Kristine Marie Berg

My research is on political rhetoric and public debate. My research focus on norms of rhetorical action, how these norms create or inhibit participation, and in how the way we talk and write to and about each other creates and breaks down communities.

My curiosity is piqued by taken-for-granted conceptions of what it means to communicate well and by unconventional and unexpected forms of rhetorical practice.

I am also interested in how textual analyses can be supplemented by other methods such as interviews, field work and protocol analysis.

I work on the following topics among others:

Social movements

Activism

Hostility

Close reading

Interviews

Protocol analysis

Fieldwork

I have taught the following obligatory courses in the Rhetoric program: Rhetorical criticism (BA), Rhetoric in Society (BA), Public speaking and Counseling (BA), Contemporary Theoretical and Methodological Perspectives (MA).

I have also taught MA elective courses such as Political Rhetoric and Humour and The Rhetoric of Hate. 

I am currently supervising two PhD projects: Frederik Emil Appel Olsen about scientist activism and Thore Fisker Keitum about the constitutive functions of the voice. I have supervised MA theses and BA projects about street parties as protest rhetoric, the rhetorical agency in stories of giving birth and the potential of conversation salons as climate science communication.

MA in rhetoric, PhD in rhetoric

Education

PhD-degree, 2011. Dissertation: ”Intercultural Dialogue” as Rhetorical Form: A Pyrrhic Victory (2011). A rhetorical criticism of the EU's and the member states' strategies to create intercultural dialogue and a number of citizens' responses.

MA, 2005. Section of Rhetoric, Department of Media, Cognition and Communication, University of Copenhagen. Elective: Anthropology, University of Copenhagen. As part of my MA I studied one year at the University of California, San Diego

Academic employment

2017-         Associate professor of Rhetoric, Department of Media, Cognition and Communication, University of Copenhagen

2013-2017 Assistant professor of Rhetoric, Department of Media, Cognition and Communication, University of Copenhagen

2012-2013 Research assistant, Section of Rhetoric, Department of Media, Cognition and Communication, University of Copenhagen. Tasks: Planning and teaching the following courses: Speech workshop and Public speaking

2007-2011 Ph.d fellow, Section of Rhetoric, Department of Media, Cognition and Communication, University of Copenhagen. As part of my phd-studies I spend three months at the Centre for Dialogue, Simon Fraser University, Vancouver. Centre for Dialogue experiments with new forms of political participation

2006          Reseacrh assistent for Professor of Rhetoric Christian Kock in his work with the book De svarer ikke (Gyldendal, 2011)

I am currently working on the following projects:

Social movements in the Nordic region:

I co-edit a special issue of the Nordic Rhetoric Journal Rhetorica Scandinavica with Esben Bjerggaard Nielsen from Aarhus University and  Frida Buhre from Uppsala University focusing on social movements in the Nordic region.

The Danish anti-nuclear movement, OOA: I am working on a project about the demonstrations organized by the OOA,1973-2001, to protest the establishment of nuclear power plants and another project about the rhetorical function of the organisation's iconic anti nuclear logo with the smiling sun.