. These archives function as material rhetorics of resistance. This course will blend theory, analysis, and application to help students understand and practice archival memory. Grounded in intersectional feminist theories, rhetorical theories of social movements, and critical memory studies, students will engage in in-depth discussion and analysis of multiple grassroots resistance movements. As the culminating project, students will work in conjunction with Justice, Equality, and Community Archivist Rosa de Jong to apply their foundational knowledge in creating an archive of LGBTQ student experiences at Davidson College. Satisfies Communication Studies major requirement. Satisfies Gender and Sexuality Studies major and minor requirement. Satisfies Justice, Equality, and Community requirement.
Instructor Martinez An exploration of relevant theories and practices of conducting media effects research in the mass mediated/disseminated communication contexts including television, radio, print, popular culture, internet, and other forms of new media. Topics include health, advertising, edutainment, stereotypes, violence, pornography, music videos, video games, news, and politics. Satisfies a major requirement in Sociology Satisfies Communication Studies major and minor requirement Satisfies Film and Media Studies interdisciplinary minor requirement
Instructor Bailey “Fake news” has long been with us. But in recent years, it has become a staple in our political discourse and shapes how many Americans view politics and their fellow human beings. It even led to a North Carolina man driving to Washington, D.C. to shoot up a pizza parlor because he had been convinced the restaurant was home to a supposed child sex ring led by Hillary Clinton - as well as a literal insurrection attempt on our Capitol building. Not every negative effect of fake news is that dramatic, but the less dramatic forms have had an even more profound effect on personal relationships of all sorts. In this course, students will be taught how to spot fake news, counter it, as well as inoculate themselves by learning how to produce real, ethical news. Satisfies Communication Studies major and minor requirement Satisfies Literary Studies, Creative Writing, and Rhetoric requirement
Instructor Martinez The oldest and most trusted form of human communication is word of mouth. The most developed and pervasive is mass media. Now comes social media, incorporating the qualities of both: word of mouth at the speed of light. Its existence, effects, and widespread usage will anchor the focus of this course as social media platforms indeed amplify and alter our communication modes and styles. We will contemplate how social media works and where the various platforms are taking our world. Students will explore the underpinnings of social media and impacts on culture, media, politics and business. This course is intended for Communication Studies majors or minors with previous Communication Studies elective experience. Satisfies Communication Studies major and minor requirement
COM 330Telling the stories of the ignored and forgotten
Instructor Bailey A recent Davidson College graduate largely avoided talking about a childhood friend for his first few years at Davidson because of shame. That childhood friend was given a 15-year-prison sentence around the time that student was being admitted to Davidson. But when he finally found the courage to tell the story through an independent project, it changed him, his friend, and those who didn’t know much about the criminal justice system. And it led to his friend’s release 12 years early. In this course, we will find the courage and develop the skills to tell the stories of the ignored and forgotten in your life, those you don’t know well, and those you should know. Satisfies Communication Studies major and minor requirement. Satisfies Justice, Equality, and Community requirement.
Instructor Martinez This course centers humor communication and comedy studies with a focus on stereotypes in various public and mass communication realms, including entertainment media, stand-up comedy, interpersonal and small group settings. Theoretical frameworks on prejudice, discrimination, intersectionality, social and personal identities, and backstage/frontstage racism will anchor the course towards a critical understanding of how stereotypes, as mental shortcuts and oversimplified kernels of truth, function in their many communicative manifestations. The particular focus on the intersection of stereotypes and humor interrogates a context in which anything goes and even the most otherwise controversial, sensitive hot button topics are given a pass under the guise of humor. Many types of stereotypes take center stage in this course with special attention to those that undermine and marginalize underrepresented populations. We will consider the great potential stereotype humor holds to impact intergroup interaction dynamics in the real world. This is a discussion-based course that relies heavily upon student participation in each class meeting. The participation basis is a major component of the course grade composition. Furthermore, this is a permission-only course. If you are interested in enrolling in this course, please contact ammartinez@davidson.edu . Satisfies Communication Studies major and minor requirement. Satisfies Sociology major requirement. Satisfies Sociology major requirement.
