Adam Hodges, Ph.D.
A.W. Mellon Postdoctoral Fellow in the Humanities
English Department, Carnegie Mellon University
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Adam Hodges is an A.W. Mellon Postdoctoral Fellow in the Humanities at Carnegie Mellon University where he teaches courses for the English Department’s rhetoric program. He is co-editor with Chad Nilep of Discourse, War and Terrorism (2007), and is the author of several scholarly articles and book chapters that examine American political discourse. He has previously taught at Stanford University, the University of Colorado, and Colorado State University.
Dr. Adam Hodges
General interests: linguistic anthropology, sociolinguistics, discourse analysis.
Specific interests: language and politics, language in the media, language and identity, narrative, language ideologies, language and power, language and gender, language policy.
Related fields of interest: communication studies (discourse analysis, language and social interaction, political communication), cultural anthropology, media studies, cultural studies.
Research summary: In my research, I take a critical approach to the study of language and communicative practices in social and cultural life. My primary sites of study involve the domains of politics and mass media where I examine how public discourse builds shared cultural narratives, represents issues of ‘truth’, and constructs identities. Through my focus on the construction of meaning and the role of language in relations of power, I aim to illuminate the way discourse shapes and influences sociopolitical reality. My forthcoming monograph, The ‘War on Terror’ Narrative, provides a comprehensive look at the Bush administration’s discourse about terrorism from the events of 9/11 through the beginning of the Obama administration.