The University of Florida College of Journalism and Communications (UFCJC) and Levin College of Law today announced that Mónica Guzmán has been named the inaugural McGurn Fellow for Media Integrity and the Fight Against Disinformation.

The fellowship, funded through a $2 million commitment from UF alumni Linda and Ken McGurn, is a collaboration between UFCJC, the College of Law and the Consortium on Trust in Media and Technology (CTMT) to understand the dynamics that have undermined the trustworthiness of content and information.

Guzmán is currently the senior fellow for public practice at Braver Angels, the nation’s largest cross-partisan grassroots organization working to depolarize America. Her book, “I Never Thought of it That Way: How to Have Fearlessly Curious Conversations in Dangerously Divided Times,” was featured on the Glenn Beck Podcast and named a New York Times recommended read.  She is also founder and CEO of Reclaim Curiosity, an organization working to build a more curious world, and cofounder of the award-winning Seattle newsletter The Evergrey.

She was a 2019 fellow at the Henry M. Jackson Foundation, where she studied social and political division, and a 2016 fellow at the Nieman Foundation for Journalism at Harvard University, where she researched how journalists can rethink their roles to better meet the needs of a participatory public. She was named one of the 50 Most Influential Women in Seattle in 2018 and served twice as a juror for the Pulitzer Prizes.

As the McGurn Fellow, Guzmán will work with UF researchers to better understand ways to employ techniques described in her book more broadly and to measure their effectiveness. Her work will connect with existing research and projects at the CTMT and UFCJC, including the consortium’s work on authentic journalism language and its impact on unintentional bias, and the work of Public Relations Department Chair and Associate Professor Myiah Hutchens on how communication functions in democratic processes, in particular what leads people to seek out diverse perspectives.

Posted: May 10, 2023
Category: College News, Trust News
Tagged as: Consortium on Trust in Media and Technology, Mónica Guzmán