University of Iowa News Release—September 1, 2009

CLAS Faculty named Scholars

Andsager named John F. Murray Research Scholar

Julie Andsager, professor of journalism and mass communication in the UI College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, has been named the first John F. Murray Research Scholar.

Andsager, whose secondary appointment is in community and behavioral health, studies media framing and message processing about health. Her book, "Medicine and the media: Communicating health through news and entertainment," is slated for publication in 2011. Andsager co-authored "Free Expression in Five Democratic Publics" (2004) and "Self versus others: Media, Messages, and the Third-Person Effect" (2007).

Courses she has taught include quantitative research methods, media and health, gender and the media, and social scientific foundations of communication. Andsager is active in the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication and is an associate editor of Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly.

The three-year appointment honors significant and sustained research or professional productivity and its public impact. The award is supported through the John F. Murray Endowment Fund, a gift to the university in 1945 from Bessie Dutton Murray in memory of her husband. Income from the permanent endowment fund is divided among the law, journalism and business schools for educational support, including student financial aid.

Bloom named Bessie Dutton Murray Professional Scholar

Stephen G. Bloom, professor of journalism and mass communication in the UI College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, has been named the school's first Bessie Dutton Murray Professional Scholar.

Bloom is the author of "The Oxford Project," co-authored with retired UI art professor Peter Feldstein, which won awards from the American Library Association and the Independent Publishers Association of America. In 2000, he published "Postville: A Clash of Cultures in Heartland America," a national bestseller named to six newspapers' best-book-of-the-year lists. His latest book, to be released in November, is "Tears of Mermaids: The Secret History of Pearls," a nonfiction detective story that chronicles the social, political, economic and historic impact pearls have had on the world.  

Bloom teaches narrative journalism and magazine reporting and writing.

The 3-year appointment honors significant and sustained research or professional productivity and its public impact. The award is supported through the John F. Murray Endowment Fund, a gift to the university in 1945 from Bessie Dutton Murray in memory of her husband. Income from the permanent endowment fund is divided among the law, journalism and business schools for educational support, including student financial aid.