Recent Press Coverage

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President Trump's Tough Trade Talk Concerns Georgia Manufacturers

February 13, 2017

Usha Nair-Reichert, associate professor in the Ivan Allen College School of Economics, was quoted in “President Trump's Tough Trade Talk Concerns Georgia Manufacturers” by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

Excerpt:

When it comes to ice cream, exports from Georgia have quadrupled since 2010, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. More than one-third of the roughly $16 million in state ice cream exports went to Mexico last year.

“There’s a sizable market to be tapped in the ice cream sector, there’s no doubt about that,” said Usha Nair-Reichert, an economist at Georgia Tech.

She questioned pulling out of NAFTA, especially given the economic interdependence of the three countries. She also pointed out that if disagreements with Mexico cause the Peso to fall, Mexican exports become more competitive. Comments by the president since his election have been linked to fluctuations in that country’s currency.

For the full article, read here.

Published in: Atlanta Journal-Constitution
OutKast in Class: Using Hip-Hop to Teach Social Justice

February 7, 2017

Joycelyn Wilson, visiting professor in the School of Literature, Media, and Communication, was interviewed in “OutKast in Class: Using Hip-Hop to Teach Social Justice,” a segement on NPR's All Things Considered.

Excerpt:

The Georgia Institute of Technology is known for graduating its students from nationally-ranked programs in science, technology, engineering and math.

A new class taught by visiting professor Dr. Joyce Wilson is using hip-hop to take those students down a more creative pathway than their STEM studies to learn about issues such as race, poverty and cultural identity.

The class is titled “Exploring the Lyrics of OutKast and Trap Music to Explore Politics of Social Justice.”

Dr. Wilson joined me in the studio to explain why she’s teaching trap at Tech.

For the full article, read here.

Published in: NPR
Thomas Lux, Esteemed Georgia Tech Teacher and Poet

February 6, 2017

"Thomas Lux, Esteemed Georgia Tech Teacher and Poet" by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution is an appreciation piece for the late Thomas Lux, who was the Margaret T. and Henry C. Bourne, Jr. Chair in Poetry in the School of Literature Media, and Communication.

Excerpt:

Distinguished by his booming laugh, his arresting poetry readings and his passion for baseball, Bourne Professor of Poetry at Georgia Tech Thomas Lux, was a self-described “literary oddball” who threw himself into teaching while remaining a dedicated master of the craft.

After weekly readings at Georgia Tech, “he would invite everyone who was at the reading to come to his house, and everyone would,” said Jericho Brown, associate professor of English and creative writing at Emory University. “I would say he was an idol of mine.”

When Lux, 70, died Sunday, the internet came alive with reminiscences from those who held him and his work in high esteem.

For the full article, read here.

Published in: Atlanta Journal-Constitution
The Value of ‘Object Lessons’ and Learning Everything About One Thing

February 3, 2017

Ian Bogost, professor in the Ivan Allen College School of Literature, Media, and Communication, was mentioned in “The Value of ‘Object Lessons’ and Learning Everything About One Thing” by The Chicago Tribune.

Excerpt:

"Object Lessons" describes themselves as "short, beautiful books," and to that, I'll say, amen. Overseen by Ian Bogost of Georgia Tech ("Play Anything") and Christopher Schaberg of Loyola University New Orleans ("The End of Airports"), the books have such scintillating titles as "Remote Control," "Shipping Container" and "Refrigerator."

For the full article, read here.

Published in: The Chicago Tribune
Making the Grade: Tech Professor Blends Music, Computer Coding

January 31, 2017

Brian Magerko, associate professor in the Ivan Allen College School of Literature, Media, and Communication, was mentioned in “Making the Grade: Tech Professor Blends Music, Computer Coding” by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

Excerpt:

The program grew out of conversations between Freeman and his EarSketch co-founder, Brian Magerko a musician and professor of digital media at Tech. “We were looking at ways to collaborate and settled on this problem of how to engage students in coding,” said Freeman. “We both saw the same thing: We use computers, but very few of us understand how they work, let alone how to control them or understand their potential.”

For the full article, read here.

Published in: The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Social Video Entrepreneur Zuley Clarke Selected for Startup Accelerator, Receives Initial $50K in Capital Investment

January 23, 2017

Zuley Clarke, an alumna (2005) of the Digital Media master's program in the School of Literature, Media, and Communication, was featured in “Social Video Entrepreneur Zuley Clarke Selected for Startup Accelerator, Receives Initial $50K in Capital Investment” by The St. Louis American.

Excerpt:

Zuley Clarke’s company Humblee is one of five women-led companies that have been selected to participate in the Spring 2017 Prosper Women Entrepreneurs (PWE) Startup Accelerator in St. Louis.

