2017 Keynote – Andrew Mendelson

Centre for Media and Celebrity Studies (CMCS)
5th International Conference

Bridging Gaps: Where is the Critic in Television Journalism?

CUNY School of Journalism
New York City, USA
August 31 – September 1, 2017

Day 1 Conference Keynote Speaker:

Andrew Mendelson
Associate Dean & Professor, CUNY Graduate School of Journalism

Everyone’s a critic:
The role of the media scholar in in the age of instant and pervasive commenting

In an era, of Twitter, Medium, Facebook, YouTube and other platforms, everyone can and does comment in real-time about everything they are reading, watching and hearing. Our social media feeds flow with observations, both banal and insightful, mild and snarky, measured at thousands of observations per minute. The effect is multiplied by reposts, retweets and shares, to the point that it is impossible to keep up. So, where in this avalanche of annotation do media scholars fit? Does their expertise matter when everyone feels they are media literate?

Bio:

Andrew L. Mendelson is currently the associate dean and a professor at the CUNY School of Journalism. Previously he was a faculty member in the department of journalism at Temple University in Philadelphia for nearly 15 years, serving as department chair for the last eight. In his current role, he serves as the school’s chief academic officer, overseeing faculty, curriculum and student affairs.

A photojournalist by training, he has published more than 30 journal articles and book chapters. His research focuses on the myriad ways news photographs shape society. He is currently examining the paparazzi and the way they document celebrities. He is also passionate about journalism education, having developed, consulted on, and presented about undergraduate and graduate curriculum around the country.

Mendelson has developed and taught classes in photojournalism and documentary photography, visual literacy, journalism and society, news literacy and social science research methods.

Mendelson, who has won numerous academic awards, has a PhD in Journalism from the University of Missouri. He has a Master of Arts in Journalism and Mass Communication from the University of Wisconsin and a B.A. in Journalism from Marquette University.

Andrew Mendelson, Ph.D.
Associate Dean and Professor
CUNY Graduate School of Journalism
219 West 40th Street, Fourth Floor
New York, NY 10018