Julie A. Scott

Julie-Ann Scott-Pollock, PhD is a Professor of Communication Studies and Performance Studies. Dr. Scott-Pollock teaches courses in performance studies, storytelling, research methods, cultural studies, and gender studies. She is deeply committed to interdisciplinary learning. She designs and teaches classes for Honors and the M.A. in Interdisciplinary Studies in addition to the Storytelling and Qualitative Research curriculum in the Communication Studies Department. Dr. Scott-Pollock is a nationally recognized scholar in Performance Studies and Ethnography. Her research interests are at the intersections of personal narrative as performance of identity and stigmatized embodiment. She is also interested in experimental research design in narrative performance, ethnography, autoethnography, and artistic methods. Her research topics include eating disorders, physical disability, memory loss, seizure disorders, anxiety disorders, and gender-expansive identity. She has published two books: one about the performance of daily life, experimental pedagogy, and community engagement and another on parenting across cultural intersections of masculinity. Her numerous research articles and artistic writings appear in journals such as Text and Performance Quarterly, Qualitative Inquiry, Critical Studies – Critical Methodologies, and Women Studies in Communication. Her nationally award-winning solo show Gazed At: Stories of a Mortal Body was live-streamed on five continents as the Plenary Performance for the International Congress on Qualitative Inquiry. Her four nationally recognized experiential-learning performance troupes reach local to national audiences, with performances designed for preschoolers, elementary and middle school students, and adults.

Education

Ph.D. in Communication and Performance Studies (interdisciplinary), University of Maine

M.A. in Communication, University of Maine

B.A. in Communication & English, Gordon College

Specialization in Teaching

Courses Taught at UNCW:

Com 116: Performance of Literature
Com 211: Storytelling and Culture
Com 212: Storytelling in the Community
Com 302: Applied Qualitative Research
Com 313: Storytelling and Community Engagement
Com 413: Storytelling and Social Identity
Com 415: Performance Practicum
Com 495: Special Topics: Ethnography in Action
Com 495: Special Topics: Applied Cultural Performance
Hon 110: Honors First Year Seminar: The Power of Story
Hon 210: Storytelling and Cultural Production
Hon 210: Robots and Culture
Hon 210: Communicating Creation
Hon 212: A Tour of Greece: Monsters Past and Present
IDS 542: Creative Nonfiction, Autobiography, and Memoir Writing
IDS 592: Identity, Difference, and Cultural Location
IDS 592: Storytelling, Identity, and Becoming Who We Are
IDS 592: Stories of Embodiment
IDS 592: The Creation of Knowledge and Culture
IDS 598: Graduate Interdisciplinary Studies Capstone

Research Interests

Methodology: Narrative Performance Analysis, Performance of Identity in Daily life; Critical Ethnographic Performance; Autoethnographic Performance; Experiential Learning and Critical Pedagogy; Existential Phenomenology; Digital Performance

Subject Interests: Stigmatized Embodiment with emphases in disability, illness, anxiety, memory loss, aging, mortality, whiteness, gender, and sexuality

Professional Service

Journal and Performance Review Boards:

Liminalities: A Journal of Performance Studies (Contributing Editor)
Communication Monographs
Text and Performance Quarterly
National Communication Association Performance Review Board
Journal of International/Intercultural Communication
Communication and Critical/Cultural Studies