Each company will receive an initial $50,000 capital investment and will have the opportunity for up to $100,000 in follow-on funding. Participants gain access to mentors, exposure to a network of experts and investors, and receive a customized curriculum designed to advance business growth and raise follow-on capital. More than 80 percent of previous participants have received follow-on funding.

For the full article, read here.

Published in: The St. Louis American
Communicators and the State of the Net Conference, Part 3

January 23, 2017

Milton Mueller, professor in the Ivan Allen College School of Public Policy, was featured in “Communicators and the State of the Net Conference, Part 3,” which aired on C-SPAN.

Excerpt:

George Sadowsky and Milton Mueller talked about issues related to internet use while attending the “State of the Net” conference at the Newseum. Topics included cybersecurity, ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers), internet access to nations around the world, and internet freedom and governance.

Watch the full segment here.

Published in: C-SPAN
The Diversity Question and the Administrative Job Interview

January 18, 2017

Richard Utz, professor and chair of the Ivan Allen College School of Literature, Media, and Communication, wrote “The Diversity Question and the Administrative Job Interview” for the Chronicle of Higher Education.

Excerpt:

Search committees have a list of six to 10 usual questions they ask every candidate interviewing to be a department chair or dean. There is the icebreaker question ("What attracts you about joining us here at Prairie Home University?"), the leadership question ("How do you deal with conflict?"), and the fund-raising question ("What is the largest private gift you have asked for and received?").

But of all the questions asked and answered, the one that has proved to be the most complex is the diversity question.

For the full article, read here.

Published in: Chronicle of Higher Education
How to Give Counterterrorism a Fighting Chance

January 17, 2017

Assistant Professor Jenna Jordan, Associate Professor Margaret Kosal, and Associate Professor Lawrence Rubin, faculty members in the Ivan Allen College Sam Nunn School of International Affairs, co-authored “How to Give Counterterrorism a Fighting Chance” for The National Interest.

Excerpt:

President-elect Trump made it clear that defeating and destroying ISIS will be one of his national security priorities. He has assembled a team of national security experts with significant leadership experience combating al-Qaeda, ISIS and the Taliban. If the Trump administration prioritizes the defeat of ISIS and violent extremism and if it allocates finite national security resources to counterterrorism policies, it should ensure that there is a fighting chance for counterterrorism to succeed. The Trump administration should look beyond the near term and implement an approach that will have positive effects for decades to come.

For the full article, read here.

Published in: The National Interest
How FIFA's World Cup Expansion May Make the Games More Global Than Ever

January 11, 2017

Kirk Bowman, associate chair and Jon Wilcox Term Professor of Soccer and Global Politics in the Sam Nunn School of International Affairs, was quoted in “How FIFA's World Cup Expansion May Make the Games More Global Than Ever” by The Christian Science Monitor.

Excerpt:

The disparity carries the geopolitical overtones of that earlier period, particularly in Africa, where nations were just starting to emerge from under European colonialism. But FIFA’s latest vote illuminates how the council’s internal politics, combined with the organization’s profit motive, may be destined to push the biggest tournament of the “universal game” toward greater inclusivity.

“The continent that really benefits, and has really suffered the most from the Europeans, is Africa,” says Kirk Bowman, a professor in soccer and global politics at the Georgia Institute of Technology.

For the full article, read here.

Published in: The Christian Science Monitor
Dr. Joyce's Innovative Social Justice Course at Georgia Tech Highlights OutKast

January 11, 2017

Joycelyn Wilson, a fellow in the Ivan Allen College's Digital Integrative Liberal Arts Center (DILAC), was interviewed in “Dr. Joyce's Innovative Social Justice Course at Georgia Tech Highlights OutKast” by Rolling Out.

Excerpt:

On Friday, Jan. 13, 2017, Dr. Joycelyn Wilson, known simply as Dr. Joyce, a Georgia Tech visiting professor is offering a hip-hop course on Atlanta’s civil rights history utilizing a unique and groundbreaking personalized learning tool, virtual reality, in addition to trap music and lyrics of OutKast.

The students will examine relationships between culture, media, race, science and technology. The course is titled: “Exploring the Lyrics of OutKast and Trap Music to Explore Politics of Social Justice.” It’s a humanities elective and a requirement of the new minor in social justice.

Here, Dr. Joyce gives insight on how artists such as OutKast play a critical role in the African American tradition of message music.

For the full article, read here.

Published in: Rolling Out
The Paradox About Play That Can Make You A Better Creative in 2017

January 10, 2017

Ian Bogost, professor in the Ivan Allen College School of Literature, Media, and Communication, had his book Play Anything reviewed in “The Paradox About Play That Can Make You A Better Creative in 2017” for Fast Company.

