Cheryl L. Nicholas

Dr. Cheryl L. Nicholas is an associate professor of communication arts and Sciences and global studies at Penn State Berks. She is an ethnographer who enjoys doing research in her homeland, Malaysia. Her research is based on how symbolic activity constitutes and is constituted by cultural worldviews. Theoretically, her work is grounded in language and social interaction, and critical perspectives. She is also interested in postcolonial and queer theory. Her research has been published in journals such as Sexuality and Culture; Communication Quarterly; Qualitative Research Reports in Communication; Storytelling, Self & Society; and Journal of International and Intercultural Communication; as well as chapters in books including Queer Identities/Political Realities; Games, Leadership and Learning in Virtual Environments; and Critical Articulations of Race, Gender and Sexual Orientation.

Dr. Nicholas is the recipient of the 2011 Penn State Berks Outstanding Full-Time Teacher Award and the 2014-15 Penn State University Commission on Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Equity (CLGBTE) Award for Outstanding Service. In 2017 she was honored in the 'Teachers on Teaching' series by the National Communication Association, at their annual conference, and in 2019 she was named an Alumni Teaching Fellow at Penn State. In 2024, she received the Penn State ARID (Anti-Racism, Intersectionality, Decolonialism) Teaching and Service Award and in 2026 was selected as part of the Penn State's Global Faculty Fellows. Also, in 2026, Dr. Nicholas was awarded the top Creative Project Award in the APAC/SD division of the National Communication Association for her multi-modal/VR project on Malaysian WWII oral histories.

Dr. Nicholas teaches classes in intercultural communication, nonverbal communication, storytelling, and communication theory and research methods. She has also developed research-based classes on focused topics such as comic-book communities, LGBTQ+ identities, storytelling and DnD, and food culture.