(BEAVER FALLS, Pa.) – Students in the Geneva College Communication Department and their professor recently presented scholarship at two conferences. Michael Kearney ’17 presented at the Sacred Rhetoric conference held at Winebrenner Theological Seminary, and a panel consisting of Integrated Media Professor Dr. Richard Talbert, Mikayla Covington ’16, Rachael Piscatello ‘19, Ben Kennedy ’18 and Savanna Thompson ’18 presented at the Integrated Marketing Communication and Popular Culture conference at University of North Carolina at Wilmington.
At the Sacred Rhetoric conference, Kearney presented Communion with Babylon: Globalization, Idolatry and Hope in Ellul’s Technological Society, a work prompted by an assignment in Talbert’s Media Ecology course. The work comparatively examines predictions of the modern-day technological society by sociologist and Christian anarchist Jacques Ellul (1912-1994) with the Tower of Babel from the Book of Genesis.
“My argument is that Ellul is not just a hopeless critic,” Kearney says. “He wants to give conscientious Christians the tools to respond to the technological society in a way that emphasizes human freedom and points to hope.”
At the Integrated Marketing Communication and Popular Culture conference, scholars and practitioners from advertising, public relations, marketing, social media and popular culture meet to present work for consideration. Geneva’s Covington, Piscatello, Kennedy, Thompson and Talbert also presented their work. The panel, titled Image, text, and light: How human communication affects and is affected by humanity’s use of the natural and the technological, included papers written by each presenter.
“The most interesting part of the conference for me was seeing my students deliver thoughtful presentations to academics and professionals, especially since three of them have never presented at a conference before,” says Talbert. “They all performed remarkably well and admirably represented Geneva and the Communication Department.”
Conference attendees recognized the quality of the Geneva presenters’ work. Vernon Cronen, Ph.D., a visiting scholar at UNCW, says, “The fact that a junior, seniors, and a first-year grad student are writing papers of this caliber gives me hope for the future of the field.”
Geneva College is a Christ-centered academic community that provides a comprehensive education to equip students for faithful and fruitful service to God and neighbor. Offering over 40 traditional undergraduate majors and programs, Adult Degree Programs with fully online and classroom options, and high-demand graduate degrees, Geneva's programs are recognized for their high quality. U.S. News & World Report ranks Geneva as a Top Three Best Value Regional University with one of the Top 100 engineering programs in the nation. Adhering to the truth of Scripture, a Geneva education is grounded in God’s Word as well as in a core curriculum designed to prepare students vocationally to think, write and communicate well in today’s world.
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