Christopher A. Medjesky is an Assistant Professor of Communication at the University of Findlay in Findlay, OH. He goes by Kit Medjesky in his personal life, and adopted the wrestling name Mauler Medjesky when he was 12. He will respond to any of the above.
Medjesky received his Ph.D. in Media & Communication from Bowling Green State University, where he studied under Michael Butterworth—an all around great guy who happens to hate wrestling (go figure). He hold an M.A. in Communication from Indiana State University, and earned a B.S. from Westminster College (the real one in Pennsylvania) in mathematics and physics.
Medjesky research has focused in recent years on the rhetoric of interactive media as well as humor. After a series of studies into rape humor burnt (and bummed) him out, he is making a scholarly turn into establishing professional wrestling as a legitimate area of study.
Medjesky was lucky enough to be a young boy during the Hogan era and a teenager in the Attitude Era, making professional wrestling a key marker of his childhood and identity. His favorite wrestler is and has always been Jericho, although he is from Pittsburgh so Kurt Angle is obviously number 2.
Medjesky has a wife too pretty for him and two boys too handsome to be his. He also has a dog named Hogan, which he some what regrets naming him after the 2015 stuff.
Contact Information:
Email: Medjesky@findlay.edu
Twitter: @medjesky
Professional Wrestling Studies Contributions
Recent Scholarship
Publications
Regina Luttrell, Karen McGrath, & Christopher A. Medjesky, “Purpose, Value, and Unintended Consequences in Social Media,” in Organization and Administration in Higher Education, 2nd ed., eds. Kristina Powers and Patrick J. Schloss (London: Routledge, 2017).
Christopher A. Medjesky, “Can Rape Be Funny?: Comic Persona, Irony, and the Limits of Rape Jokes,” in Standing Up, Speaking Out: Stand-Up Comedy and the Rhetoric of Social Change, eds. Matthew R. Meier and Casey R. Schmitt (London: Routledge, 2017).
Christopher A. Medjesky, “Rhetorical Strengths & Limitations of Interactivity for Activism in the Stewart/Colbert Universe,” in Television, Social Media and Fan Culture, eds. Alison Slade, Amber Narro, and Dedria Givens-Carrol (Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2015).
Presentations
Christopher A. Medjesky, “Recreating Collective Memory via the WWE Corporate Documentary,” Central States Communication Association, Minneapolis, MN, March 2017.
Christopher A. Medjesky, “Kenneth Burke and the MoMA,” Central States Communication Association, Minneapolis, MN, March 2017.
Matthew R. Meier & Christopher A. Medjesky, “That’s What She Said: Joke Cycles as Symbolic Rapists,” National Communication Association, Philadelphia, 2016.