Dr. Wendy Atkins-Sayre

About

Wendy Atkins-Sayre is Professor and Chair of the Department of Communication & Film at the University of Memphis. Her research centers on regional identity and food studies as well as social change/controversy. Her most recent book, co-authored with Ashli Stokes, is Hungry Roots: How Food Communicates Appalachia’s Search for Resilience (University of South Carolina Press, 2024). The book explores the complex messages that food reflects about the region, adding nuance to an understanding of the history and people of Appalachia. She and Stokes previously authored Consuming Identity: The Role of Food in Redefining the South (University Press of Mississippi, 2016) and co-edited City Places, Country Spaces: Rhetorical Explorations of the Urban/Rural Divide (Peter Lang, 2020). Her essays have appeared in Western Journal of Communication, Southern Communication Journal, Public Relations Inquiry, Journal of Contemporary Rhetoric, and Women & Language, as well as numerous edited volumes.

Dr. Atkins-Sayre served as the Southern States Communication Association president in 2021-2022. She currently sits on the National Communication Association Research Council (2023-2026) and the editorial boards for Communication Monographs and Quarterly Journal of Speech.

Prior to joining the Memphis faculty, Atkins-Sayre worked for 12 years at the University of Southern Mississippi and was the director of the USM Speaking Center from 2007-2016. As a result of that work, she has also published on communication pedagogy, co-editing (with Esther Lee Yook) two books: Communicating Advice: Peer Tutoring and Communication Practice and Communication Centers and Oral Communication Programs in Higher Education. She also served as chair of the National Communication Association’s Communication Center Division, as well as the National Association of Communication Centers.

Education