Instructor Bailey, Martinez The U.S. population continues to become increasingly more diverse, and this increased diversity creates newer, greater challenges for organizations (including government, nonprofit, and corporate entities) as well as for individual communicators. How do our upbringing and biases shape the way we characterize, interact with, and talk about others? The focus of this course is to introduce students to issues of power, race, class, and gender, as related to communication theory and practice. Satisfies Communication Studies major and minor requirement Satisfies the Justice, Equality, and Community requirement
Instructor Staff This course is an examination of the role of public space in contemporary civic life. In this course we will consider what it means to study spaces/places as communicative and rhetorical. In doing so, we will explore the following inquiries: How do places communicate in material, symbolic and discursive ways? What is the role of space in shaping, maintaining and transforming social interactions and political orders? How do places enact differential relationships of publicity, prescribe models for participation in public life and determine who counts as a legitimate member of “the” public? What happens when public space is reproduced electronically or virtually? The first section of the course will introduce students to a rhetorical approach to the study of space and place, while the second half of the course will focus on scholarship that applies rhetorical theory to the study of public space, exploring such topics and spaces as: museums, monuments and memorials, capitols, free speech zones, infrastructure, border spaces and travel, digital interactivity and data mining, the privatization and securitization of public space, new urbanist and pseudo/semi-public spaces as well as temporary public spaces. Satisfies Communication Studies major and minor requirement. Satisfies Literary Studies, Creative Writing and Rhetoric requirement.
Instructor Baugh While it is an inclination to assume protests and social movements emerge as instantaneous, unique responses to contemporary injustices, this class examines contemporary protests and social movements as continuations of longstanding rhetorical traditions held within a movement’s collective memory. Students will analyze contemporary and historical protests and social movement rhetorics, along with adversarial rhetorics, to identify common, foundational strategies. Students will also examine departures in protest rhetoric, and they will be asked to explain why the needs of a movement might demand an approach which diverges from previous strategies. By analyzing protests and social movements from the intersection of rhetoric and collective memory, students will have a better understanding of the long arch in struggles for justice and equity, and they will also have a strong understanding of the rhetorical legacies that support public persuasion within social movements. Satisfies Communication Studies major and minor requirement. Satisfies the Literary Studies, Creative Writing and Rhetoric requirement. Satisfies Justice, Equality and Community requirement.
Instructor Baugh Reading theorists like Emma Pérez, María Lugones, Gloria Anzaldúa, Chela Sandoval, and others, this course departs from rhetorical studies memory work centered in place, and instead emphasizes intimate performances of memory in/against imperial and colonial systems. Examining art, street art, antimonuments, poetry, plays, films, and more, students will explore how community performances of memory work to create liberatory spaces that do not center majoritarian notions of inclusion. Rather, in our class, we will look at how the ways in which peoples rhetorically perform their pasts guide us toward imagining future possibilities outside of broken frameworks. Moreover, this course will engage the idea that our intimate family stories are also inherently connected to our cultural, social, and political experiences, so the course will weave the (un)telling of our own narratives within the (un)telling of broader historical narratives. Satisfies Communication Studies major and minor requirement. Satisfies Justice, Equality, and Community requirement. Prerequisites & Notes The B section requires permission and is for majors.
Instructor Staff Those who wish to promote social change have typically relied on language, perhaps our most important symbolic resource, to help them to define problematic social and political practices and to argue for new policies. How have persons and groups mobilized linguistic resources in order to argue for social change in the United States? Rhetoric-the study of how public understandings are shaped, shared, and changed through the agency of language-has since ancient times guided speakers and writers in the production of persuasive discourses. The course will examine several episodes of sharp disagreement in American life where civic roles and the rights of citizens have been contested. Using a rhetorical lens, we will analyze primary documents (written and spoken discourses produced during these episodes) in order to understand and evaluate the ways in which groups with unequal power have struggled to define some significant part of their common experience. Satisfies Communication Studies major and minor requirement Satisfies the Literary Studies, Creative Writing, and Rhetoric requirement Satisfies the Justice, Equality, and Community requirement
COM 390Special Topics - Land and Legacies: Environmental Rhetoric
Fall 2026 Instructor J Smith This course is a survey of the field of environmental communication. Exploring the premise that how we communicate informs our perceptions of the “natural” world, the course will examine the social construction of the environment and environmental issues. The guiding principle of the course is that humans have relationships with the natural environment, and we will examine how (and why) people talk about these relationships in a variety of contexts, including: wilderness, the history of the environmental movement, Indigenous conceptions, colonialism, climate change, energy development, environmental justice, non-human entanglements, and public lands.” Special topics course titles and descriptions may change. May be repeated for credit. Satisfies the Literary Studies, Creative Writing, and Rhetoric distribution requirement. Satisfies a requirement in the Communication Studies major and interdisciplinary minor. Satisfies Environmental Studies major requirement. Spring 2027 Instructor Baugh Coming soon.
Instructor Staff Independent work under the direction of a faculty member who determines the means of evaluation. Open to advanced students with special projects. Prerequisites & Notes Communication Studies 101 or 201 and permission of the instructor. (Fall and Spring)
Instructor Baugh The senior capstone course for the Communication Studies major integrates communication theories and scholarly research as the basis for the investigation of key research questions concerning processes of communication. The course culminates in a major creative project bringing together a variety of theoretical perspectives depending on majors’ interests within the various subfields of the Communication discipline. Only senior majors may register for COM 495. Majors should have completed their method requirement by the end of junior year or before enrolling in the capstone course senior year.
