Tanner Mirrlees
PhD

Background

Tanner Mirrlees is the former president of the Canadian Communication Association (CCA) (2020-2022), the past organizer of the CCA’s annual conference for the Congress of the Federation for the Humanities and Social Sciences (2018-2020), and the current Director of the Communication and Digital Media Studies program, a member of the Centre on Hate, Bias and Extremism (CHBE) and the Petrocultures Research Group and a research associate of the Digital Life Institute and the Global Labour Research Centre.

Mirrlees earned a PhD from York University and Toronto Metropolitan University’s Joint Graduate Program in Communication & Culture, and won the prestigious Governor General’s Gold Medal Award for achieving the highest academic standing in the program. Mirrlees is the author or co-author of numerous publications, including Global Entertainment Media: Between Cultural Imperialism and Cultural Globalization (Routledge, 2013), Hearts and Mines: The US Empire's Cultural Industry (UBC Press, 2016), and EdTech Inc.: Selling, Automating and Globalizing Higher Education in the Digital Age (Routledge, 2019). Mirrlees is also the co-editor of Media Imperialism: Continuity and Change (Rowman & Littlefield, 2019), Media, Technology, and the Culture of Militarism (Democratic Communiqué, 2014), and The Television Reader (Oxford University Press, 2012), and on the editorial boards of Canadian Journal of Communication, Media, War & Conflict, and Democratic Communiqué.

Mirrlees’ general research focuses on: the global geopolitical economy of communications; creative, digital media and entertainment industries; social media platforms and society; work and labour in the digital age; persuasion, public relations, public diplomacy and propaganda; political and strategic communications; war, media & conflict; new media and social movement activism; the social shaping of technology; and, critical theory. Some of Mirrlees' current research probes: an emerging rivalry between the United States and China’s digital technology industries; green energy, environmental sustainability and new technologies; video games and the future of warfare; the far Right and social media platforms; democratic socialist creator cultures; and, green techno-utopianism.

A committed educator, Mirrlees is the winner of the University of Guelph-Humber Media Studies Teaching Award (2011) and the Ontario Tech University Faculty of Social Science and Humanities Teaching Award (2014), and has designed over 25 unique social science and humanities courses across disciplines such as communication and media studies, information technology and society, political science and international relations, and the sociology and philosophy of technology. Mirrlees has given over 100 public presentations, co-organized over 40 public events (webinars, symposia, conferences), interviewed with print, radio, TV, digital and podcast media, written op-eds, appeared in documentaries such as Theatres of War (Media Education Foundation,  Myths on Screen: Hollywood’s Role in War and Propaganda (CBC IDEAS), and Man Up! The Masculinity Crisis (CBC IDEAS), co-created podcasts including Tech-Bros and Techno-Utopias: A Darts and Letters Mini-Series, authored video essays for YouTube, and designed digital posters, managed social media campaigns, and edited videos for community events. Mirrlees is currently completing a book titled Work in the Digital Media and Entertainment Industries: A Critical Introduction and co-creating a new podcast series called Green Dreams: A Podcast Series on Our Renewable Futures (with Dr. Imre Szeman and Cited Media Productions).