Name: David W. Bulla
Where you work: Augusta University, as an associate professor and interim dept. chair in Communication.
Where you got/are getting your Ph.D.: University of Florida, in mass communication (August 2004).
Current favorite class: COMM 4950 (Sports Communication).
Current research project: Working on two projects, one on Frederick Douglass and the other on Mohandas K. Gandhi.
Fun fact about yourself: I am a fan of northern European mystery fiction, especially Ann Cleeves, the late Colin Dexter, the late Henning Mankell and Ian Rankin. I have visited both Oxford (locale of Dexter’s Morse novels) and Edinburgh (where Rankin’s Rebus novels are set), and plan to visit both the Shetlands (Cleve’s Jimmy Perez novels) and southern Sweden one of these days to complete the cycle. I have actually been to Newcastle upon Tyne, England, where Cleves lives, and I have spent time at the Literacy and Philosophical Society Library where she gives readings, though I still have not seen her give a lecture or reading. I did meet Rankin at the Dubai Literary Festival a few years back. Yes, he says Rebus loves the Rolling Stones more than the Who. But Rebus’ brother was a big Who fan. A partial victory.
Name: Paulette D. Kilmer
Where you work: I am a full professor in the Communication Department at the University of Toledo in Ohio. I also serve as the department liaison to the Independent Collegian student newspaper and have coordinated UT’s celebration of the American Library Association’s Banned Books Week for 22 years. Today we are known campus-wide as The UT Banned Books Coalition.
Where you got/are getting your Ph.D.: I earned my doctorate in the Institute of Communications Research at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign with Dr. James W. Carey and Dr. Clifford Christians as co-advisors for my study of the media as a form of storytelling in popular culture.
Current favorite class: A few years ago, I created Storytelling in Public and Private Spaces to teach journalism students how to adapt oral storytelling techniques to narrative journalism and to use these skills in interviewing to help sources tell their stories.
Current research project: I am finishing a study of newspaper accounts of the paranormal and working on some studies of archetypes in news internationally. I am also creating a model of history and the imagination.
Fun fact about me: I love waterfalls! I hold a white belt in Nia, the dance form of martial arts. I dance with my Nia friends once or twice a week. In my quest for a form of aerobic exercise that would not kill me 16 years ago, I started my journey in personal fitness and spiritual growth.
Name: Christina Littlefield
Where you work: Pepperdine University, associate professor in journalism and religion.
Where you got/are getting your Ph.D.: University of Cambridge, Ph.D. in Divinity, or more specifically, church history.
Current favorite class: American religious history and investigative and narrative reporting: One lets me explore the nation’s incredible diversity and one lets me coach students to bring data and documents to life.
Current research project: Social Gospel Muckrakers: how Protestant religious reformers started their own periodicals to promote reform, both preceding and alongside the secular muckrakers.
Fun fact about yourself: I use Star Wars (episodes 4-6) to explain American religious history.
Name: Michael T. Martínez
Where you work: School of Journalism & Electronic Media at the University of Tennessee-Knoxville.
Where you got/are getting your Ph.D.: School of Journalism, University of Missouri-Columbia.
Current favorite class: Communication Law in a Democracy (Graduate level).
Current research project: I am working on a book manuscript on official White House presidential photographers and the presidents they served.
Fun fact about yourself: I like to read mystery and crime novels as a mindless break from scholarly reading.
Compiled by Madeleine Liseblad.