I just got back from a book signing event featuring noted Canadian public relations professional and political satirist, Terry Fallis, who read from his new book, The High Road, which is the sequel to The Best Laid Plans. The event was co-hosted by McMaster Chief Librarian, Jeff Trzeciak and Mark Lefebvre, from Titles, McMaster University’s …
Category Archives: Political Comm
How I became an academic: from tenure until the present
During the last month, I have been recounting the story of how I became an academic. In this, the final blog entry in this series, I discuss what it was like settling into the reality of becoming a middle-career academic and learning to savour life a little. During the last two years before tenure, I …
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Montréal, je t’aime.
Sometimes, my mind wanders, during that brief moment between dusk and night, as my eyes adjust to the dimming light and advancing twilight makes the edges of tree branches seem soft and hazy against the paling sky. My mind wanders back through misty memories to moments I would like to relive or retrieve. Perhaps it …
QPMAP – Question Period Monitoring and Analysis Project Launched at CCA in Montréal!
Today, my colleague Philip Savage and I presented the first, very preliminary results from our QPMAP: Question Period Monitoring and Analysis Project in front of a great crowd of 24 engaged colleagues from across Canada at the Canadian Communication Association’s (CCA) annual conference at Concordia University in Montréal. The CCA was part of the Congress …
Automotive Frustrations.
I went into Toronto yesterday and had lunch with one of our Mac communications alumni, Elena Yunusov. Elena is a very dynamic professional communicator and social media enthusiast (she tweets a lot!) who now works for the Ontario Ombudsman. We had lunch at Mercato at Bay and Queen, and had a great conversation about communications, …
Preliminary comment on BBC’s coverage of the UK Election
I have to say – I love London. And it would be great to be in London on the night of a general election, in the thick of things. But the BBC is doing a great job of bringing us there and helping us share in the excitement. The infographics are great! They have a …
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Some thoughts on the three British televised Leaders’ Debates
I just finished watching the three televised British Leaders Debates on C-Span (the player at cpac.ca never booted up for me: wake up CPAC). This was the first time that the United Kingdom had a televised confrontation of the Leaders of the three major national parties: Prime Minister Gordon Brown of Labour, Nick Clegg of …
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The Hon. Paddy Torsney gives a guest lecture to CMST 3QQ3: Communications Campaigns and Elections
Today was an excellent day at Mac for me. Not only was it the last day of class and the end of a superb Level III seminar on Communications Campaigns for Not-for-Profits and Elections, but we had a distinguished visitor, my old friend, the Honourable Paddy Torsney. It was a real thrill for the students …
Guest lecture from Don Smith, Dir. of Operations, Public Affairs Branch, CRA
Yesterday and today were a lot of fun for me. My good friend and Master of Communication Management thesis student, Don Smith came to visit. He arrived rather late and I got home to see him wheeling in to my driveway. We went out to the Outback Steakhouse in Ancaster and had sirloin steaks. It …
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COMM-Lab: Communication Metrics Laboratory is LAUNCHED!
Today, we launched the COMM-Lab: Communication Metrics Laboratory, of which I am the founder and co-director with my colleague, Dr. Philip Savage. COMM-Lab was created because of a dearth of empirical and evidence-based research on communication studies in Canada. Many scholars, practitioners and MPs have told Philip and me that more data is needed to …
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