Director of Graduate Programs and Faculty Development
Professor of Journalism
Dr. Dane S. Claussen, professor and director of graduate programs and faculty development for the School of Communication, joined the Point Park faculty in August 2001. He teaches Applied Mass Communication Research Methods; Sociology of Journalism & Media Ethics; Mass Communication History; Newspaper and Magazine Management; Writing the Nonfiction Book; Communication Law and Regulation; and other courses. Dr. Claussen also regularly chairs master's thesis committees and supervises many Directed Readings, Directed Research, and Publication Project studies. He currently is Chair of the University’s Graduate Council (which he previously chaired from 2001-5, before and during Point Park College’s successful rechartering as Point Park University) and Chair of the University’s Program Review Committee. (From August 2005 to May 2006, he also was Point Park's first campus-wide faculty development coordinator.)
Beginning with the summer 2006 issue, Dr. Claussen is editor of the quarterly Journalism & Mass Communication Educator, one of the two major scholarly journals published by the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication (AEJMC). In the editorship, he works with a U.S. editorial advisory board of about 50 scholars, a new and growing international editorial advisory board of about 35 scholars, and with researchers worldwide who submit article manuscripts.
Dr. Claussen is a certified Specialist with the Fulbright Specialists Program, sponsored by the U.S. State Department’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs, and administered by the Council for International Exchange of Scholars (CIES), a division of the International Institute of Education. He is a visiting professor at the School of Communication, IE University, Madrid and Segovia, Spain.
In 1984, he graduated with a B.S. degree in journalism from the University of Oregon. In 1986, he completed his M.B.A. degree in corporate finance and labor relations at The University of Chicago. From 1986 until 1995, Dr. Claussen was publisher, president, and editor of weekly, biweekly and monthly community newspapers in Lakewood (suburban Tacoma), Wash.; the Oregon-based executive editor of a biweekly international trade magazine and a weekly international consumer publication for Capital Cities/ABC (now part of Disney); publisher, CEO, and editor of The Daily Reporter, a statewide business and law newspaper based in Milwaukee; and Midwest media mergers/acquisitions broker for Maryland-based W.B. Grimes & Co. From November 1996 until June 2003, he was editor of the Industrial Marketing Practitioner, a monthly/quarterly newsletter.
While working for the Grimes company, he also held management positions at alternative newsweeklies in Milwaukee (Shepherd Express) and Kansas City (PitchWeekly), and was elected the first president of the Midwest Association of Alternative Newsweeklies (AAN-Midwest). Starting in 1993, Dr. Claussen began teaching, part-time, college courses in English composition, advertising, organizational behavior, corporate finance, human resources management, and journalism. From early 1992 until late 1994, he was a member of the Media-Law Relations Committee of the State Bar of Wisconsin and helped edit the Wisconsin News Reporter's Legal Handbook, 3rd Edition (1995).
Dr. Claussen completed his M.S. degree in mass communications at Kansas State University in August 1996, and his Ph.D. degree in mass communication at The University of Georgia in April 1999. From August 1999 until July 2001, he was assistant professor of communication and mass media at Missouri State University (Springfield), where he served as Journalism Area Coordinator, Graduate Council representative, a Gender Studies Program faculty member, and advisor to The Scope, an independent student publication.
He is the author of "Anti-intellectualism in American Media: Magazines and Higher Education" (Peter Lang Publishing, 2004) and is the editor of, and a contributor to, "Sex, Religion, Media" (Rowman & Littlefield, 2002); "The Promise Keepers: Essays on Masculinity and Christianity" (McFarland & Co., 2000); and "Standing on the Promises: The Promise Keepers and the Revival of Manhood" (Pilgrim Press, 1999). Dr. Claussen currently is revising "Public Affairs Reporting: The Citizen's News" (2nd Edition), by Ralph Izard and Marilyn Greenwald; editing a collection on masculinity and U.S. news media; writing a history of newspaper marketing practices from 1920 to 1970; and doing preliminary research for several other books. In addition, he has written scores of scholarly journal articles, book chapters, encyclopedia entries, book reviews, and national conference papers (as well as trade press articles for Publishers' Auxiliary, Free Paper Publisher, and Grassroots Editor).
Dr. Claussen serves on the Editorial Boards of the scholarly journals Communication Education, Newspaper Research Journal, Mass Communication & Society, Journalism History, Journal of Media & Religion, Journal of Media Sociology, Journal of Magazine & New Media Research, Australian Journalism Review, International Journal of Interactive Communication Systems and Technologies, Journal of Men’s Studies, and the Journal of Men, Masculinities & Spirituality; reviews manuscripts for Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly, American Journalism, Men & Masculinities, Review of Religious Research, and the Journal of Religion and Popular Culture; and has assessed mass communication textbook proposals and/or manuscripts for Sage Publications; Allyn & Bacon; Houghton Mifflin; and Mayfield/McGraw-Hill. Dr. Claussen is a former Book Reviews Editor of JHISTORY, a scholarly listserv in the H-NET system based at Michigan State University. He also regularly judges papers for numerous national and regional scholarly conferences. Dr. Claussen has been quoted as an expert source by The Washington Post, The Christian Science Monitor, The Baltimore Sun, The Denver Post, Chicago magazine, The Denver Business Journal, Editor & Publisher magazine, Quill magazine, and many other publications, and has had letters to the editor published in the Sunday New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and Details magazine, among others.
He is committed to the Association for Education in Journalism & Mass Communication (AEJMC), the premier organization for mass communication professors and graduate students. During 2009-2010, Dr. Claussen is Research Chair, Media Management & Economics Division. He also is a former head, Mass Communication & Society Division (second largest of AEJMC's 30+ divisions, interest groups, and commissions); former head, History Division (AEJMC’s fourth largest); former head, Magazine Division; former head, GLBT Interest Group; a former officer of the Cultural & Critical Studies Division; and a former member of both the standing Publications Committee and the Diversity Task Force. In the National Lesbian & Gay Journalists Association (NLGJA), Dr. Claussen is primarily responsible for the content of the Educators Toolbox on NLGJA's Web site; chair, Hall of Fame Task Force; advisory board member, Leroy F. Aarons Journalism Education Program; member, Leroy F. Aarons Scholarship Committee; and moderator, Educators Caucus. Dr. Claussen is immediate past president, American Philatelic Society Writers Unit; former board member, American Men's Studies Association, and a member of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), American Journalism Historians Association (AJHA), American Studies Association, Committee of Concerned Journalists, European Communication Research & Education Association (ECREA), International Communication Association (ICA), National Communication Association (NCA), and Society of Professional Journalists (SPJ).
Dr. Claussen lives in a 100+-year-old house in Pittsburgh's Mexican War Streets neighborhood, reflecting his longtime interests in Victorian architecture, antiques, museums, and history generally. He is the former newsletter editor and former board member of Preservation Pittsburgh, and also is a member of Carnegie Museums of Pittsburgh, National Aviary (Pittsburgh), Phipps Conservatory and Botanical Gardens, Pittsburgh History & Landmarks Foundation, Pittsburgh Zoo & Aquarium, Senator John Heinz Pittsburgh Regional History Center, Pennsylvania Heritage Society, Preservation Pennsylvania, Western Pennsylvania Conservancy, Western Pennsylvania Humane Society, and Animal Rescue League of Western Pennsylvania. Dr. Claussen is especially honored by having been elected a Fellow of the Royal Philatelic Society, London (Patron: Her Majesty the Queen).
Contact Dr. Dane Claussen
E-mail: dclaussen@pointpark.edu
Office phone: (412) 392-3412
Office: 1009 Thayer Hall
