Dr. Raquel M. Robvais
Instructor
PhD: Louisiana State University
Master's Degree: Louisiana State University - Communication Studies
Bachelor's Degree: Southern University A&M College - Biology
Phone: (225) 578-4172
E-mail: rrobva1@lsu.edu
Office: 147 Coates Hall
Research
My research interest considers the preoccupation and durability of blackness as a marker of difference in disease processes. I question the epistemic authority of race to inform and make possible certain knowledge claims about black bodies. In doing so I seek to disclose the malleability of white supremacy in establishing particular disease concepts to serve ideological purposes in the normalization of medical racism and in the presumption that bodies are shaped by race.
My work is situated within the field of the Rhetoric of Health and Medicine as I consider the symbolic nature and persuasive aspects of bodies, medical discourses, and scientific practices. I am drawn to the reification of blackness in medical discourse and scientific research, particularly in America during the 19th and 20th century, as these practices and ideologies establish paradigms for understanding how race gets written onto bodies and into diseases.
Teaching
CMST 2060: Public Speaking
CMST 2064: Small Group Communication
CMST 2063: Argumentation and Debate
AAAS 3044: The Black Rhetorical Tradition