K.J. Rawson
Associate Professor of English and Women's, Gender and Sexuality Studies; Co-Director of NULab for Texts, Maps, and Networks
K.J. Rawson works at the intersections of the Digital Humanities and Rhetoric, LGBTQ+, and Feminist Studies. Focusing on archives as key sites of cultural power, he studies the rhetorical work of queer and transgender archival collections in brick-and-mortar and digital spaces. Rawson is founder and director of the Digital Transgender Archive, an award-winning collection of trans-related historical materials, and he chairs the editorial board of the Homosaurus, an LGBTQ+ linked data vocabulary.
- 2022 Lavender Rhino Award, The History Project
- 2022–2025 CLIR Grant, “‘Y’all Better Quiet Down:’ Trans BIPOC Digitization Initiative”
- 2021-2022 Northeastern University Tier 1 Grant, “Establishing the Homosaurus at Northeastern University”
- 2021-2022 Faculty Fellowship, Northeastern University Humanities Center
- Kneupper Award for Best Essay Published in RSQ in 2018
- American Council of Learned Societies Digital Extension Grant, “Developing the Digital Transgender Archive” (2017–2018)
- American Council of Learned Societies Digital Innovation Fellowship, “Building the Digital Transgender Archive” (2015–2016)
Since 2012:
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“Living and Dying as a Gay Trans Man: Lou Sullivan’s Rhetorical Legacy.” Peitho 22.4 (Summer 2020). https://cfshrc.org/article/living-and-dying-as-a-gay-trans-man-lou-sullivans-rhetorical-legacy/
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Co-edited collection: “Transgender Rhetorics.” Peitho 22.4 (Summer 2020). Special issue co-edited with GPat Patterson. https://cfshrc.org/journal/peitho-volume-22-issue-4-summer-2020/
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“Marie Høeg: Portraits of a Gender Trailblazer.” Co-authored with Nicole Tantum. Journal of Visual Culture 19.2 (2020): 184–196.
- “Witness, Bystander, or Aggressor? Encountering Cassils.” QED: A Journal of Queer Worldmaking 6.1 (2019): 87–93.
- “The Rhetorical Power of Archival Description: Classifying Images of Gender Transgression.” Rhetoric Society Quarterly 48.4 (Winter 2018): 327–351.
- “An Inevitably Political Craft.” Transgender Studies Quarterly 2.4 (Nov. 2015): 544–552.
- “Coalition of Who? Regendering Scholarly Community in the History of Rhetoric.” Co-created with Patricia Bizzell. Peitho 18.1 (Fall/Winter 2015).
- “Archival Justice: An Interview with Ben Power Alwin.” Radical History Review 122 (Spring 2015): 177–187.
- “Transgender*: The Rhetorical Landscape of a Term.” Co-authored with Cristan Williams. Present Tense 3.2 (April 2014). Corresponding timeline:
- “Transgender Worldmaking in Cyberspace: Historical Activism on the Internet.” QED: A Journal of Queer Worldmaking 1.2 (June 2014): 38–60.
- “Rhetorical History 2.0: Toward a Digital Transgender Archive.” Enculturation 16 (June 2013).
- “Queer Archives/Archival Queers.” Co-authored with Charles E. Morris III. In Theorizing Histories of Rhetoric. Ed. Michelle Ballif. Carbondale, IL: Southern Illinois University Press, 2013. 74–89.
- “Archive This! Queer(ing) Archival Practices.” In Practicing Research in Writing Studies: Reflections on Ethically Responsible Research. Eds. Katy Powell and Pam Takayoshi. New York: Hampton Press, 2012. 237–250.
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Education
PhD in Composition and Cultural Rhetoric, 2010, Syracuse University
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Contact
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Address
407 Holmes Hall
360 Huntington Avenue
Boston, MA 02115 -
Office Hours
by appointment
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Associations
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