Tracey Owens Patton

Biography

Prof./Dr. Tracey Owens Patton is Professor of Rhetoric and Critical Cultural Studies & Media Studies and Interim Director of Graduate Studies in the Department of English at The University of Wyoming. She joined the UW English Department in 2022 after being in the Department of Communication & Journalism (2003-2022). She also served as the Director of the African American & Diaspora Studies Program from 2009-2017 at the University of Wyoming. Patton’s area of specialization is critical cultural communication, rhetorical studies, and transnational studies. She is the author of A Nation’s Undesirables: Mixed-Race Children and Whiteness in the Post-Nazi Era (2024) and co-author of Gender, Whiteness, and Power in Rodeo: Breaking Away from the Ties of Sexism and Racism (2012). Patton’s research has been presented at countless academic conferences, and her work has appeared in numerous books, journals, and in media. Patton teaches courses involving critical theory, critical media studies, cultural studies, womanist theory, and rhetorical theory.

Education

Ph.D., in Communication, The University of Utah

M.A., in Speech Communication, Colorado State University

B.A., in Speech Communication, Colorado State University

B.A., in German, Colorado State University

Certificate, in German, Lessing Kolleg, Marburg, Germany

Recent and Upcoming Courses

Black American Rhetoric

Culture, Communication and Work

Critical Media Studies

Rhetoric and Social Justice

Rhetorical Theory and Criticism

Rhetoric and Social Movements

Inquiry for Public Humanities Engagement

Selected Publications

Patton, T. O. (2024, April). A Nation's Undesirables: Mixed Race Children and Whiteness in the Post-Nazi Era. This book is also, part of the Intersectional Rhetorics Collection, Karma Chávez (Series Ed.). The Ohio State University Press.

Patton, T. O. & Snyder-Yuly (2025, January). (Un)Intentional Provocation: Critical Dialogue and Pitfalls in the Communication Classroom, in Teaching from the Heart: Critical Communication Pedagogy in the Communication Classroom 2nd ed., C. Kyle Rudick and Kathryn B. Golsan. Cognella Academic Publishing.

(2025, June 1). Black Women in Rodeo: The Historical Foundations. Glamour Magazine UK. Interview. Black Cowgirls: the untold legacy behind Cowboy Carter's spotlight | Glamour UK

Patton, T. O. & Snyder-Yuly (2024, April 27). Unapologetically Blackfishing: Being Black without the Consequences of Blackness). Communication Studies, 75 (4), 1-20. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/10510974.2024.2345935 

Patton, T. O., & Small, N. (2020, November 29). Making Waves in the Water: Maxine Waters and her Challenge to Black Women’s Erasure and White Hegemony. In M. Goins, J. F. McAlister, and B. K. Alexander, Chapter 15. The Routledge Handbook of Communication and Gender.

Awards

The 2025 Spring speaker in the Arnold Nemirow Lecture Series in Holocaust Studies, Zucker/Goldberg Center for Holocaust Studies, College of Charleston, SC.