Communitas 2026 Program

Panel Session A: 9-9:40 am

How Rhetorics of Place, Space, Religion, and Race Impact the Care, Practices, and Communication of Health

Location: DOR 105

Join the conversation as students from COMM 308W: Health Communication explore how health disparities take shape in places and spaces in which the “unhealthy” body is discursively treated as “the other.” From housing, to immigration, to cancer diagnosis, to age, even to the state of Missouri, the rhetorics of race and religion play an important role in how we systematically provide healthcare.

●  Etta Bybee - Environmental Justice and Community Health: Reviewing Disparate Health Impacts Resulting from Unjust Environmental Conditions

●  Sabrina Hemedi - Mental Health Stigma in Immigration Communities

●  Natalia Blek - Nursing Home Neglect: Health Disparities within the Nursing Home

●  Sophie Hurst - The Health Disparity of Breast Cancer Diagnostics

●  Adam Staples - How Poverty Impacts Transgender Healthcare in the State of Missouri

Moderated by Dr. Karly Poyner-Smith, Assistant Professor of Communication Studies

Propose, Discover, Design, and Deliver: Understanding The Blue Print Design Agency

Location: DOR 106

During this panel, students representing The Blue Print Student Design Agency will discuss the inner workings of Columbia College’s student run graphic design group. The topic will involve what the student designers created during our first year, their creative process, how they collaborated, their procedures when working with clients, and examples of the students’ work.

●  Panelists

○  Marci Lammers

○  Jordan Joos

○  Shelby Wedel

Moderated by Dr. Bethanie Irons, Visiting Professor of Graphic Design

Man Cannot Speak For Her, Healthcare Cannot Speak For Her Either: Gender, Sexuality, and Feminization Panics within Healthcare Practices

Location: DOR 107

As communication scholars and rhetoricians, Karlyn Kohrs Campbell and Barbara Biesecker argue, Western discursive systems are written with men in mind. While this is the case for many patients navigating the healthcare system, it is not merely the task of the patient to manage this health disparity alone. Students from COMM 308W: Health Communication tackle this issue by exploring various systems upholding male-centric practices and failing to respond due to feminization panics.

●  Sophie Ling - Later Diagnosis of ASD in Females: A Health Communication Analysis of Gender Disparities in Mental Healthcare

●  Luca Stevens - Trauma-Informed Care and Reproductive Health Disparities Among Girls in the Juvenile Justice System

●  Abby Harper - LGBTQIA+ Healthcare: Storytelling Networks and the Health Belief Model

●  Kathryn Dothage - Health Disparity and Gender Inequality: Delayed Cardiovascular Disease Diagnosis in Women

Moderated by Professor Amy Enderle, Instructor of Communication Studies

Artificial Intelligence as Collegiate Ideograph: Student Perspectives on AI as a Tool for Management and Support

Location: DOR 206

Instead of merely focusing on technical details related to the practical usage of AI, these panelists discuss how students may begin to use AI to better understand complex ideas, manage their time, and support decision-making, while still relying on professors, coaches, and their own judgment. AI is presented as a helpful tool, not a shortcut or a replacement for human guidance to which we can respond thoughtfully and responsibly.

●      Panelists

○      Hailey Gerard

○      Jack Hotze

Moderated by Dr. Moenes Mellouli, Assistant Professor of Statistics

 Panel Session 2: 9:50-10:30 am 

From Slavery to Stereotype: Hollywood’s Modern Racism

Location: DOR 105

Join this panel as Peer Educators discuss how Hollywood films play a large role in perpetuating stereotypes. Through critical engagement with film and their ongoing work with the Peer Educators program, through the lens of Erica Balls and Richard Dyers, these panelists analyze how movies such as 12 Years a Slave, The Help, The Color Purple, and Moonlight use particular media devices and center suffering to maintain stereotypes that commodify and stigmatize Black and queer communities.

●  Panelists

○      JuRaya Libbus

○  Travis Hudson

Moderated by Dr. Rebekah Freese, Assistant Professor of Human Services and Peer Educators Faculty Advisor

The Governance of Bodies, Emotions, and Communities: Purity Discourse, Media, and Gender Communication

Location: DOR 106

What do video games, TikTok trends, late night talk shows, and downtown CoMo have in common? They’re regulated through purity discourse. As an ideology of safety from impurities, purity messages regulate the intimacy and portrayal of bodies within cultural rules–often rules of silence, taboo, and nonexistence. Join this panel as students from COMM 343W: Gender Communication present case studies in which they examine how purity is regulated in various media forms.

