Soumia Bardhan PhD

Ph.D. Communication University of New Mexico, U.S.
M.A. Communication University of Madras, India
B.A. with Honours University of Calcutta, India

Soumia Bardhan’s research interests are interdisciplinary and informed by Intercultural Communication (communication dynamics of difference based on religious, historical, and political values) and Islamic/Religious Studies. By focusing on the intersections of culture, religion, and politics, she explores: a) the multi-vocal discursive practices within Islam; b) the rhetoric and deliberative capacity of Muslim communities in marginalized and/or authoritarian contexts; and c) the role of media and deliberation in the cultural-political transformation of Arab-Muslim societies. A commitment to facilitating intercultural relations, civic engagement and democratic capacity building, social justice, and shaping public policy drives her research and scholarship. 

She has conducted grant-funded fieldwork in Egypt, Jordan, Morocco, and India and her work has appeared as essays in peer-reviewed journals, chapters in books published by top academic presses, and invited encyclopedia entries, book review, and public-facing scholarship (details in ‘Select Publications’). She is currently completing a monograph examining the political rise and fall of the Islamist Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood (MB) in Egypt between 2005-2015. She uses perspectives from rhetoric, religion, politics, and technology to decipher how this decade shaped the global identity of the MB and examines the rhetorical affordances digital fora present to non-state actors in authoritarian contexts to participate effectively in the global discursive arena. 

Bardhan teaches courses related to intercultural/critical intercultural communication; intercultural rhetoric; religion, culture, and communication; communication theories; history and philosophy of communication studies; qualitative research methodologies; gender, politics, and Islam; and directs Study Abroad courses focusing on Islam and intercultural dialogue in Spain, France, Morocco, and India. As a certified mediator, she also teaches mediation (creative dispute resolution) courses. She has taught in India, China (including CU Denver’s International College Beijing program), the Middle East, Japan, and the U.S. Bardhan has won several curriculum development grants, including University of Notre Dame’s Global Religion and Research Initiative grant to develop an interdisciplinary course titled “Religion and Communication in the Middle East.” She recently published (December 2019) a co-edited volume titled “Internationalizing the Communication Curriculum in an Age of Globalization” (Routledge Research in Communication Studies series).  

Bardhan served as a Big 12 Faculty fellow (2017-2018) and is an Association of College and University Educators (ACUE) fellow. She serves as a director on the board of the International Communication Association and is chair of its Intercultural Communication Division (2019-2021). She is also a member of the advisory board of the National Communication Association-China Global/International Collaborations Committee (2018-present). She served on the National Communication Association’s Task Force on Fostering International Collaborations in research, teaching, and service (2015-2019). Bardhan serves on the editorial board of Journal of International and Intercultural Communication (2018-present) and is an associate editor for Frontiers in Intercultural Communication (2020-present).

Books

1. Turner, P. K., Bardhan, S., Holden, T. Q., & Mutua, E. M. (Eds.). (2019). Internationalizing the Communication Curriculum in an Age of Globalization. Routledge.

   i.   Bardhan, S. (2019). Internationalizing the communication curriculum: Benefits to stakeholders. In Turner, P. K., Bardhan, S., Holden, T. Q., & Mutua, E. M. (Eds.), Internationalizing the Communication Curriculum in an Age of Globalization. Routledge.

   ii.   Bardhan, S., Colvin, J., Croucher, S., O’Keefe, M., & Dong, Q. (2019). Intercultural communication: A 17-year analysis of the state of the discipline. In Turner, P. K., Bardhan, S., Holden, T. Q., & Mutua, E. M. (Eds.), Internationalizing the Communication Curriculum in an Age of Globalization. Routledge.

Peer-Reviewed Publications

1. Bardhan, S., & Cutter, D*. (forthcoming). Recruiting foreign warriors: Function of moral and temporal tropes in the Islamic State’s ‘Dabiq’. Rhetoric and Public Affairs. *former Master’s advisee
    
2. Bardhan, S. & Foss, K. (2020). Revolutionary graffiti and Cairene women: Performing agency through gaze aversion. In Charrad, M & Stephan, R. (Eds.), Women Rising: In the Arab Spring and Beyond. New York University Press. (Grant-funded)
    
3. Bardhan, S. (2018). Affordances of websites for counterpublicity and international communication: Case of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood. Georgetown Journal of International Affairs, 19, 3-11. (Lead article)
    
4. Bardhan, S. (2018). The Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood and ‘Ikhwanweb’: Deliberative ethic/voice in a counterpublic’s rhetoric? Journal of Public Deliberation, 4(1), 5. (Now Journal of Deliberative Democracy)
    
5. Bardhan, S. (2017). Rhetorical approaches to communication and culture. In J. Nussbaum (Ed.), Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Communication. Oxford University Press.
    
6. Bardhan, S. & Wood, R. (2015). The role of culture in civil society promotion in the Middle East: A case study approach with technology for social networking. Digest of Middle East Studies, 24(1), 111-138. (Grant-funded)
    
7. Bardhan, S. (2014). Egypt, Islamists, and the Internet: The Muslim Brotherhood and its rhetoric of dialectics in ‘Ikhwanweb’. Digest of Middle East Studies, 23(2), 235-261
   Reviewed by Mark Allen Peterson, Professor of Anthropology and International Studies, Miami University, in Connected in Cairo- https://connectedincairo.com/2014/12/07/the-muslim-brotherhood-on-line-in-english/ (2014)
    
8. Oetzel, J. G., Dhar, S., & Kirschbaum, K. (2007). Intercultural conflict from a multilevel perspective: Trends, possibilities, and future directions. Journal of Intercultural Communication Research, 36(3), 183-204.

Invited Encyclopedia Entries and Book Review

1. Bardhan, S. (forthcoming). Rhetoric and intercultural communication. In P. Moy (Ed.), Oxford Bibliographies in Communication. Oxford University Press.
    
2. Gonzalez, A. & Bardhan, S. (2017). Intercultural rhetoric. In Y. Y. Kim (Ed.), The International Encyclopedia of Intercultural Communication. Wiley Publications.
    
3. Bardhan, S. (2015). Book review- Jeremy Bowen’s ‘The Arab uprisings: The people want the fall of the regime.’ Contemporary Islam, 9, 413-421.
    
4. Bardhan, S. (2014). Evolution of social media and the Arab Spring. In K. Harvey (Ed.), Encyclopedia of Social Media and Politics. Sage Publications.

Invited Public-Facing Scholarship

1. Bardhan, S. (July, 2020). Intercultural communication and postcolonialism. Society for Intercultural Education, Training, and Research (SIETER) India Newsletter.
    
2. Bardhan, S. (2017). Internationalizing the communication curriculum. Spectra. National Communication Association.

CU Denver
Undergraduate

• Intercultural Communication
• Religion, Culture, and Communication

Graduate

• Intercultural Communication
• Introduction to Graduate Work in Communication

 CU Denver-International College Beijing

• Mediation (Undergraduate)
• Global Communication (Undergraduate)