Currently community manager for Higher Logic, freelance writer, and apprentice metalsmith. Former research assistant with the Social Media Collective at Microsoft Research New England, former resource coordinator, research assistant and graduate fellow for The Center for Games & Impact at Arizona State University. I wrote blogs, curated educational materials, sometimes fixed website errors, and played boardwalk barker/carnie at events.

MA English — Rhetoric and Composition (2014), BA English — Creative Writing (2012), both from Arizona State University. My research focused on digital literacies and communities, specifically on rhetorical genre studies, archival and aggregation, collective intelligence, collective storytelling, and affinity spaces. I wrote a lot about memes, hashtags, and Tumblr.

In my spare time I enthuse about the Tolkien universe, obsess over the Haunted Mansion, collect more action figures and toys than a twentysomething should have, dress up in costumes, read comics, and play a lot of video games. You might be familiar with that last part.

Connect with me via my various profiles linked in the sidebar, in-game, or shoot me an email at rebeccafayhoffman@gmail.com.

Presentations

• “Are We Forming Some New Language on the Internet? Examining Rhetorical Actions of Cross-Space Hashtag Leakage.” Presentation at Computers & Writing Conference, Pullman, WA, 2014.
• “Know Your Meme!” Invited lecture with peers for ASU’s Night of the Open Door Symposium, Tempe, AZ. 2013; 2014
• “Digital Ethnography: Research Methods and ‘Gameful’ Applications.” Invited lecture for ENG 394, October 3rd, 2013. Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ
• “Visual Analysis Toolkit: Four Use Cases.” Poster presented with peers at the Games+Learning+Society Conference, Madison, WI, 2013.
• “Always Reach for the Light: Cyber Resources for Teaching the Works of Ellen Hopkins.” Presentation at the Arizona English Teachers Association Conference, Phoenix, AZ, 2011.

Publications

• Daer, A., Hoffman, R., & Goodman, S. (2014). Rhetorical Functions of Hashtag Forms Across Social Media Applications. Communication Design Quarterly, 3(1), 12-16.
• Holmes, J., Hoffman, R, et al. (2013). Visual Analysis Toolkit: Four Use Cases. Proceedings of the GLS 9.0 Games+Learning+Society Conference, Madison, WI. (pp. 510-511).
• Hoffman, R. (2011). Review: Slayers. Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, 55(7), 655.