Journalist… Professor… Undeterred.

Dr. James Winter graduated from grade 13 after an illustrious, well rounded student career that saw him compete in basketball, football, play in the school band and serve as our student council president. He capped his final year by winning the Principal’s Prize at Commencement. Following a Master’s degree (1977) from Carleton in Journalism and his Ph. D. (1981) in Mass Communication from Syracuse University, Dr. Winter moved to the University of Windsor where he has taught courses in media literacy, the political economy of the media and the sociology of the news to thousands of students over the past 20 years.

Jim has worked as a journalist and continues to write for both alternative and mainstream media. One of his articles on media concentration and ownership, published in the Canadian Forum magazine, made the 1994 project Censored Canada top ten list of stories for that year. Most recently, he is the author of MediaThink, published in 2002 and available from the University of Toronto Press. Other works include the critically acclaimed Democracy’s Oxygen, a 1996 treatise on corporate concentration in the news media, The Big Black Book on Conrad Black (co-authored in 1997 with Maude Barlow of the Council of Canadians) and Common Cents, a work that examined media coverage of various topics ranging from the Gulf War to the Ontario NDP to the OKA rebellion.

Dr. Winter has researched, practiced and taught journalism in this country for more than two decades. He is the author of numerous published papers and conference presentations ranging from sexism in the lyrics of golden oldie music to stereotyping in children’s animated films. He was the founding editor of the Electronic Journal of Communication in 1990 and the muckraking webzine, Flipside, in 1995. The groups to which he has spoken over the years range from the Canadian Librarians Association to the Council of Canadians, from Science For Peace to the Ontario Federation of Labour, the CAW and CUPW.

He currently lives with his partner, Gail Robertson, on Pelee Island in Lake Erie, where she runs a bed and breakfast and where they welcomed their first child together, Aidan Robertson, in August 2002. Aidan joins Kieran and Kaeleigh.

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