Southern Arkansas University will host a panel discussion on Media and Democracy at 6:30 p.m. on Wednesday, April 11, in Reynolds Center Foundation Hall. The event is free and open to the public.
Participants will be Dr. Paul Babbitt, associate professor of political science at SAU, James Reppert, associate professor of mass communication at SAU, and Mike McNeill, editor and publisher of the Magnolia Reporter.
Rex Nelson, senior editor and columnist for the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, will moderate the panel.
Discussion will center on the future and relevance of journalism and what news literacy is in the era of fake news. A total of four such discussions are being held across the state thanks to a grant awarded to the Arkansas Humanities Council from the Federation of State Humanities Council’s “Democracy and the Informed Citizen” project, which was funded by the Pulitzer Prize and the Mellon Foundation.
“In the age of fake news and other distractions in the news these days, it is important to have a conversation about the true principles of journalism that make up real news,” said Paul Austin, executive director of the Council.
