I used to be an Assistant Professor of Technical Communication and Rhetoric in the English Department at Virginia Tech. Nowadays, I am a harbormaster at a small marina on Orcas Island in the great state of Washington. I do still dabble in academic work but most of my time is now composed of boating, weather, knots and crabbing. If you want to talk about my work or my previous life as an academic, feel free to reach out: justalewis1@gmail.com.

In my previous life as an academic, I did this: 

My research considers the ways that technical communication intersects with front-end and back-end user experience design (UXD). In so doing, I draw attention to the ways that digital rhetoric works itself out via interfaces, interactions, navigational structures and database architectures. Using a mixed-method research methodology heavily influenced by Activity Theory, Rhetorical Genre Studies and discourse analyses, my work explores the iterative relationship among language, individuals, tools and communities in digital contexts. By articulating digital objects as rhetorical genres, my work extends investigation into the medial and agenic capacities of objects to shape our collective digital experience.

When not researching, I spend time teaching courses in technical communication, professional writing, digital writing, rhetorical theory and composition history. I also spend time working as the Design Editor at Literacy in Composition Studies. In my role, I am responsible for maintenance of our open-access website. I also design and layout the digital and print versions of LiCS. As a contributing editor, I work with the editorial team to review and revise manuscripts toward publication.

If you have any questions, feel free to contact me.

Academic Appointments

Education & Training