Kari Campeau

Areas of Expertise

Rhetoric of Health & Medicine; Technical and Professional Communication

Brief Bio

Kari Campeau is an Assistant Professor of Rhetoric in the English Department at the University of Colorado Denver. Dr. Campeau earned her PhD in Rhetoric, Technical and Scientific Communication from the University of Minnesota. Her research has focused on medical dissent; using qualitative and rhetorical methods, she has studied vaccine hesitancy, experimental microbiome healthcare, and unsanctioned uses of clinical trial participation.

Dr. Campeau’s new book Rhetorics of Refusal: Medical Dissent in the U.S.-Somali Diaspora (The Ohio State University Press, 2025) is informed by a two-year rhetorical ethnography that follows Somali parents’ grounded experiences with diverse healthcare and healing systems. Dr. Campeau’s other publications on vaccination have focused on rural communities and public-health outreach, COVID-19 vaccination, and maternal vaccinations and have appeared in the peer-reviewed journals such as Journal of the Medical Humanities, Written Communication, Technical Communication Quarterly, and Rhetoric of Health and Medicine.

In Dr. Campeau’s new study, she shifts from studying medical dissent to examining the nuances of medical compliance; this study uses ethnographic methods and rhetorical analysis to explore motives, experiences, and communication practices of those who volunteer as healthy adults in U.S. clinical trials. 

Selected Publications

Campeau, K. (2025). Rhetorics of Refusal: Medical Dissent in the U.S.-Somali Diaspora. The Ohio State University Press.

Campeau, K. (2023). Who’s a vaccine skeptic? framing vaccine hesitancy in post-covid news coverage. Written Communication, 40(3), 976-1023. https://doi.org/10.1177/07410883231169622

Campeau, K. (2023). Vaccine lines and line jumpers: Mapping a new metaphor from an interview-based study about COVID vaccination. The Journal of Medical Humanities, 44, 369-94. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10912-022-09749-y

Campeau, K. (2022). Vaccination double bind: A study of pregnancy and COVID-19 vaccine decision-making. Rhetoric Society Quarterly, 52(5), 1-16. https://doi.org/10.1080/02773945.2022.2062437

Campeau, K. (2022). Unofficial vaccine advocates: Technical communication, localization, and care by COVID-19 vaccine trial participants. Technical Communication Quarterly. https://doi.org/10.1080/10572252.2022.2100485.

Campeau, K. (2019). Vaccine Barriers, Vaccine Refusals: Situated Vaccine Decision-Making in the Wake of the 2017 Minnesota Measles Outbreak. Rhetoric of Health & Medicine, 2(2), 176–207.

Courses Taught

• Accessibility in Professional Writing
• Proposal and Grant Writing
• Technical Writing
• Technical Editing
• Usability & UX