From gen ed to journal publication

A general education course in the Kenneth P. Dietrich School of Arts and Sciences launched rising senior Maia Stephenson on her research career, garnering her and her mentor publication credits and community connections.

In fall 2018, Stephenson was a student in Assistant Professor Khirsten Scott’s Seminar in Composition: Topics in Diversity course, which focused on hip-hop. Scott had asked the class to write lyrics that responded to the recent Tree of Life shooting in Pittsburgh.

“I remember thinking about how I was in a constant of disappointment, downtrodden by horrific event after horrific event, the killings of Trayvon Martin, Michael Brown, Antwon Rose, the Tree of Life murders—all of these tragedies without a moment of rest,” said Stephenson, who is a public and professional writing and history major. 

“The chorus that I wrote was in reference to what the public is commonly told after devastating events, specifically mass shootings. It's something usually along the lines of ‘We won’t ever allow something like this to ever happen again,’ but those words never seem to ring true. It happens again, and again, and again, and those claims are nothing but hollow attempts at assuagement that do nothing for the anger, pain and loss that individuals feel.”

Her contribution, “Never Again,” became the refrain of the class’s collaborative track and consequently shaped her classmates’ collective revision process toward an album, which was recorded at the Homewood-Brushton YMCA. She didn’t know it yet, but connections made she there, in addition to Scott’s mentorship, would drive the course of Stephenson’s academic career.

Not done yet

Stephenson’s work around hip-hop and interrogations of Black culture continued in Scott’s spring 2019 “Rhetorics of Public Blackness: Topics in Black Rhetoric” seminar, where she presented her research with more members of the Homewood community.

“During my presentation, I had the chance to talk about how I situate and understand myself within contexts of Blackness. I grew up in a predominantly white area and although I never felt unsafe or discriminated against, I always knew I was different. My dark skin and my cornrows noticeably set me apart from peers, and during the process of creating this presentation I was able to reflect on how those differences produced certain experiences that I didn’t realize had affected me at the time,” Stephenson said.

In fall 2019, Stephenson enrolled in Assistant Professor Louis Maraj’s Projects in Black Rhetoric: Theory in Practice seminar where she continued to hone her skills. By the conclusion of the term, Stephenson’s project “Black Female Perspective of ‘Diversity’ Programs: Considerations of Hospitality on a College Campus” was accepted to the 2020 Rhetoric Society of America Conference (later cancelled due to COVID-19). 

“Being part of this new community and meeting Dr. Scott and then Dr. Maraj has opened my eyes to available opportunities for young Black women,” she wrote in a reflection on the project. “It is interesting to think that had I not taken that seminar in composition class first semester, I wouldn't know these types of opportunities for a black females were possible.”

The next term, Stephenson was awarded a University Honors College Community Research Fellowship. Her project focused on how Black female students use social media to influence their community’s narrative. She worked with high schoolers in Homewood to stand up youth programs, including an effort called H.Y.P.E. (Home Youth-Powered and Engaged) Media. The fellowship allowed her to ethnographically explore the H.Y.P.E. Media students’ perspectives on community, a project motivated by Scott and Maraj’s classes. 

Plans for the fellowship quickly changed in the aftermath of COVID-19, but Stephenson carried out her project with flexibility and reflexivity, her mentors said. Scott served as Stephenson’s fellowship mentor and advisor, meeting with her weekly for conversations around research and writing, while also meeting with Westinghouse Academy students from H.Y.P.E. Media and collaborators from the School of Social Work.

“It has been an absolute joy and privilege to work closely with Maia,” said Scott. “The development of her projects and her circling back to Black faculty for support and community are a testament to the potential impact we can have when we enhance support for Black undergraduate students, Black faculty, Black communities, the Black rhetoric track and DBLAC.”

DBLAC—Digital Black Lit and Composition—was started in 2016 and brought to Pitt in 2018 by Scott and Assistant Professor Louis Maraj. The group strives to address micro- and macro-level issues that affect Black students in the academy. Stephenson was an intern for the group during spring 2020.

The latest culmination of Stephenson’s work, “H.Y.P.E. (Homewood Youth-Powered and Engaged) Media: Empower Youth to Change Their Community’s Narrative,” was published this spring in the Undergraduate Journal of Service Learning and Community-Based Research’s special issue on projects in a time of disruption. Stephenson also presented her research at the 2020 University’s Diversity Forum and later won the University Honor’s College Research Fair Award for the Arts and Humanities discipline.

The project that started it all will be also further contextualized in Scott’s forthcoming course design essay, “‘Whose World is This?’: Explorations in Hip Hop, Writing, and Culture,” to be published in Composition Studies’ special issue Diversity is Not Equity: BIPOC Scholars Speak to Systemic Racism in the Academy.

On her scholarly publication, Stephenson said: “I was able to show myself what I am capable of and not only that, but I was able to give voice to a community that I had built a close relationship with. I’ve also received nothing but encouraging responses that expressed pride or claimed that they were impressed with my work which makes me even more proud of my accomplishment.”

In her final semester this fall, Stephenson plans to wrap up her majors and apply to law school; her work with H.Y.P.E. piqued her interest in copyright law and protecting images and brands—especially for Black girls. 

“Ultimately, I want to help people defend what they value: their image, identity and how they choose to represent themselves,” she said.