Teaching 

Cara Finnegan teaches undergraduate and graduate courses in rhetorical criticism, rhetorical theory, U.S. public address, and visual politics. For a decade she served as Director of Oral and Written Communication (CMN 111-112), a general education composition/public speaking course that served more than 650 first-year students per year. In 2006, Cara was awarded the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching Award and the Campus Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching Award from the University of Illinois. She was the 2017 recipient of the Faculty Mentoring Award given by the Rhetorical and Communication Theory Division of the National Communication Association.

Graduate Courses

Concepts in Visual Rhetoric 
The Problem of the Public 
Visual Politics of U.S. Public Culture 
Writing Rhetorical Histories
Visual Rhetoric: Extended Case Study of Farm Security Administration Photography 
Rhetoric in Context 
Rhetorics of Sight, Sound, and Sense 
Writing in Graduate School 
Picturing Health
Introduction to Communication Graduate Study (teaching in Fall 2025) 

Undergraduate Courses

Visual Politics 
Photography and Public Life (teaching honors program section in Fall 2025)
Rhetorical Criticism 
Gender & Rhetoric 
History of Photography