Notable Achievements

Associate Professor and Chair of Communication Studies Lamiyah Bahrainwala (LB) attended the 2023 National Communication Association conference, the discipline’s flagship conference, in National Harbor, MD:

  1. LB presented on three panels: a roundtable discussion on extractivism and energy justice, a roundtable discussion on the “bamboo ceiling” about challenges undercutting Asian scholars, and a co-authored-paper presentation on de-whitening consent amidst COVID-19 rhetoric.
  2. LB received a Top Paper Award for her co-authored paper from the Critical/Cultural Studies Division.
  3. LB assumed responsibility as elected Vice Chair of the Feminist and Gender Studies Division and will plan the division’s NCA Program for 2024.
  4. LB chaired a panel on misogyny in international media.
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Lamiyah (LB) Bahrainwala

Associate Professor of Communication Studies

Expertise

Anti-Muslim sentiment; feminist surveillance studies

LB’s work examines bizarre iterations of anti-Muslim sentiment and whiteness in mediated texts. She uses critical race and feminist surveillance approaches to examine how discourses of terrorism, nationalism, and disability animate texts of marginalization. LB’s work appears in leading journals, including Quarterly Journal of Speech, Communication, Culture and Critique, and Journal of International and Intercultural Communication, in addition to creative venues. She has received numerous top paper and research awards from the National Communication Association, Southern States Communication Association, Eastern Communication Association, and Conference on College Composition & Communication. 

Additionally, LB is involved in community education and gives recurring talks to parents at various schools in Austin about how to talk about race with their children. She also secured a national grant to organize a Muslims in Academia Symposium at Southwestern. 

LB has a PhD in Communication Studies from the University of Texas at Austin, an MA in Rhetoric from Michigan State University, and a BA in English from the American University of Sharjah in the United Arab Emirates, where she grew up. 

LB’s teaching hinges on three values: 

  • Accessibility: for students with varying learning styles and expertise
  • Flexibility: through classroom routines that are explicitly structured but also explicitly open
  • Portability: with course takeaways that are applicable to students’ various home disciplines
  • Biography

    LB’s work examines bizarre iterations of anti-Muslim sentiment and whiteness in mediated texts. She uses critical race and feminist surveillance approaches to examine how discourses of terrorism, nationalism, and disability animate texts of marginalization. LB’s work appears in leading journals, including Quarterly Journal of Speech, Communication, Culture and Critique, and Journal of International and Intercultural Communication, in addition to creative venues. She has received numerous top paper and research awards from the National Communication Association, Southern States Communication Association, Eastern Communication Association, and Conference on College Composition & Communication. 

    Additionally, LB is involved in community education and gives recurring talks to parents at various schools in Austin about how to talk about race with their children. She also secured a national grant to organize a Muslims in Academia Symposium at Southwestern. 

    LB has a PhD in Communication Studies from the University of Texas at Austin, an MA in Rhetoric from Michigan State University, and a BA in English from the American University of Sharjah in the United Arab Emirates, where she grew up. 

    LB’s teaching hinges on three values: 

    • Accessibility: for students with varying learning styles and expertise
    • Flexibility: through classroom routines that are explicitly structured but also explicitly open
    • Portability: with course takeaways that are applicable to students’ various home disciplines
  • Publications

    Selected Publications:

    Bahrainwala, L. & Harris, K. L. (2023) De-whitening consent amidst COVID-19 rhetoric. Quarterly Journal of Speech. DOI: 10.1080/00335630.2023.2255636

    Bahrainwala, L. (2023) Muslim mothering and divesting from whiteness. Refiguring Motherhood Beyond Biology. edited by Kirsti Cole and Valerie Renegar. Routledge: Taylor & Francis

    Bahrainwala, L (2023). Critical surveillance studies: Living ethically in a surveillant world. Introduction to Communication Studies: Translating Communication Scholarship into Meaningful Practice. Edited by Kara Shultz & Alan Goodboy. Kendall Hunt

    Bahrainwala, L. (2020). Shithole rhetorics. Journal of International and Intercultural Communication. DOI: 10.1080/17513057.2020.1795224

    Bahrainwala, L. (2020). The web of white disengagement. Women & Language. 43 (1), 135-140, DOI: 10.34036/WL.2020.013

    Bahrainwala, L. (2020) Precarity, citizenship, and the “traditional” student. Communication Education. 69 (2), 250-260, DOI: 10.1080/03634523.2020.1723805

    Bahrainwala, L. (2019). Blind submission. Communication, Culture and Critique, August 2019. DOI: 10.1093/ccc/tcz027

    Bahrainwala, L. & O’Connor, E. (2019). Nike unveils Muslim women athletes. Feminist Media Studies, July 2019. DOI: 10.1080/14680777.2019.1620822

    Bahrainwala, L. (2019) Responding to White Fragility: A Manifesta of Screams. Feral Feminisms. Special issue titled State Killing: Queer and Women of Color Manifestas against U.S. Violence and Oppression, guest edited by Annie Hill, Niq D. Johnson, and Ersula Ore. Issue 9, 21 - 25, https://feralfeminisms.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/3-Bahrainwala.pdf

    Bahrainwala, L. (2019) Visible Allies & Muslim Inclusion. In Academic Labor Beyond the College Classroom: Working for Our Values, edited by Holly Hassel and Kirsti Cole. Routledge: New York, https://doi.org/10.4324/9780429316265

    Bahrainwala, L. (2017). When terrorists play ball. Communication & Sport, October 2017. DOI: 10.1177/2167479517736758

  • Works

    Public Scholarship & Anti-Racist Resources

    Talking about Race with your Children: recurring panel for AISD schools

    Muslim Inclusion: a guide to organizing a public symposium addressing Muslim capacity for allyship and anti-Muslim racism

    White Fragility: an open-access essay exploring normalized white violence

    Follow me on Medium for discussions of desi allyship and anti-black racism

     

    In the News

    2019 Muslims in Academia Symposium: National Communication Association’s Inside Out and SU News

    Quoted in The Chronicle of Higher Education

    Featured on She Speaks: Academic Muslimahs

  • Presentations

    Selected Presentations:

    Bahrainwala, L. & Harris, K. L. De-Whitening Consent Amidst COVID-19 Rhetoric. National Communication Association, National Harbor, MD. November 2023. Top Paper, Critical/Cultural Studies Division

    Bahrainwala, L. Extracting the Construct of “Home” from Domestic Labor Discourse. National Communication Association. November 2016. Philadelphia, PA. Top Four Reviewed Paper/Competitive Paper.

    Bahrainwala, L. The “EnCampment” of Antoine Dodson. Southern States Communication Association. April, 2016. Austin, TX. Top Paper. 

    Bahrainwala, L. The ‘Heroic’ Vessel: Extending Scapegoating Theory through the Malala Yousufzai Case. Eastern Communication Association. April, 2014. Providence, RI. Top Paper.