Dr. Michele J. Knobel, PhD Obituary (1966 - 2021)

Dr. Michele J. Knobel, PhD, 55, died in Glen Ridge, NJ on Friday, October 15, 2021. Born in Moree in New South Wales, Australia, Dr. Knobel earned a BEd and MEd from the University of Southern Queensland. She earned a second MEd and a PhD from Queensland University of Technology, where her partner and husband of 28 years, Dr. Colin Lankshear, PhD, was employed. Dr. Knobel began her career in the 1980s as an elementary school teacher at Good Shepherd Lutheran Primary School in Noosa, Australia. This career developed into researching and teaching in the area of Literacy Education at the university level in Australia, Canada, Mexico and the United States. During the 1990s she lectured at University of Southern Queensland, Toowoomba; Queensland University of Technology, Brisbane; and the Australian Catholic University, Brisbane. In January 1999 she and her husband moved to Mexico to live. Between 1999 and 2001 she worked remotely as an Adjunct Professor with graduate students at Central Queensland University in Rockhampton, Australia. During this time Dr. Knobel also worked as a Visiting Researcher at the National Autonomous University of Mexico. In 2002, she joined the Department of Education of the University of California as an Assistant Professor and Associate Research Specialist. She was appointed Associate Professor at Montclair State University, NJ, in 2003, and was promoted to Full Professor in 2006. She remained in her faculty position in the Department of Teaching and Learning until her death. Her best-known research focused on everyday literacy practices mediated by digital technologies, with a particular emphasis on popular cultural activities like gaming, blogging, fan fiction writing, and uses of social media. Dr. Knobel published books, chapters for edited collections, and academic articles, including Everyday Literacies: Students, Discourse and Social Practice, based on her doctoral research; "Rants, ratings and representations: Ethical issues in researching online social practices"; and "Memes and Affinity Spaces: Some implications for policy and digital divides in education". She presented keynote addresses and academic conference papers and workshops in countries as diverse as Australia, Finland, Argentina, Mexico, Cuba, Canada, Spain, and England. She also co-wrote and edited more than a dozen books published in English, Spanish, Catalan, Portuguese, and Chinese with Dr. Lankshear, and co-edited a successful academic book series on New Literacies. Dr. Knobel served on the editorial board of numerous international academic journals, and advised many Masters and Doctoral research students in Australia, Canada and the US. Dr. Knobel is recognized internationally as an extraordinary teacher, mentor, researcher and scholar. Her work has influenced many others in the field of education and literacy research, and she will long be remembered by her students and colleagues the world over as a leading figure in the development of the academic field known as New Literacies. Outside of her research and teaching activities, Dr. Knobel enjoyed spending time at Bottle Cove in Newfoundland and on the small coffee hobby farm she owned with her husband in the Mexican state of Veracruz, where they made their own coffee. Dr. Knobel was predeceased by her father, John Knobel. She is survived by her husband Colin, her mother, Betty, and siblings Leanne Reynolds, Nicole Williams, and Tim Knobel. Donations in her memory to Memorial Sloan Kettering would be greatly appreciated. Condolences may be left at proutfuneralhome.com.