●      Sophie Ling - Public Discourse Analysis: Media Response to the Downtown Shooting through Rape Myth Acceptance Theory

●      Sydney Turner - Tradwife Origins: Ballerina Farm and the Domains of Power

●      Luca Stevens - Biopower and Stigma in Arcane: League of Legends: An Analysis of Power, Identity, and Social Regulation

●  Nick Hunkins - Purity, Media, and Jimmy Kimmel: A Case Study of Purity Discourse and Modern Media Governance

Moderated by Dr. Karly Poyner-Smith, Assistant Professor of Communication Studies

Fact and Truth: Discussions in Creative Nonfiction

Location: DOR 107

Join this panel of ENGL 314W students as they engage in an informative discussion on the craft of creative nonfiction. This includes the discussion of vital themes such as fact vs truth, constructing a narrative, and exploration vs examination of our lives. During this discussion, panelists will share firsthand experiences with navigating the writer’s role in narrative nonfiction.

●  Panelists

○      Bella Dablemont

○      Sam Grabner

○      Jordan Joos

Moderated by Professor Sarah Parris, Instructor of English and Creative Writing

Understanding the “Mock” and the “Trial” of Columbia College’s Mock Trial Team

Location: DOR 206

Join this informative discussion led by Columbia College’s competitive Mock Trial team about the purpose and experiences of Mock Trial. Panelists will dive further into the ins and outs of Mock Trial by presenting the work/cases they have or currently are working on and will discuss their various experiences with Mock Trial and its unique contribution to their experiential learning.

●      Panelists

○      Nathan Carroll

○      Grace Salter

○      Emma Winchester

 Panel Session 3: 10:40-11:20 am

Realism and Identity in 19th-20th Century American Literature

Location: DOR 105

Understanding the social and cognitive constructions of identity can take place by exploring 19th-20th Century American Literature. As these panelists examine this phenomenon through various literary cases, we see how systematic barriers, social forces, and ideas of the self play a role in identity construction and social navigation.

●      Peter Anderson - “Gender and Race in Kate Chopin’s Stories”

●      Evan Bartelt - “The Self as Adaptation in Henry James’s ‘The Real Thing’ and Edith Wharton’s ‘The Other Two.”

●      Andreja Brown - “Marcher’s Condition in Henry James’s ‘The Beast in the Jungle.’”

●  Adam Krauss - “‘The Yellow Wallpaper’: A Psychological Analysis.”

Moderated by Dr. Danny Campbell, Associate Professor of English and Literature 

ICE-Out: The Rhetoric, Funding, Media, and Public Perception of Immigration and Customs Enforcement Protests

Location: DOR 106

In this panel, students from COMM 215: Mass Communication and Social Movements analyze the American public's opposition to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) through a social movement lens. As protests against immigration raids, family separation, and deportation rise, each panelist focuses on a specific perspective and area of analysis.

●      Sophie Ling - “The Rhetoric of ICE Out and the Application of RMA Theory”

●      Zeel Patel - “Insight into ICE Funding: Resource Allotment Reveals Administrative Priorities”

●      Megan Allen - “Media Framing: Comparing News Coverage on ICE Opposition from Across the Political Spectrum”

●      Luca Stevens - “Beyond Politics: The Human Cost of ICE and the Collapse of Public Trust”

Moderated by Professor Amy Enderle, Instructor of Communication Studies

The Social Labeling of Deviancy: Media, Nonconformance, and Sexuality

Location: DOR 107

Join this panel as students from SOCI 218: Social Deviance critically analyze specific cases in which social control operates from socially constructed categories of deviance and stigma. Through a sociological perspective on human behavior, panelists will examine how violence, sexual deviance, mental illness, substance abuse, street crime, and white collar crime are categorized via performances of media, nonconformance, and sexuality.

