About me – David R. Davies

An Arkie who made his way to Mississippi. A recovering journalist who found his way into academe. That’s me. But, if you prefer the more formal biography, it’s below.

Dr. David R. Davies, professor in the School of Media & Communication at Southern Miss, teaches media history, writing, and editing.

Before entering academia, he was a reporter for 10 years in Arkansas, working for both the Arkansas Democrat and the Arkansas Gazette. He is a graduate of the Kiplinger Program in Public Affairs Reporting at Ohio State University, where he earned a master’s degree in journalism. He also holds a master’s degree in American history from The University of Southern Mississippi and a Ph.D. in mass communication specializing in media history from the University of Alabama.

Dave & Mandy — With the incredible Mandy Nace, my longtime friend and colleague in the School who now works at the Southern Miss Center for Faculty Development.

His research specialties are the press and the Civil Rights Movement and trends in American newspapers since World War II. He has written two books, The Press & Race: Mississippi Journalists Confront the Movement (University Press of Mississippi, 2001) and The Postwar Decline of American Newspapers, 1945-1965 (Praeger, 2006). With Pam Parry of Eastern Kentucky University, he is co-editor of the Women in American Political History book series published by Lexington Press. Four books in the series are already in print, and six more are in progress. In 1998 his doctoral dissertation won the prize for best dissertation in media history awarded by the American Journalism Historians Association.

Davies directs the Southern Miss British Studies Program and for a dozen years taught its British Studies in Journalism class each summer in London. He directed the Southern Miss semester in France initiative, the Château Program, from 2014 to 2016.

Davies was chair of the USM Journalism Department from 1998 to 2001 and interim director of the School of Mass Communication and Journalism in 2004-2005. He was an associate dean of the College of Arts & Letters in 2006-2007 and dean of the Southern Miss Honors College from 2007 to 2014. He was also director of the School of Mass Communication & Journalism from 2014-2018. He has served on the board of directors of the American Journalism Historians Association. Since 2005 he has served on the board of directors of the University Press of Mississippi.