National Center for Radio and Television Studies

 

Founded in early 2000, the National Center for Radio & Television Studies at Communication University of China (former Beijing Broadcasting Institute) is a national key research institute of humanities & social science in Chinese universities with distinctive features. NCRTS focuses on the scientific research, professional training, academic exchanges, information collection and consultancy in the radio and television domain and now becomes a comprehensive research center with national leading position and international reputation.

Professor Zhao Yuming assumes NCRTS counselor. Professor Hu Zhengrong assumes the director. Professor Long Yun and Professor Zeng Qingrui are both vice directors. NCRTS filial institute: Institute of Radio & TV Journalism, Institute of Radio & TV Management, Institute of Radio & TV Arts, and Institute of Radio & TV Language. NCTRS also founds Institute of Media Policy and Law, a joint project initiated by the Annenberg School of Communications at University of Pennsylvania.

During the past six years, NCRTS has established a modern management system under the direction of Social Science Department at Ministry of Education and the Scientific Research Office at CUC. The 11th five-year plans as well as the regulations of researcher employment and project management constitute stead foundation for the center. NCRTS has invited nine experts as commission members in charge of directing academic research and 41 outstanding scholars, full-time or part-time to undertake the research tasks. These researchers are from CUC, Renmin Univesrsity of China, Tsinghua University, SARFT, CCTV, etc.

At present, NCRTS undertakes 12 key research projects of Ministry of Education and more than ten national and international joint projects.

The academic journal Media Studies focuses on China Media development, transformations and trends. Each issue discusses particular theories or phenomena under a specific theme. NCRTS plans to set up the most integrated broadcasting database. Until now, there are 330,000 Chinese books, 1,162 foreign books, 220 kinds of Chinese newspapers, magazines and 16 foreign ones.

NCRTS devotes to develop national and international academic resource network, keeps close relationship with journalism departments of domestic universities, research institutions, media agencies and social associations, and also holds exchange programs with institutions and media in USA, UK, Canada, Korea, Japan, Australia, France and Singapore.

China Communication Forum, advocated by NCRTS, has been successfully held 6 times, provides a favorable opportunity for outstanding scholars and experts to communicate with each other. The director of NCRTS, Professor Hu Zhengrong, has been elected as president of Chinese Association of Communication. Therefore, NCRTS, as the new CAC secretariat, for the moment actively organizes the 2007 China Communication Forum in order to build a larger platform for academic exchanges.

In the future, NCRTS will contribute to basic theoretical research and applied research, enlarge the scope of international and national academy communication, and keep making great efforts for academic prosperity, industrial innovation and social development.

  

School of Communication, Simon Fraser University

 

The School of Communication has built its curriculum and research around understanding the organization, operation and meaning of the communication messages on which personal, national and global associations are built and sustained. The School had its origins in 1965 as the Centre for Communications and the Arts, a unit in the Faculty of Education which offered credit courses, non-credit workshops, and public events. In 1970, the Faculty of Education was reorganized. The Arts program separated from the Faculty of Education to become part of the Division of General Studies. It retained the organizational title of Centre for Communications and the Arts although it no longer offered academic courses in communication studies. These courses remained in the Faculty of Education and became part of that faculty's Educational Foundations Centre. In 1972 Communication Studies became a department of the newly created Faculty of Interdisciplinary Studies. In 1977-1978, its name changed to the Department of Communication. The School concentrated on six areas in the undergraduate program: theory and systems, history of communication, communication processes, communication media, political economy, and communication policy. In 1980, the School played an active role in founding the Canadian Communication Association (CCA). In 1981 a proposal was submitted to the Universities Council of British Columbia to establish a Ph.D. program in Communication. Approval for this program was obtained in 1983, making it the only Communication Department in Canada (west of Ontario) to offer a full set of academic degree programs (Ph.D., M.A., and B.A.) in the communication field. In 1984 the School consolidated its teaching and research areas, focusing on three areas of specialized concentration: communication media, technology and policy. In 1985 after the dissolution of the Faculty of Interdisciplinary Studies, the School moved into the Faculty of Applied Sciences, in recognition of the fact that communication is a discipline of practical application. In 1994, the School adopted its current name, the School of Communication. The School continues to be leader in local and international communication research and is involved in a number of projects including the Canadian Centre for Studies in Publishing (founded in 1987), Centre for Policy Research on Science and Technology (established in 1988), The Digest (an on-line journal published by the Centre for Policy Research on Science and Technology), Emergency Preparedness Information Exchange (operated by the Telematics Research lab), and NewsWatch Canada. The School also has a number of lab facilities that supporting research and communication development. These include the Assessment of Technology in Context Design Lab (ATIC-DL) created in 1997, the Emergency Preparedness Information eXchange Lab, the Media Analysis Lab and the Sonic Research Studio (home of the World Soundscape Project established at Simon Fraser University during the late 1960s and early 1970s). The School of Communication has had a number of senior officers throughout its history: Martin Laba, Director, 2001 - ; Brian Lewis, Director, 1995 - 2001; Robert S. Anderson, Director, 1992 - 1994; Martin Laba, Director, 1989 - 1992; Liora Salter, Director, 1985 - 1989; William Leiss, Chair, 1980 - 1985; William H. Melody, Chair, 1977 - 1980; Dallas Smythe, Chair, 1974 - 1977; Robert C. Brown, Acting Chair, 1974 - 1974; Thomas J. Mallinson, Chair, 1971 - 1973; Thomas J. Mallinson, Director, 1966 - 1971.