For two consecutive days, two esteemed members of the Philippine academe graced the Polytechnic University of the Philippines to deliver separate lectures on mass communication and cultural studies January 26-27, at the Bulwagang Bonifacio of Ninoy Aquino Library Learning and Resource Center.
The Polytechnic University of the Philippines Office of the Vice President for Academic Affairs and Office of the Vice President for Research, Planning and Development through Center for Creative Writing under Institute of Cultural Studies, in partnership with the College of Arts and Letters recently conducted a Professorial Chairholder Lecture Series on Friday.
The event featured the lecture of Dr. Epifanio San Juan Jr. titled “Kontra Modernidad: Ang Tadhana ng Panahon sa Pilipinas Pagkaraan ng Isang Siglo” where he highlighted the national-popular culture in the Philippines in the last four decades.
He also launched his very own book “WALA: Akda at mga Tula”during the lecture.
Dr. E. San Juan Jr. is a Harvard University-trained International scholar. As an author of books on race and cultural studies, he was a “major influence on the academic world”. He was the director of the Philippines Cultural Studies Center in Storrs, Connecticut in the United States. In 1999, San Juan received the Centennial Award for Achievement in Literature from the Cultural Center of the Philippines because of his contributions to Filipino and Filipino-American Studies.
Meanwhile, Dr. Luis Teodoro, the former two-term dean from University of the Philippine’s College of Mass Communication, tackled topics about the current media landscape of the Philippines.
His first talk delved on “The Political Economy of the Media: A Critical Perspective” while his lecture for the afternoon session was about the different alt media or Alternative Media of today.
Dr. Teodoro was a member of the Commission on Higher Education’s (CHED) Technical Panel on Communication and the Social Sciences and chair of the CHED Technical Committee on Journalism Education.
He is currently a deputy director of the Center for Media Freedom and Responsibility.
Peter Paul Duran
