Media and Social Justice

Sue Curry Jansen is a Professor of Media and Communication at Muhlenberg College. She is the author of Censorship (1991) and Critical Communication Theory (2002). She served on the board of the short-lived but far-sighted Cultural Environmental Movement.

Jefferson Pooley is an Assistant Professor of Media and Communication at Muhlenberg College. He is co-editor of The History of Media & Communication Research (with David W. Park, 2008). His research centers on the history of communication studies, as the field’s emergence has intersected with the twentieth century rise of the other social sciences. His particular interest is in the field’s memories of itself, as these serve to privilege certain approaches while closing off others. He is an active member of the local media reform movement.

Lora Taub-Pervizpour is an Associate Professor and Chair of the Department of Media and Communication at Muhlenberg College. She directs the RJ Fellows program, an honors program focused on social change. A recent publication growing out of her social justice commitments appears in Story Circle: Digital Storytelling Around the World (2009). She has been engaged in collaborations with young people making media for more than a decade in communities as diverse as San Diego, California and Sao Paulo, Brazil. In Allentown, Pennsylvania, she collaborates with community partners on HYPE (Healthy Youth Peer Education), a youth leadership development program that mobilizes new digital media as tools for advocacy and community change.