Excerpt:

In a world where creative hyphenates have become the norm, game designer-philosopher Ian Bogost stands out. His most famous game, Cow Clicker, began as an impish parody of Facebook games like Farmville but took on non-ironic life of its own. He’s written a book-length appreciation of a single line of BASIC code and a metaphysical monograph about the inner lives of burritos. Now with his latest book, Play Anything, Bogost applies his catholicintelligence to the phenonemon of philosophical life-hacking. Think game design meets confessional memoir meets "This Is Water" meets Marie Kondo, with a dash of "here’s what’s wrong and/or right with our entire culture" polemicism thrown in, too.

For the full article, read here.

Published in: Fast Company
Kosal on China, underwater drones, & international governance

January 4, 2017

Professor Margaret E. Kosal interviewed by Hong Kong's South China Morning Post on China's recent seizure of a US Navy underwater unmanned vehicle and international efforts to create norms of behavior for new technology.

Published in: South China Morning Post
Global Atlanta "Reader's Picks: Best Books 2016"

January 4, 2017

Global Atlanta’s Reader’s Picks for 2016 released New Year’s Day 2017 features Nunn School Professor Emeritus John Garver’s book. “The most remarkable nonfiction book I read this year was China’s Quest: The History of the Foreign Relations of the People’s Republic of China by John W. Garver, a life-long China scholar and Georgia Tech professor whose knowledge of the Chinese language and vast research background on the country primed him to write this astoundingly ambitious work, the first to trace the history of China’s complex foreign relations since the Communist regime took power in 1949.” Read full review by Nancy Hollister.

http://us6.campaign-archive2.com/?u=77eca2bc4d2b666a1b2bfa1f6&id=ebf2a365c5&e=10a787417e

Published in: Global Atlanta
China and US ‘Need Rules’ for Underwater Drone Clashes

January 2, 2017

Nunn School Associate Professor Margaret E. Kosal was interviewed by Hong Kong's South China Morning Post on China's recent seizure of a U.S. Navy underwater unmanned vehicle and international efforts to create norms of behavior for new technology.

Excerpt:

Margaret Kosal, a security expert at Georgia Institute of Technology in the US said CUES should be “reviewed regularly and expanded as new technologies are employed”, but Yan Yan, a maritime law expert at the National Institute for South China Sea studies, a Chinese government think tank, said underwater drones were in a legal grey area.

Read full article: http://www.scmp.com/news/china/diplomacy-defence/article/2058186/china-and-us-need-rules-underwater-drone-clashes

Published in: South China Morning Post
There’s a Name for Terrible Science Fiction: Skiffy

December 28, 2016

There’s a Name for Terrible Science Fiction: Skiffy features LMC professor and associate chair Lisa Yaszek. Futurity - December 28, 2016

Excerpt:

Lisa Yaszek, an expert on the history of science fiction, describes the genre’s three categories: SF, sci-fi, and skiffy, which range from the seriousness of Stanley Kubrick to the silliness of Sharknado. “Science fiction is a global language that allows us to communicate the experience of science and technology across centuries, continents, and cultures,” says Yaszek, professor and associate chair in the School of Literature, Media, and Communication at Georgia Tech.

Watch the video: http://www.futurity.org/science-fiction-skiffy-1324832-2/

Published in: Futurity
Video: Robotic Arms, Energy From Your Car's Suspension, Musical Coding, and More

December 22, 2016

Brian Magerko's TuneTable was featured in Electronics 360. Magerko is an associate professor of digital media in Ivan Allen College of Liberal Arts School of Literature, Media, and Communication.

Excerpt:

A novel method for teaching children computer programming basics will go on display at two museums in 2017. TuneTable, an interactive tabletop device, teaches kids programming basics while they put together a musical piece. A research team from Georgia Institute of Technology and Northwestern University, funded by the U.S. National Science Foundation, recently introduced the device. A user makes music with TuneTable by moving coaster-like markers around the interactive surface. Each marker is assigned a sound or a command. The surface uses computer vision to detect each marker’s function. The markers include basic programming that anyone learning programming would encounter. The table will be installed at the Museum of Design Atlanta in early 2017 and Chicago’s Museum of Science and Industry in the summer.

http://electronics360.globalspec.com/article/7872/video-robotic-arms-energy-from-your-car-s-suspension-musical-coding-and-more

Project video: http://www.news.gatech.edu/2016/12/14/musical-table-teaches-basics-computer-programming

Published in: Electronics 360
Coder’s delight: TuneTable teaches kids programming basics by making music

