Lynda Olman

Professor of English at the University of Nevada, Reno. Her primary field is the rhetoric of science, particularly the public reception of visual STEM arguments and of the ethos or public role of the scientist. Her most recent book, “Scientists as Prophets: A Rhetorical Genealogy” (Oxford, 2013) traces a dominant strand in the role of the science adviser back to its roots in Ancient Mediterranean prophecy.

Her first book, “Sins Against Science: The Scientific Media Hoaxes of Poe, Twain, and Others” (SUNY, 2006), examined the pivotal epoch when science first entered American political life. Her most current project seeks a structural vocabulary for scientific graphics in order to help non-experts better interpret them. Walsh also has published studies in environmental and non-Western rhetoric; these are joined to her main body of work through an unswerving commitment to archival data, inductive methods and interpretation of results in terms of local politics.