Raquel Robvais

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

cURRICULUM VITAE

 

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