Mark Gibson

Mark joined the National Centre for Australian Studies in 2007 as coordinator of the Graduate Program in Communications and Media Studies. He is a graduate of the University of Sydney, the University of Technology, Sydney and Edith Cowan University. He has wide experience in research and teaching in communications, media and cultural studies in Australia, having worked previously at Murdoch University, Curtin University, Central Queensland University, the University of Canberra and the University of Technology, Sydney.

Mark is General Editor of the international refereed journal Continuum – Journal of Media and Cultural Studies. Continuum, has a long Australian history, having begun in Perth in 1987, but now receives submissions from Australasia, Asia, Europe and North America. A number of recent special issues have featured leading international scholars and been converted to book publications by Routledge. Mark has also been an officeholder in various roles with the Cultural Studies Association of Australasia and has organised national conferences of the CSAA and the Australian and New Zealand Communications Association.

Mark believes that coursework postgraduate work should combine strong scholarship and vocational relevance, while also having an element of fun. Since taking on coordination of the Communications and Media Studies program, he has taken a number of initiatives to improve this mix. For example, he has initiated an International Field Trip subject within the Masters, drawing on experience developed in this area in the undergraduate journalism program by Andrea Baker. In 2008, students on the field trip visited leading media organizations in London and New York, including the BBC, The Times, Reuters, Bloomberg, the United Nations media unit, Time Out and Rolling Stone.