Jennifer Sano-Franchini
Jennifer Sano-Franchini researches the linkages between culture, meaning-making, power, and technology. She has published on a range of topics including the affective politics of Facebook’s user interface design, Asian American sonic rhetorics, and emotional labor on the academic job search in journals such as College Composition and Communication, Technical Communication, Technical Communication Quarterly, and Kairos, and edited collections including Equipping Technical Communicators for Social Justice Work, Rhetoric and Experience Architecture, and Rhetoric and the Digital Humanities. She teaches courses on professional writing theory, multimedia writing, cultural rhetorics, and feminist interaction design.
Professor Sano-Franchini has held leadership roles in several national professional organizations in her discipline of rhetoric and writing studies, including the Conference on College Composition and Communication (CCCC), the Modern Language Association (MLA), and the Consortium of Doctoral Programs in Rhetoric and Composition (CDPRC). She currently serves as Chair of the CCCC and Chair of the MLA Rhetoric, Composition, and Writing Studies (RCWS) History and Theory of Rhetoric Forum Executive Committee.
Sano-Franchini completed her BA and MA degrees in English at the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa, and her PhD in Rhetoric and Writing at Michigan State University. She also has seven years of previous industry experience as a document designer and professional writer.
Specializations:
technical communication
cultural politics of user experience (UX) design
cultural and digital rhetorics
Asian American rhetoric
the rhetorical work of institutions
Recent Publications:
Johnson, Gavin P., Charles Woods, Laura L. Allen, Amber Buck, Ashanka Kumari, James P. Purdy, Jennifer Sano-Franchini, and Jason Tham. (2024). “Generosity in Computers and Writing: Doing What Gail, Halcyon, Johndan, and Bill Taught Us.” Computers and Composition, 74. 1–12.
Sano-Franchini, Jennifer and Nina Ha. (2024). “Asians at Virginia Tech: Recovering an Institutional History of Asians in Appalachia through Intra-Institutional Networks.” Peitho: Journal of the Coalition of Feminist Scholars in the History of Rhetoric and Composition, (26)2. 86–95.
Sano-Franchini, Jennifer. (2024). “Interaction Design.” In Jason Tham (Ed.), Keywords in Making: A Rhetorical Primer. Parlor Press. pp. 192–196.
Sano-Franchini, Jennifer (Ed.). (2023). Critical Digital Interface Analysis and Social Justice. Special issue of Technical Communication, 70(4).
Sano-Franchini, Jennifer. (2023). “Re-Orienting Rhetorical Theory in an Asian American Rhetorics Seminar.” Course Design. Composition Studies 51(1), 111–123.
Monberg, Terese Guinsatao and Jennifer Sano-Franchini. (2023). “Asian American Affect and Advocacy: Remembering Hyoejin Yoon.” Peitho: Journal of the Coalition of Feminist Scholars in the History of Rhetoric and Composition, 25(3).
Sano-Franchini, Jennifer, André M. Jones, Priyanka Ganguly, Chloe J. Robertson, Luana J. Shafer, Marti Wagnon, Olayemi Awotayo, and Megan Bronson. (2023). “Slack, Social Justice, and Online Technical Communication Pedagogy.” Technical Communication Quarterly, 32(2), 134–148.
Sano-Franchini, Jennifer, Johnson, Nathan R., and Lane, Liz. (2023). “Teaching bell hooks in Technical and Professional Communication.” College English, 85(3), 205–216.
Chen, Chen, Dev Bose, Jennifer Sano-Franchini, Elizabeth Keller, Ruth Osorio, and Elliot Tetreault. (2023). “Interrogating the 4Ps: Positionality, Privilege, Power, and Professionalism in the Rhetoric and Composition Job Market.” Composition Studies 50(3), 20–39.