Academic Associations

Christopher H. Sterling

With some organizations dating back to the World War I period, a variety of academic associations have helped to shape academic journalism and mass communication programs in the United States for nearly a century. Their interests often overlap but they center on sharing and improving methods of teaching and research into all aspects of journalism. They also reflect trends in the development of American academic teaching and research in mass communication. College and university-level study of mass communication in the United States grew out of courses and programs in many fields, chiefly English and speech, sociology and political science, and later psychology. Other subjects, including management and law, were also contributors. While mass communication education and research in some universities dates to the 1930s, major growth took place only after World War II. By the 1950s, as media programs spread to more schools, a degree of specialization was already evident—a ...

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