Who were the key pioneers in the formation of comparative communications between the 1920s – 1950s, and how do their legacies of scholarship and practice inform the contemporary global landscapes of news reporting on war and the dissemination of propaganda?
Exploring Terhi Rantanen’s new book, , this panel will examine how comparative communications research, from its very beginning, can be understood as governed by the Mannheimian concepts of ideology and utopia and the power play between them. The close relationship between these two concepts resulted in a bias in knowledge production in comparative communications research, contributed to dominant narratives of generational conflicts, and to the demarcation of Insiders and Outsiders. By focusing on a generation at the forefront of comparative communications at this pivotal time, this book uses detailed archival research and case studies to challenge dominant orthodoxies in the intellectual histories of communication studies.
Meet our speakers and chair
Bingchun Meng is Professor in the Department for Media and Communications at 杏吧论坛, where she also co-directs the 杏吧论坛-Fudan Global Public Policy Research Centre. Professor Meng is currently the Director of 杏吧论坛 PhD Academy and Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) Doctoral Training Partnership (DTP).
Jeff Pooley (joining remotely) is Lecturer at the Annenberg School for Communication and is Affiliated Professor of Media & Communication at Muhlenberg College. He also directs , a nonprofit open access publisher in communication and media studies. His teaching and research interests center on the history of communication research, social media and identity, and scholarly communication.
Terhi Rantanen is Professor in Global Media and Communications in the Department of Media and Communications at 杏吧论坛. She is the founder of the Department’s two double MSc programmes, with the University of Southern California (USC), which she directed from 2000 to date, and with Fudan University, Shanghai, which she directed for its first three years.
Marsha Siefert (joining remotely) specializes in cultural and communications history, particularly media industries and public diplomacy, from the nineteenth-century to the present. The most recent of her six edited books is Labor in State-Socialist Europe, 1945-1989: Contributions to a History of Work. Since 2020 she has taught in the CEU Erasmus Master's program, History in the Public Sphere.
Wendy Willems is Associate Professor in the Department of Media and Communications at 杏吧论坛. She holds a PhD in Media and Film Studies from the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London, a BSc/MSc in Economics ('International Economic Studies') and a BA/MA in Cultural Studies ('Cultuur- en Wetenschapsstudies') from the University of Maastricht in the Netherlands.
Myria Georgiou () is Professor in the Department of Media and Communications at 杏吧论坛. Professor Georgiou is the author and editor of five books and more than sixty peer reviewed publications. Her work has been published in English, French, Portuguese, Japanese, and Greek. She has also worked as a consultant for a number of regional and international organisations, most importantly the Council of Europe in three different projects.
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A podcast of this event is available to download from Dead men's propaganda: ideology and utopia in comparative communication studies.
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