Contact: Sasha Steinberg

STARKVILLE, Miss.—An alumnus and faculty member of Mississippi State’s communication department is the newly elected president of the American Journalism Historians Association.

University associate professor Glenn D. “Pete” Smith Jr. recently began the one-year term. Previously, he served terms as the academic organization’s second- and first vice president.

In recognition of 10 years of “exemplary service,” Smith also has been honored with the 2015 President’s Award of the organization founded in 1981 to advance education and research in mass communication history.

He and other members work to raise historical standards and ensure that all scholars and students recognize the vast importance of media history, among other goals. For more, see https://ajha.wildapricot.org/.

“I’ve been a member of AJHA for 10 years, and this organization has done more for my career than any other professional group. They also are one of the most collegial of mass communication organizations,” Smith said. “To say that I owe them a debt is an understatement, but I am ready to serve and repay their support and encouragement.”

Prior to the most recent positions, Smith served on AJHA’s board of directors, as well as the public relations and history in the curriculum committees. He also was co-organizer of the AJHA Southeast Symposium regional conference and first digital media editor of “American Journalism: A Journal of Media History,” among other achievements.  

A Morton native, he is a 1993 communication/communication studies graduate who went onto complete a master’s degree in the subject at Auburn University.

Also a doctoral graduate in mass communication from the University of Southern Mississippi, Smith is the author of “Something on My Own: Gertrude Berg and American Broadcasting, 1929-1956” (University of Syracuse Press, 2007).

Since returning to MSU, he has taught a variety of courses in the College of Arts and Sciences’ largest department, including public speaking fundamentals and introductory courses in communication theory, cinema and mass media, as well as mass media and society and elements of persuasion.

Also a member of the Southern States Communication and National Communication associations, Smith’s primary research areas include media history, biography and film criticism, and gender communication.

Additional information about MSU’s communication department is online at www.comm.msstate.edu, http://bit.ly/MSUCommFB and twitter.com/MSUComm.

MSU is Mississippi’s leading university, available online at www.msstate.edu.