Name

• Dr. Fayez A. Al-Ghamdi
• Assistant Professor of English
• Department of English Language and Literature
• College of Arts
• King Saud University
• fayez3@gmail.com

Education

• Ph.D. in English, the University of Wisconsin-Madison (Dec. 2004); dissertation title: “The Rhetoric of Cultural Encounter in Arab-American Autobiography”
• M.A. in Linguistics, the University of Wisconsin-Madison (Dec. 1996)
• B.Ed. in English, King Saud University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia (1993)

Teaching Experience

• Currently an Assistant Professor of English, teaching rhetoric, literary criticism, and writing at the Department of English Language and Literature, College of Arts, (KSU)
• Part-time professor at the College of Applied Studies and Community Service, Riyadh, teaching IEP courses
• Lecturer: Department of English Language and Literature, College of Arts, (KSU)
• English teacher: middle and high school levels for two years (1994- 1995)

Academic and Research Interests

Rhetorical theory and criticism, postcolonial theory and criticism, cultural studies, autobiography, Arab American literature, and intercultural dialogu

Consulting Activities

• Academic Assessment and Accreditation: Department of English, College of Arts, KSU; ESL centers and programs 
• KSU Preparatory Year Program (Intensive English Program)
• KSU Research and Development

Current Projects

• The rhetoric of intercultural dialogue
• The ethics of literature
• Identity in Western Thought
• Translating Bill Ashcroft’s Post-Colonial Transformation into A

 Teaching Projects

In my Advanced Writing class I supervised a unit of online discussion via the internet between KSU students and American students from the College of Southern Maryland for two consecutive semesters. The students from both countries/institutions responded to a number of questions that revolved around several cultural topics of interest to both cultures. There were two interconnected objectives of this project. First, the project aimed to give students the opportunity to practice expository and argumentative writing online; interact with native speakers of English in a virtual/real rhetorical situation that involved readers from another academic setting; and learn/practice various strategies of cultural self-(re)presentation. Second, the project focused on the ethics of dialogue and intercultural exchange; sought to enhance our students’ global awareness/understanding of and coexistence with other cultures; and presented Saudi culture and its Arabo-Islamic principles, beliefs, and values to American students based on the Saudi students’ personal views. Discussion topics included: an overview of each country (history, family, religion, races/ethnicities); education and culture; dominant cultural patterns/values; the media and intercultural relations; and coexistence and interaction between nations/cultures.

Professional Affiliations

• Modern Language Association (MLA)
• Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages, Inc. (TESOL)
• Rhetoric Society of America (RSA)
• International Society for the Study of Argumentation (ISSA)

Personal Statement

The complex and reciprocal relation between language and culture is at the foundation of my research and teaching. I’m particularly interested in how writers construct their cultural identities and affiliations in particular historical and social contexts. I’m also interested in how different cultural traditions, beliefs, and values are written or rhetorically constructed in particular transcultural situations. In both cases I examine the various rhetorical strategies that writers deploy and the material constraints or conditions they have to negotiate in this construction. In my classes, I try to make students aware of their own specific historical-cultural situatedness as writers and readers of English texts, and the specific historical-cultural situatedness of the texts/authors they read, analyze, and interpret. I usually do that through asking comparative questions about the various differences and similarities between our own culture and Anglo-American culture(s), and how these factors shape texts as well as readers. By doing that I seek to evoke a comparative, transcultural conceptual framework for the issues or concepts discussed in the class rather than a one-sided ethnocentric or Western/Eurocentric framework. This comparative strategy should make students conscious of the cultural, epistemological, and ethical underpinnings of their critical positions and (dis)identifications with the writers/texts they read and evaluate.