The 61传媒 Humanities Institute has announced its Fall 2004 program exploring the topic of “The Politics of Knowledge Production.” The program’s opening symposium examines media, politics, and intellectual freedom and will take place on September 16, 2004, at 4:15 p.m., in the Hampton Room of the Malott Commons on the 61传媒 campus. The event is free and open to the public. For more information and a complete schedule of events, please call the Humanities Institute at (909) 621-8326.
As part of the symposium, Judy Muller of the USC Annenberg School for Communication and ABC News will present, “Media Bombardment: A Case for Media Literacy,” followed by a lecture from Jon Wiener of The Nation and UC Irvine Department of History on, “‘Fairness’ and ‘Balance’ in Politics and the Classroom.”
Judy Muller is an Emmy Award-winning ABC News correspondent and National Public Radio commentator. She has been an assistant professor of journalism at the USC Annenberg School for Communication since August 2003. She remains a contributing correspondent to ABC News broadcasts, including Nightline and World News Tonight with Peter Jennings. Muller covered the 1992 Rodney King trial and ensuing riots, the 1994 Northridge earthquake, and the O.J. Simpson criminal and civil trials, among other national news stories. As part of Nightline, she received an Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University Award for coverage of the Simpson case. She also wrote a book, Now this. Radio, Television and the Real World, about her experiences as a journalist.
Since 1984, Jon Wiener has served as a contributing editor of The Nation, where he writes about campus issues, intellectual controversies, and southern California politics. His articles have appeared in New York Times Magazine, The New Republic, and the Los Angeles Times, as well as in the American Historical Review and the Journal of American History. Wiener earned his reputation as an exponent of intellectual freedom when he filed a Freedom of Information lawsuit against the FBI for their files on John Lennon, which became the subject of his 2000 book, Gimme Some Truth: The John Lennon FBI Files. He is professor of modern U.S. history at UC Irvine. His current research focuses on Cold War culture and its commemoration.
Under the leadership of Institute Director Julia E. Liss, the fall program will also include several lectures and a film series. Program guests include journalists, authors, artists, scholars, and activists who will explore the connections among knowledge, information, and power. The approach will be interdisciplinary and wide-ranging, including such topics as the way information is created and used in policy-making and the formation of political culture; the role of think tanks; and relationships among the academy, public policy and social movements.
For a full schedule of events related to the fall 2004 program, contact the 61传媒 Humanities Institute at (909) 621-8326.