December 20, 2016

“Coder’s Delight: TuneTable Teaches Kids Programming Basics by Making Music” featured LMC professor Brian Magerko's project EarSketch
Yahoo! Finance - December 20, 2016

Excerpt

As some states consider computer coding as a foreign-language high school credit, researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology and Northwestern University are developing a musical table to teach kids the basics of programming. They’re calling the interactive exhibit TuneTable, and they hope its vibe will resonate with youth across the United States. The table emerged from a design challenge that Brian Magerko, the project lead and an associate professor at GT, posed to his students. Magerko and his team had already created EarSketch, an online platform that allows high school students to make music through code, and in doing so practice languages like Python, JavaScript, and Blockly by blending beats, effects, and samples. Magerko asked his college students to apply a similar approach to an informal learning environment, and to compress the weeks’ worth of learning time involved in EarSketch to just a few minutes.

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/coder-delight-tunetable-helps-kids-131121999.html

Published in: Yahoo! Finance
The Must-Read Brain Books Of 2016

December 19, 2016

Forbes’ “The Must-Read Brain Books of 2016” featured LMC professor Ian Bogost’s “Play Anything: The Pleasure of Limits, the Uses of Boredom, and the Secret of Games” (Basic Books 2016). Forbes - December 19, 2016

Excerpt:

The best of the brain books in 2016 featured deception, empathy, placebos, gaming, algorithms, microbes and that little voice in your head. Whether touching on psychology, neuroscience or the mind more broadly construed, the eight books on this list are top reads in a genre always popping with new titles… “Play Anything: The Pleasure of Limits, the Uses of Boredom, and the Secret of Games” by Ian Bogost (Basic Books) (Georgia Tech). Of all the books on this list, this may be the hardest to describe, and in my assessment that was an asset. The year saw a few new entries in the “Tackle life’s challenges like a game” category, a thesis that’s gaining momentum, but this book goes deeper than most via an enlightening discussion of the role of limits in both games and life. Bogost strikes me as equal parts philosopher and savant game enthusiast—a systems thinker with a penchant for high score formulas—and I’m glad he wrote Play Anything because it’s causing me to look at problems in a different way. Read it and I think you’ll see why.

Published in: Forbes
Publishers Are Playing Around with Games Again

December 15, 2016

Ian Bogost was quoted in DIGIDAY'S article “Publishers Are Playing Around with Games Again:”

Excerpt:

A few years after publishers fell in and out of love with games, they are toying around with them again. In the past couple months, Hearst Digital has begun producing branded puzzle games and quizzes for MSN; both Mic and the Washington Post have begun experimenting with non-branded game bots on platforms like Kik and Facebook Messenger, respectively… Indeed, the just-concluded election seemed to get publishers back into the gaming mood. The New York Times published an Everyday Arcade game called “The Voter Suppression Trail”; The Washington Post launched a mobile game called “Floppy Candidate”; Wonkette worked with the UK-based game developer Auroch Digital on “Game Of U.S. America Elections: The Game,” a turn-based card game it funded on Kickstarter.… These all grabbed headlines. But they never spurred publications to invest more meaningfully in them.

“This stuff is made to be novel rather than to do journalism,” said Ian Bogost, a distinguished chair of media studies at Georgia Tech and the author of “Newsgames.” “[Those games] never rose to the level of becoming speech.”

Published in: Digiday

Recent Press Coverage

President Trump's Tough Trade Talk Concerns Georgia Manufacturers

OutKast in Class: Using Hip-Hop to Teach Social Justice

Thomas Lux, Esteemed Georgia Tech Teacher and Poet

The Value of ‘Object Lessons’ and Learning Everything About One Thing

Making the Grade: Tech Professor Blends Music, Computer Coding

Social Video Entrepreneur Zuley Clarke Selected for Startup Accelerator, Receives Initial $50K in Capital Investment

Communicators and the State of the Net Conference, Part 3

The Diversity Question and the Administrative Job Interview

How to Give Counterterrorism a Fighting Chance

How FIFA's World Cup Expansion May Make the Games More Global Than Ever

Dr. Joyce's Innovative Social Justice Course at Georgia Tech Highlights OutKast

The Paradox About Play That Can Make You A Better Creative in 2017

Kosal on China, underwater drones, & international governance

Global Atlanta "Reader's Picks: Best Books 2016"

China and US ‘Need Rules’ for Underwater Drone Clashes

There’s a Name for Terrible Science Fiction: Skiffy

Video: Robotic Arms, Energy From Your Car's Suspension, Musical Coding, and More

Coder’s delight: TuneTable teaches kids programming basics by making music

The Must-Read Brain Books Of 2016

Publishers Are Playing Around with Games Again

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