●      Kia Pouliezos - Catholic Views on Homosexuality

●      Jay Roberson - Gender-Nonconformance in the LGBT Community

●      Emma Winchester - Online Sex Work

Moderated by Dr. Yngve Digernes, Associate Professor of Sociology

Jus in bello: Critical Conversations through the Theoretical Lens of Just War Theory

Location: DOR 206

Whether theoretical or historical, what is the justification for why and how wars are fought? Exploring ethics, tradition, rules, and institutional adherence merely scrapes the surface of diving into the question of Is war just? Join this panel as students in PHIL/POSC 200: Political Philosophy discuss how the nature of sovereignty, the role of the state, the justification of powers held by the states, critiques and defense of democracy, and justice can be understood through a Just War theoretical lens. 

●  Panelists

○  Travis Hudson

○  Nathan Carroll

○  Xavia Cullers

Moderated by Professor Carmen Price, Instructor of Philosophy

 Panel Session 4: 11:30 am -12:10 pm

An Intended or Unintended Consequence?: The Rhetorics of Health and Gender in the Maintenance of Competitive Sporting Modalities

Location: DOR 105

This panel dives into the complexities of how health, purity, and gender are rhetorized in order to maintain an entertaining and competitive sporting atmosphere—both at a national level and in online arenas. In doing so, how do these rhetorical texts essentialize the role of an athlete to remain pure, sexually healthy, and nationally aligned? From the National Hockey League’s All-American Game to the Super Smash Bros. community guidelines and online moderating, panelists explore how issues of stigma, nationalism, counterpublics, and biopower curate consequences—whether intentional or unintentional—for athletes, spectators, and a wider audience trying to grapple with implications from governance challenges.

Note: These panelists will be presenting their work at the Central States Communication Association annual research conference in Mid-April through the Sports Communication Division.

Panelists

●  Trent Luebbert - “The Crisis of Sexual Deviancy: Counterpublics in Digital Gaming Spaces and the Structural Limitations of Community Moderation”

●  Nick Hunkins - “Consubstantiality on Ice: The Rhetorics of National Health in the NHL’s Four Nations Face-Off”

●  Luca Stevens - “Taking Mental Health out of Second Base: A Qualitative Approach to Understanding Rhetorics of Urgency Regarding Physical Health and the Stigmatization of Mental Health”

Moderated by Dr. Karly Poyner-Smith, Assistant Professor of Communication Studies and CSCA panel chair

America’s Next Top Model UN: The What, Why, and How of Columbia College’s Model United Nations Club

Location: DOR 106

The Model United Nations Club of Columbia College's mission is to promote a better understanding and an interest in the function and processes of the United Nations (UN). Join these panelists as they reflect on how UN simulations provide space for students to engage in in-depth conversations of politics, law, and transnational debates.

●  Panelists

○  Elena Ireland

○  Iris Martin

○  Kia Pouliezos

Moderated by Dr. Brian Kessel, Associate Professor of Political Science and Model UN Club Faculty Advisor 

“Consumption”: Technology, Romanticism, and Nostalgia

Location: DOR 107

Join this ARTS 403: 20th and 21st Century Art History panel as students explore how art pieces contain complex rhetorical functioning to respond to and situate historical and contemporary issues. In their analyses, panelists argue that everyday material deals with issues of globalism, diaspora, feminism, racial inequity, diversity, and colonialism.

Panelists

●  Lily Herwald - “Romanticized AI Landscapes: Modern Abstract Landscape Design as Romanticized Yet Consumed by AI Landscape.”

●  Wren Harms - “Nostalgia and Labubus, Reinterpretations of Wayne Thiebaud: A Presentation on the Dichotomy of Consumer Consumption vs. Nostalgic Food Consumption.

●  Laik Graham - “Abstract Renderings of Destroyed Technology”

Moderated by Dr. Laura Ursprung-Nerling, Assistant Professor of Art History and Chair of the Department of Visual Arts and Music

Gamification of Learning in Early Childhood Education

Location: DOR 206

Gamification of learning entails integrating game elements (competition, rules, skill, strategy, reward) into non-game activities (instruction). Gamification of learning can be highly engaging as it activates the reward centers of the brain, so join CDEV 314: Motor Development and Play students for active learning through early educational games.

●      Panelists

●      Blair Benton

●      Samantha Moser

●      Makinna Skaggs

●      Rhyleigh Wilson

Moderated by Dr. Ariel Robinson, Assistant Professor of Education and Child Development

If you are interested and/or have questions, feel free to email us.