BROADCAST EXECUTIVE TONY BURMAN ON “NEWS OVER NOISE IN THE AGE OF AL JAZEERA”

Montreal, November 10, 2011 --- One of Canada's top broadcast executives, Tony Burman, was the keynote speaker at the sixth edition of the Gail Guthrie Valaskakis Annual Lecture on Diversity and Canadian Media, hosted by Concordia University's Communication Studies Department and CRARR.

Entitled “News over Noise in the Age of Al Jazeera”, Mr. Burman's lecture will address the place of Al Jazeera in current global broadcasting and public affairs. More than 100 guests attended the lecture.

Other special guests at this year's Lecture included David Graham, Concordia University Provost; Linda Kay, Chair and Associate Professor, Journalism Department and Enn Raudsepp, former Chair of the Journalism Department and former Vice Dean of Arts and Science, Administrative Affairs during the time when Dr. Valaskakis was Dean. Dr. Lorna Roth, former Chair of the Communication Studies Department and a long-standing CRARR Advisor, chaired the evening.

Presently the Velma Rogers Graham Research Chair at Ryerson University, Mr. Burman is a graduate of Loyola College (now Concordia University) and has worked as a journalist in print, radio, television and online for more than 35 years. He was Editor-in-Chief of CBC news and then served as managing director of the Al Jazeera English network, for which he subsequently acted as Chief Strategic Advisor for the Americas. In October 2007, Burman received the Academy of Canadian Cinema and Television's Gordon Sinclair Award for lifetime achievement in broadcast journalism.

Created in 2005 as a joint initiative between CRARR and Concordia's Department of Communication Studies, the Annual Lecture aims to promote research and other initiatives with industry, government and the broader community on issues involving Canadian media and diversity. The activity is also co-sponsored by the Institute for Research and Education on Race Relations.

In 2008, the Annual Lecture was officially named after the late Dr. Gail Guthrie Valaskakis, one of Canada's leading experts on Aboriginal communications. Dr. Valaskakis was Chair of Concordia's Communication Studies Department and Dean of Concordia’s Faculty of Arts and Sciences, Research Director of the Aboriginal Healing Foundation, a Director at CRARR and a recipient of the National Aboriginal Achievement Award.

Past speakers include Tom Perlmutter, current Chairman of the National Film Board; Rita Shelton Deverell, broadcast executive, filmmaker, news director and recent holder of Nancy's Chair in Women's Studies at Mount St. Vincent University; Haroon Siddiqui, former editor and current columnist with the Toronto Star and Drew Hayden Taylor, playwright, author and comedian.

A video recording of Mr. Burman's lecture will be available soon.