The Mary Junck Research Colloquium Series was formally established in 2007 to nurture an intellectually vibrant climate with both interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary shades, by scheduling scholarly presentations on diverse topics.

The speakers represent various disciplines and units on campus as well as other universities and organizations in the Triangle. The series has been particularly successful in attracting scholars and researchers of national and international renown from within the U.S. and abroad. The series attracts a diverse audience comprising faculty, graduate students and researchers from around the Triangle.

The colloquia meet 2-3:30 p.m. on Thursdays in the Freedom Forum Conference Center (3rd floor) in Carroll Hall.

The talks are recorded and made available for public view via the Mary Junck Colloquium Series playlist on the school's YouTube channel.

For more information or to make suggestions, please contact Sriram "Sri" Kalyanaraman at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it or 919.843.5858.

Spring 2012 Speakers

• Professor, College of Communications, Penn State
  
  
• Title: Moral Beauty and Media Entertainment
  
  
• Abstract: Research in media effects has frequently focused its attention on the many harms that media entertainment can cause, such as increased aggression, heightened mistrust, or the development of unhealthy habits. In contrast, the purpose of this talk is to overview recent and ongoing research on the possible positive outcomes of media entertainment. Specifically, in this presentation, Dr. Oliver will suggest that media entertainment can provide viewers the opportunity to grapple with life meanings, to seek greater insight concerning human compassions, and to be inspired by portrayals of moral beauty. Implications of these effects for prosocial content will be considered.

• Associate Professor, School of Journalism and Mass Communication, UNC-Chapel Hill

• Title: Twenty Years of Exemplification Research, or, What to do When a Theory Hits Middle-age.

• Abstract: Twenty years ago Professor Dolf Zillmann and a group of scholars at the University of Alabama began discussion about a program of research to investigate the effects of news reports on issue perception, focusing on the specific effects of case studies.  Eventually, a theory of exemplification effects emerged, and more than 40 published studies have utilized this theory.  Exemplification research continues, with the focus expanding from news to other areas of communication.  This presentation will trace the development of exemplification theory and consider the larger question of how a theory matures and adapts to maintain relevance.

February 9 - Dr. Daniel Kreiss

• Assistant Professor, School of Journalism and Mass Communication, UNC-Chapel Hill

• Title: Producing and Coordinating Political Participation in Electoral Campaigning: Computational Management and the 2008 Obama Campaign

• Abstract: This presentation analyzes the new media managerial and data practices used by the 2008 Barack Obama campaign for president.  Campaigns have long sought to generate and effectively coordinate citizen participation in fundraising, messaging, and fieldwork.  To help secure these fiscal and human resources, the Obama campaign developed a set of management techniques and data and analytic practices designed to increase the allocative efficiency of resources and probabilistically produce desired actions among supporters and the wider electorate.  Through in-depth interviews with more than twenty staffers working with new media on the campaign, this presentation analyzes the New Media Division’s development of what I call a ‘computational management’ style, or the delegation of managerial, allocative, messaging, and design decisions to analysis of user actions made visible in the form of data as they interacted with the campaign’s media.  It does so through an in-depth study of the campaign's website optimization and field campaign practices.  While these practices and tools did not on their own produce the extraordinary mobilization around the campaign, they helped translate it into staple electoral resources: money, messages, and votes.

February 23 - Dr. Brian Southwell

• Research Professor, UNC-Chapel Hill
• Senior Research Scientist, RTI International

• Title: The promise and perils of leveraging social networks for strategic communication

• Abstract: Recent years have witnessed a dramatic surge in popular attention to social networks (and social media). Strategic communication professionals have helped shine this spotlight, including social media components in many contemporary efforts. Useful theoretical development and empirical research, however, has been slower to emerge, especially in the arena of mass media campaign evaluation. Understanding the roles that social networks might play with regard to mass information spread and mass media campaign effects paradoxically requires a look backward: more than a century of thinking about interpersonal interaction tells us much about where we might head next. Southwell will outline an agenda of research in this vein and highlight several recent papers that begin to address (and raise) relevant questions.

March 1 - Dr. Christine Rini

• Research Assistant Professor, Gillings School of Global Public Health, UNC-Chapel Hill

March 8 - No Colloquium - Spring Break

March 15 - TBA

March 22 - TBA

March 29 - TBA

April 5 - TBA

April 19 - TBA

April 26 - TBA