Robert J. Thompson (born 3 August 1959 in
HinsdaleHinsdale is an affluent Chicago suburb located partly in Cook County and mainly DuPage County in the U.S. state of Illinois. The population was 17,349 at the 2000 census. The town's ZIP code is 60521...
,
IllinoisIllinois , the 21st state admitted to the United States of America, is the most populous and demographically diverse Midwestern state and the fifth most populous state in the nation...
) is an American educator.
Thompson is the Trustee
ProfessorThe meaning of the word professor varies. In some English-speaking countries, it refers to a senior academic who holds a departmental chair, especially as head of the department, or a personal chair awarded specifically to that individual...
of Television and Popular Culture at the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications at
Syracuse UniversitySyracuse University is a private research university located in Syracuse, New York, U.S.A.. It was founded as a university in 1870, but its roots can be traced back to a seminary founded by the Methodist Episcopal Church in 1832 which eventually became Genesee College...
and founding director of the Bleier Center for Television and Popular Culture.
His areas of research are television history,
Popular CulturePopular culture is the totality of ideas, perspectives, attitudes, memes, images and other phenomena that are deemed preferred per an informal consensus within the mainstream of a given culture...
, media criticism, and TV programming. Thompson's various soundbites have been dubbed by the
Associated PressThe Associated Press is an American news agency. The AP is a cooperative owned by its contributing newspapers, radio and television stations in the United States, which both contribute stories to the AP and use material written by its staff journalists...
as "Thompson-isms".
On February 4, 2009
Jon HeinJon Hein is a radio personality and webmaster notable for popularizing the term "jumping the shark" and created the website jumptheshark.com.-Jump the Shark origins:...
of the Howard Stern Show announced that Thompson is his "arch nemesis," referring to popular culture trivia.
He holds a B.A. in political science from the
University of ChicagoThe University of Chicago is a private, coeducational research university in Chicago, Illinois, USA. It was founded by oil magnate and benefactor John D...
and an M.A. and Ph.D. in radio, television and film from
Northwestern University{{Infobox university|name = Northwestern University|image_name = NU seal.png|motto = Quaecumque sunt vera |mottoeng =Whatsoever things are true |established = 1851|type = Private|calendar = Quarter...
.
Publications
Thompson has authored, co-authored, or edited six books and textbooks:
Television Studies: Textual Analysis with Gary Burns (1989),
Making Television: Authorship and the Production Process with Gary Burns (1990),
Adventures on Prime Time: The Television Programs of Stephen J. Cannell (1990),
Prime Time, Prime Movers (1992),
Television's Second Golden Age (1997), and
Television in the Antenna Age: A Concise History (2004).