Research Monograph Reviewer

Temple University Press
Routledge
Palgrave MacMillan
Sage

National Service to the Discipline

Chair, IDEA Council, National Communication Association, (2024-2028).
Chair, Performance Studies Division, National Communication Association (2020-2024)
Legislative Assembly Representative, 2020-2023
Chair, Ethnography Division, National Communication Division, 2018-2022
Chair, Disability Issues Caucus, National Communication Association, 2018-2022
Nominations Committee for the Performance Studies Division of the National Communication Association, Eastern States Representative (2018, 2010).
Secretary, Disability Issues Caucus, National Communication Association (2007-2009).
Ellis-Bochner Narrative Research Award Selection Committee, 2023-present
Chair, Task Force on Virtual Accessibility, 2021-present
Scholars Office Hours, National Communication Association 2021, 2022
Chair for National Communication Webinar Series on Disability and Interdisciplinarity, 2022
Diversity Task Force Strategic Planning Committee, National Communication Association 2021
Ethnography Division Awards Committee Chair, 2021.
Donald Ecroyd Award for Outstanding Teaching in Higher Education Selection Committee, 2020-2023.
Lilla Heston Award for Outstanding Scholarship in Interpretation and Performance Studies Selection Committee, 2016-2019
Awards Committee Chair, Performance Studies Division (2015-2019)
Best Book Chapter Award Committee for the Ethnography Division of the National Communication Association (2015)
Research Committee for the Performance Studies Division of the National Communication Association, Committee Member (2011-2014)

Community Engagement

Dr. Scott-Pollock is the founding director of UNCW Performance Studies (Established in 2014), which includes four undergraduate performance troupes with local and international audiences. The UNCW Storytellers and Hawk Tale Players adapt children's stories and ethnographic narrative interviews into interactive performances for elementary and middle school students to promote literacy, reading fluency, and the value of diverse human experiences. The Just Us Performance Troupe creates original, devised performances for adult audiences that foster dialogue around personal experience and cultural understanding. UNCW Performance Ethnography adapts Dr. Scott-Pollock's research interviews and fieldwork into accessible performances to share data findings about cultural identity with non-academic audiences. The UNCW Performance Studies troupes have received university, local, regional, and national accolades. The nationally award-winning Research Monograph, Embodied Performance as Applied Research, Art, and Pedagogy, explains the research methodology and experimental pedagogy that informs the troupes' design. In addition to directing UNCW Performance Studies, Dr. Scott-Pollock's solo performance work, from one-woman adaptations of her research to folk character performances, has been performed on campus for community audiences and throughout the local elementary school system in addition to national and international stages. Find out more at the troupes' promotional website uncwstorytelling.org.

Honors & Awards

Awards For Research:

Jim Ferris Award for Outstanding Contributions to the Field of Disability Studies and Communication, 2024

Outstanding Mid-Career Award – Ethnography Division of the National Communication Association, 2023

Best Aural/Visual Ethnography Award, National Communication Association, 2023

Ellis-Bochner Personal Narrative Research Award, Society for the Study of Symbolic Interaction, Affiliate of the National Communication Association, 2022

Lilla Heston Award for Outstanding Scholarship in Interpretation and Performance Studies, National Communication Association, 2020.

Top Ethnographic Book, National Communication Association, 2018

Top Ethnographic Article, National Communication Association, 2018

Top Ethnographic Book Chapter, National Communication Association, 2018

Top Ethnographic Article, National Communication Association, 2015

Awarded the “Woman to Watch” in Education by Wilma Magazine: Wilmington’s Successful Women, 2015

Janet Ellerby Award for Gender Studies Research, University of North Carolina Wilmington, 2012

Awards for Teaching

University of North Carolina System Award for Teaching Excellence, 2024

The IDEA (Inclusion, Diversity, Equity, and Access) Award, National Communication Association, 2021

Donald H. Ecroyd Award for Outstanding Teaching in Higher Education, National Communication Association, 2019.

Distinguished Teaching Professorship Award, University of North Carolina Wilmington, 2018

Chancellor’s Teaching Excellence Award, University of North Carolina Wilmington, 2017

YWCA Woman of Achievement in Education for the Cape Fear Region, 2018

Awards for Service

National Communication Association Presidential Citation for Service, 2023

Office of Community Engagement and Applied Learning Excellence in Community Engagement Award, 2020

Distinguished Award for Scholarly Engagement and Public Service, University of North Carolina Wilmington, 2015