Journalism Professor Carolyn Kitch has been named the 2012 B. Aubrey Fisher Memorial Lecturer at the University of Utah. She will speak on Oct. 18.

Kitch holds a Ph.D. in Mass Media and Communication from Temple and a Master's degree in American Studies from Penn State University. Her research focuses primarily on journalism history, media and memory and public memory. She has authored four books, including The Girl on the Magazine Cover: The Origins of Visual Stereotypes in American Mass Media (University of North Carolina Press, 2001) and Pages from the Past: History and Memory in American Magazines (University of North Carolina Press, 2005).

In addition to teaching classes ranging from "Critical Perspectives on Journalism" to "Magazine Editing and Design," Kitch has served as the faculty director for the School of Media and Communications' programs in London (2001, 2003, and 2010) and in Dublin (2006). Prior to her years in the academy, Kitch was a magazine editor and writer in New York City for more than a decade. She held staff positions at McCall’s and Good Housekeeping, where she was a senior acquisitions editor. She also wrote for both magazines and did freelance writing for Reader’s Digest, Health, and American Health, among others.

According to a University of Utah statement, Professor Kitch's "experience inside and outside the academic world... make her journalistic insights as the B. Aubrey Fisher Memorial Lecturer valuable and highly anticipated."