Larry Gross, Contributor

Zuade Kaufman / Truthdig

Larry Gross is the Director of the USC Annenberg School for Communication.  Before joining USC Annenberg in 2003, Gross spent 35 years teaching communication at the University of Pennsylvania where he was the Sol Worth Professor of Communication and deputy dean of the Ivy League university’s Annenberg School for Communication.

A specialist in the areas of media and culture, art and communication, visual communication and media portrayals of minorities, Gross helped found the field of gay and lesbian studies. From 1971 to 1991, Gross co-directed the Cultural Indicators Project with George Gerbner, which focused on television content and its influence on viewer attitudes and behavior, introducing the theory of cultivation. He has written and edited a number of books, including “Contested Closets: The Politics and Ethics of Outing” and “Up from Invisibility: Lesbians, Gay Men, and the Media in America.”

Gross was named a Guggenheim Fellow in 1998 and received the International Communication Association’s Aubrey Fisher Mentorship Award in 2001.  Gross holds degrees from Brandeis University and Columbia University.