Sandy Pensoneau-Conway | SIU

Communication Studies

Sandy Pensoneau-Conway is an Associate Professor of Communication Studies at Southern Illinois University Carbondale, and serves as the graduate coordinator. She received a B.S. (cum laude) in Speech Communication from Southern Illinois University Edwardsville (1999), an M.S. in Speech Communication from Southern Illinois University Carbondale (2001), and a Ph.D. in Speech Communication from Southern Illinois University Carbondale (2006). 

Her teaching and research interests include critical communication pedagogy, communication and identity (particularly disability), and automethods. She is a member of the Teaching and Learning Council for the National Communication Association, and sits on the editorial boards of journals such as Communication Education, Communication Teacher, Journal of Communication Pedagogy, and the Journal of Autoethnography. At SIU, she is a member of the advisory committee for the Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies program, and the SIU Recruitment and Retention Team. She will soon begin her role as the coordinator of the College of Liberal Arts European Student and Scholar Partnership program.

Dr. Pensoneau-Conway has received the SIU Emerging Leader University Excellence Award, the John T. Warren Mentor Award from the Central States Communication Association, and the Outstanding Faculty Award in Communication Studies. In her previous position at Wayne State University (Detroit), she was awarded the Harriet Dowdell Bantz, Sandra Petronio, & Charles R. Bantz Faculty Research Award; Commitment to Excellence in Graduate Education Award, President’s Award for Excellence in Teaching (nominee), and the Graduate College Teaching Award. She has presented research at local, regional, national, and international conferences. Recent publications include essays in QED: A Journal of GLBTQ Worldmaking and Critical Education; and the collections Handbook of Autoethnography, and The Discourse of Disability in Higher Education: Narrative-based Research for Social Change. She is currently working on a co-edited book Leadership Communication Theory and Practice: An Advanced Introduction, along with several contributed book chapters.