Teaching 

Finnegan teaches undergraduate and graduate courses in rhetorical criticism, rhetorical theory, American 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 serves more than 650 first-year students per year. In 2006, she 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. Most recently, 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 (CMN-538-CF syllabus) 
The Problem of the Public (CMN-538-CF syllabus) 
Visual Politics of U.S. Public Culture (CMN 538-CF syllabus) 
Writing Rhetorical Histories (CMN 538-CF syllabus)  teaching in Spring 2020
Visual Rhetoric: Extended Case Study of Farm Security Administration Photography (CMN 538-CF syllabus) 
Rhetoric in Context (CMN 538-CF syllabus)
Rhetorics of Sight, Sound, and Sense (CMN 538-CF syllabus) taught in Spring 2019
Writing in Graduate School (CMN 529-CF syllabus) 

Undergraduate Courses

Visual Politics (CMN 340 syllabus) 
Photography and Public Life (CMN-396 syllabus) taught in Fall 2019
Rhetorical Criticism (CMN 423 - grad/undergrad - syllabus) 
Gender & Rhetoric (CMN 450 - grad/undergrad - syllabus) 
History of Photography (Art History course, Odyssey Project - syllabus)