Dr. Keven James Rudrow

Overview

Summary:

Keven James Rudrow, Ph.D. (he/him/his) is a jointly appointed Tenure-Track Assistant Professor in the Department of Communication and the African American Studies Program in the College of Arts and Sciences at Mississippi State University. Rudrow received his Ph.D. in Communication Studies with an emphasis in Rhetoric and Media and a Graduate Certificate in Women’s and Gender Studies at the University of Memphis in 2020.

Rudrow’s research and teaching explore contemporary discourses concerning race, gender, and sexuality in rhetorics attendant to social, economic, and political vulnerability and the resistance it animates in the U.S. and abroad. For instance, Rudrow’s published, forthcoming, and in-progress scholarship engages topics like hip-hop representations of vulnerability and resistance in the U.S. and the Middle East; the use of new media to construct and negotiate complex identities (e.g., African American queer boyhood and Black veganism); representations of interracial allyship in documentary television (e.g., Last Chance U); and how diverse audiences use film (e.g., Moonlight) to meditate on identity construction and subversion.

Rudrow’s published work can be read in highly regarded peer reviewed Communication Studies and Ethnic Studies journals, including Communication and Critical/Cultural Studies; Critical Studies in Media Communication; Communication, Culture & Critique; Communication and Race; and the Journal of Black Studies.

From an interdisciplinary perspective, Rudrow teaches and has taught Media Studies, Cultural Studies, Ethnic Studies, and Rhetoric courses such as Rhetorical Theory; Introduction to African American Studies; Race, Gender, and Class in Global Media; Race and Ethnicity in Communication; Hip-Hop Cultures; Race, Rhetoric, and Masculinity; and Communication in Popular Culture.

Currently, Rudrow serves on the editorial board for Critical Studies in Media Communication, Quarterly Journal of Speech, QED: A Journal in GLBTQ Worldmaking, the Journal of Hip-Hop Studies, and Qualitative Research Reports in Communication. In 2025, Rudrow was awarded the Department of Communication's Faculty Award for Excellence in Research.

Education:

• Doctor of Philosophy, Communication, University of Memphis, 2020
• Master of Arts, Communication, Valdosta State University, 2016
• Bachelor of Fine Arts, Speech Communication, Valdosta State University, 2014