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Dr. Mark Aakhus is an American professor currently working as the Associate Dean of Communication and Information at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, New Jersey. He is widely known in the academic world for his work in various fields including but not limited to communication design, argumentation theory, sustainable communication, language, and communication in digital society. In addition, he has a multitude of academic journals that have been published such as: Argumentative Polylogues in a Dialectical Framework, Journal of Public Affairs, and Journal of applied Communication Research. Apart from this, Dr. Mark Aakhus participates in many associations nationally as well as internationally working with many other academic leaders. Through his work, Dr. Mark Aakhus analyzes communication concepts in order to better understand human communication and other variables that human communication cross paths with.

Biography
Major notability for Dr. Mark Aakhus is derived from his roles in global communication research, including a concentration in communication design. In fact, he serves as a chair member of the International Communications Association specifically in the division focusing on language and social interaction. The goal of the International Communications Association is to further the study of human communication by encouraging global research. The International Communications Association started rather small but has now reached eighty countries internationally with even having ties to the United Nations specified as a non-government association. Working in an association that has global connections is a prime way of expanding on what is known about human communication, collaborating on a large scale in order to make a difference is the purpose of the International Communication Association.

Dr. Mark Aakhus was also a co-founding member of National Communication Associations Human Communication and Technology Division. His participation in such associations solidifies his experience with communication. Dr. Mark Aakhus focuses strongly on the ties within communication and design (technological and organizational design); through this he looks for the reasoning of decision-making as well as other human interaction. By using a variety of methods, Aakhus examines closely social interaction in a professional setting, organizational processes, and informational structures. His current research aims to better understand the organizational design of communication institutions.

Education
Dr. Mark Aakhus first attended the University of North Dakota from 1982-1986 where he received a Bachelor of Arts Degree; he studied Communication, media studies, and Political Science. He then continued his education at Washington State University from 1986-1988 where he got a master’s in communication (Language and Social Interaction). Lastly, he attended the University of Arizona where he got his PHD in Communication, Organizations, Decision-Making, and Management Information Systems from 1992-1996.

Experience
Dr. Mark Aakhus has been working at Rutgers University School of Communication and Information for twenty-four (24) years in a variety of positions. He started as an Assistant Professor, then as an Associate Professor in his first nineteen (19) years at Rutgers University. He then became a professor and is now working as the Associate Dean for Research at Rutgers University in New Brunswick New Jersey where he continues his research and academic career.

His academic excellence has provided him with opportunities to give keynote speeches and presentations at other well-established institutes of higher learning; for example, Penn State University, the University of Colorado-Boulder, and George Mason University. He was also recognized as a guest professor of Information Systems Uppsala University's Department of Informatics and Media. His research has given him the opportunity to share it to various institutions apart from his own.

Work
One of Dr. Mark Aakhus's publications is a journal about the role of design in communication, a large focus of his research. One of his journals, "Becoming More Reflective about the Role of Design in Communication" inspects the idea that design work is more than an application of a theory, but instead design is a theory building concept. Aakhus states that design inquiry is versatile to all subfields of communication in a way that incorporates and contributes to contrasting communication theories. It is evident in the research shown that communication design offers a scaffolding for other theories, it can be utilized in the building up of theories in many cases. Another area of his work that he focuses on is argumentation; in the journal, "The Communicative Work of Organizations in shaping Argumentative Realities" Aakhus examines how argumentative practice is revolving around the logic of conversation and principle of personalization. The journals analysis puts argumentation theory up against the creations of communication constructs in order to rigorously engage the two (2) as well as the realization of ideas surrounding disagreement management in certain informational and organizational infrastructures.

Dr. Mark Aakhus's work has covered a wide range of communication subsections, another highlighted work is called, "Stakeholder Engagement as Communication Design Practice". The purpose of the scholarly article is to highlight that all sorts of organizations and professional individuals are tasked to invent kinds of engagement with "organizational stakeholders" creating communication into a reality that was before impossible or hard to picture. The framework for communication design practice provides a schema for unlocking and figuring out the logistics of stakeholder engagement in order to bring advances to communication understanding in organizational fields of communication as well as professional fields.

Current Research
In his past publications, Mark Aakhus's has worked with many other scholars in conducting their research. Currently, this is a short list of research on a variety of topics that Dr. Mark Aakhus is working on while at Rutgers University:
 * Argument Mining
 * Designing Common Ground for open innovation: Social media and information systems for deliberation and collective intelligence in health decision making
 * Sustainability communication: Controversy and rationality in polylogues about the environment and wellness in the new media ecology

Awards
Dr. Mark Aakhus has been widely recognized with an emphasis of recognition from his University of work; he is a prized member of the faculty at Rutgers University and a very notable academic scholar in his field:
 * Received the National Communication Association's Applied Communication Division's 2015 Distinguished Publication Award for Journal of Applied Communication Research


 * Distinguished Achievements in Teaching and Service within Rutgers Communication Department
 * Most Valuable Rutgers MCIS Professor for the years 2009 and 2012