Sarah Tracy, a professor in the Hugh Downs School of Human Communication at Arizona State University, will present “Compassion in the Face of Terror” at 9 a.m., Tuesday, April 21, in the Student Union, Room 340 (A-E). This presentation is for the Communication Studies Week Spring Colloquium, sponsored by the Communication Studies Graduate Student Association and the Communication Studies Department’s graduate program.
The April 21 talk will center on the August 2013 incident at Ronald E. McNair Discovery Learning Academy just outside Atlanta, in which an individual entered the school with an AK-47-type weapon. Tracy will provide an in-depth exploration of the compassion communicated by the school bookkeeper Antoinette Tuff to the would-be shooter Michael Hill.
According to Tracy, discourse analysis of Tuff and Hill’s 911 recorded interaction provided a picture of the conversational particulars that constitute compassion. The case extended current theoretical conceptualizations of compassion and contributed insights for communicating compassion to sufferers who are angry, threatening, or resisting help.
Tracy studies stressful workplace issues such as burnout, work-life balance, faking emotions and workplace bullying, as well as positive types of communication such as compassion, engagement, and generosity.
As co-director of the Transformation Project at Arizona State University, Tracy examines new possibilities related to collaboration, health and work-life wellness. She is author of 60-plus manuscripts and two books, including "Qualitative Research Methods: Collecting Evidence, Crafting Analyses, Communicating Impact.”