More About Mary Etta Cook
- B.S., Concord College
- M.A., Marshall University
Mary Etta Cook founded the Communication Studies department more than 30 years ago. She has been involved in some kind of work in communications all her professional life ~ first as a high school English teacher, as a newspaper columnist, and then as an award-winning television and film writer. Currently, she is retired but continues to teach part-time in the department.
Her interest in languages and cultures has taken her to a number of countries around the world to do research. Most recently, she spent time in many small towns and villages all around New Zealand attempting to analyze the complex relationship between the Maori (original inhabitants) and the Pakeha (Caucasians). While there, she went far enough south to be forced to build wood fires in stoves in order to keep warm and to have her picture made with a penguin in the wild.
She is a native West Virginian and is very proud of her mountain roots. She attended Concord College and Marshall University before leaving her beloved hills. She still has a connection with WV in the form of ownership of 16 acres of virgin woodland, which she won't sell or allow to be disturbed. 'I'm protecting it for the animals living there,' she says.
