Meet a Tiger: Darren Linvill

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This Tiger’s research has not only benefited the field of communication, but American politics in general. He and his colleague, Patrick Warren, are studying the impact Russian troll accounts had on the 2016 presidential election and continue to have on politics. Their work has been highly successful, even being featured in congressional hearings pertaining to social media disinformation.

Meet Darren Linvill.

Title: Associate professor, department of communication

Years at Clemson: 11 as a full time faculty member, a lifetime as a Tiger. I’m a second-generation Clemson professor. My father was the agricultural meteorologist here at Clemson for most of his career. I moved away for many years, but Clemson has a way of pulling you back.

What I do at Clemson: In addition to my responsibilities as a faculty member, I have been the basic courses director in the department of communication. I have been in charge of all oral communication general education classes in the department. Ninety-five percent of all Clemson students in the past 11 years have taken my tests. After 11 fantastic years, I’m stepping down from this position in December to focus more on my research and teaching.

What I love about Clemson: I love having access to all that the Clemson Forest and Botanical Gardens have to offer. It’s wonderful living in a town where I can enjoy lakes and waterfalls while still being a part of a dynamic, internationally diverse community.

My defining moment at Clemson: My wife, Claiborne, and I have two amazing daughters, Sylvia, 8 and Amelia, 6. My defining moment was after we had them and I realized this is where I am raising my family. There are many wonderful people doing amazing work here at Clemson and I love that my girls will have such great role models in their life as they get older.

Accomplishment I’m most proud of: My work with my colleague in the department of economics, Patrick Warren, understanding the activity of Russian disinformation campaigns on social media. We were able to use Clemson’s Social Media Listening Center to download three million tweets from known Russian accounts attempting to further divide Americans along ideological lines. In July, we released these data publicly and have been thrilled with the response from both the media and fellow researchers. We hope to continue to work to better understand this ongoing societal threat.

Where I see myself in five years: Still teaching the best students in the world!

Last thing I watched on TV: The Durrells in Corfu, because I’m a BBC nerd.

Guilty pleasure: Podcasts. Lots of podcasts.

One thing most people don’t know about me: Despite being in charge of the public speaking program for more than a decade, I’ve never taken a public speaking class.

Want to nominate a colleague to be featured in Meet a Tiger? Contact Jackie Todd at jtodd3@clemson.edu.

Meet more Tigers here, and check out #FacesOfClemson on Instagram.