Faculty

Todd Gitlin

Professor of Journalism and Sociology

tg2058@columbia.edu
http://www.toddgitlin.net

Gitlin's checkered career began with degrees in three different subjects: mathematics (B. A., Harvard), political science (M. A., Michigan), and sociology (Ph. D., Berkeley). Along the way, he was activated into activism, first in the student movement of the 1960s, then writing for the so-called underground press.

He's written twelve books, chiefly on media and recent America, starting with Uptown: Poor Whites in Chicago (co-author, 1970); The Whole World is Watching: Mass Media in the Making and Unmaking of the Left (1980);Inside Prime Time (1983); The Sixties: Years of Hope, Days of Rage (1987); The Twilight of Common Dreams: Why America is Wracked by Culture Wars (1995); Media Unlimited: How the Torrent of Images and Sounds Overwhelms Our Lives (2002); Letters To a Young Activist (2003);The Intellectuals and the Flag (2006); and The Bulldozer and the Big Tent: Of Identities and Ideals in the Uproar of American Politics (John Wiley, October 2007). Also a book of poetry, Busy Being Born (1974), and two novels: The Murder of Albert Einstein (1992) and Sacrifice (1999), the latter of which won the Harold U. Ribalow Prize for novels on Jewish themes.

He contributes to many newspapers and magazines, is a member of the editorial board of Dissent,and is online regularly at TPMcafe.com.