Robert J. Thompson is the founding director of the Bleier Center for Television and Popular Culture at Syracuse University where he is also the Trustee Professor at the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications. He was a visiting professor for six summers at Cornell University and served for nine years as professor and director of the N.H.S.I. Television and Film Institute at Northwestern University.

Professor Thompson has written pieces for The New York Times, Newsday, The Los Angeles Daily News, The Christian Science Monitor, Electronic Media, Multichannel News, Encyclopedia Britannica, and many other publications. His commentaries have been heard on NPR’s Morning Edition and All Things Considered, he is a frequent contributor to The Washington Post, and he writes a regular column for AdWeek. Thompson is the author or editor of six books: Television in the Antenna Age (Blackwell, (2004), Television’s Second Golden Age (Continuum, 1996), Prime Time, Prime Movers (Little, Brown, 1992), Adventures on Prime Time (Praeger, 1990), Making Television (Praeger, 1990), and Television Studies (Praeger, 1989).

The general editor of an ongoing series of books about television published by Syracuse University Press, Thompson is also a past president of the national Popular Culture Association. He lectures across the country on the subjects of television and popular culture. In 1991 and 1992, he was awarded the Stephen H. Coltrin Award for Excellence in Communication Theory by the International Radio & Television Society.

Hundreds of radio and TV programs and publications have featured Professor Thompson’s commentary, including: CBS’s 60 Minutes, 48 Hours, The Early Show and The Evening News with Dan Rather; NBC’s Dateline, Today, and Later Today; ABC’s 20/20, World News Tonight, and Good Morning America; PBS’s Newshour with Jim Lehrer; MSNBC’s News with Brian Williams, Time and Again, Headliners & Legends, and Playback; CNN’s Newsstand; CNBC’s Upfront Tonight with Geraldo Rivera; NPR’s All Things Considered, Morning Edition, Talk of the Nation, Fresh Air, On the Media, and Anthem; The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, USA Today, Time, Newsweek, Fortune, TV Guide, and Variety.

He holds a B.A. in political science from the University of Chicago and an M.A. and Ph.D. in radio, television, and film from Northwestern University.

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