Jo Tyler, associate professor of linguistics and education, and Stephen Watkins, associate professor of English, will be featured on the radio program “With Good Reason” in April. Tyler’s interview, part of “Autobiography as Autofiction,” will air on Saturday, April 11 and Sunday, April 12. Watkins’ interview will air on Saturday, April 18 and Sunday, April 19. Both interviews will air on Saturday at 4:30 p.m. on WCVE 88.9, on Sunday at 12:30 a.m. on WAMU 88.5 and online at www.withgoodreasonradio.org.
An associate professor at the UMW College of Graduate and Professional Studies, Tyler has studied the effects of storytelling on memory, using her own experiences as a foundation. She presented her research findings, that memory is fallible and easily changed by others’ recollections, at a linguistics conference at Georgetown University.
Tyler received the 2004 Faculty Award at the College of Graduate and Professional Studies for excellence in teaching and professional leadership. She teaches courses on linguistics, sociolinguistics, cross-cultural communication, phonetics and phonology, among other subjects.
Tyler earned a bachelor’s degree from Michigan State University, a master’s degree from the University of Virginia and master’s and doctoral degrees from the University of Florida.
An award-winning author and journalist, Watkins teaches courses in journalism, creative writing and 20th-century American literature. His recently released young-adult novel, “Down Sand Mountain,” won a Golden Kite Award, presented by the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators for excellence in children’s literature. His non-fiction book, “The Black O: Racism and Redemption in an American Corporate Empire,” was published in 1997 and won the Virginia College Stores Award for Best Book by a Virginia Author. Watkins’s short story collection, “My Chaos Theory,” was published in 2006.
Watkins earned a bachelor’s, a master’s and a doctoral degree from Florida State University.
“With Good Reason” is the only statewide public radio program in Virginia. It hosts scholars from Virginia’s public colleges and universities who discuss the latest in research, pressing social issues and the curious and whimsical. Now in its seventeenth year, “With Good Reason” is produced for the Virginia Higher Education Broadcasting Consortium by the Virginia Foundation for the Humanities and is broadcast in partnership with public radio stations in Virginia and Washington, D.C.