Liane Malinowski

I am an Assistant Professor of Writing Studies, specializing in feminist rhetorics, archival research, and rhetorical history. I consider myself a Midwesterner and am thrilled to live and teach in Minnesota. I grew up in Illinois and attended the University of Illinois, where I studied English and education as an undergraduate and trained to be a secondary school teacher. After completing my BA, I earned an MA and PhD in English at UMass Amherst, specializing in rhetoric and composition. After completing my doctoral degree in 2018, I accepted a tenure-track position with the English Department at the University of North Texas. In 2024 I began a position in Writing Studies at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities. I am excited to work in a department that brings together perspectives on writing from composition & rhetoric, literacy studies, and technical communication. I envision my current position as one from which I can build connections with students, teachers, and scholars through inquiry into the topics of feminism, rhetoric, archives, labor, and history.

In my feminist rhetorical scholarship, I work to recover and amplify the voices of speakers and writers historically excluded from the public sphere and to theorize writing as an accessible, transformative tool for social change. My research examines how both prominent leaders and everyday citizens shape political discourse and social movements. My book, City Housekeeping: Women’s Labor Rhetorics and Spaces for Solidarity, 1886-1910, follows women in Chicago’s early labor movement who reimagined work and solidarity by drawing from diverse practices and traditions. Published in 2025, City Housekeeping is part of Parlor Press’s Studies in Rhetorics and Feminisms series. Recently, I have turned to focusing on students as rhetorical agents who write their way into political conversations, as well as to a new longitudinal project on the writing and rhetoric of Midwestern public imaginaries.