[146]MAJOR NEW ENCYCLOPEDIA FEATURES NUMEROUS MTSU SCHOLARS

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Oct. 8, 2008
EDITORIAL CONTACT: Gina Logue, 615-898-5081, gklogue@mtsu.edu

MAJOR NEW ENCYCLOPEDIA FEATURES NUMEROUS MTSU SCHOLARS
Nationally Prominent Experts Pen Comprehensive First Amendment Reference Book

(MURFREESBORO) – Nineteen members of the Middle Tennessee State University community are among the accomplished contributors to a groundbreaking new reference work, The Encyclopedia of the First Amendment, published by Washington, D.C.-based CQ Press and available now through bookstores and online at www.cqpress.com. The encyclopedia, the first of its kind ever published, examines all five freedoms covered in the First Amendment to the United States Constitution, including religion, speech, press, assembly and petition. Entries are divided into the broad categories of concepts and legal terms, controversial works, documents, events, governmental entities, groups and organizations, issues, laws and proposed laws, methods of interpretation, media, people, and religious perspectives and churches. The two-volume set, with an introduction by Tennessean Chairman Emeritus John Seigenthaler, was edited by Dr. John R. Vile, dean of the MTSU University Honors College; David Hudson Jr., adjunct MTSU political science professor and scholar at the First Amendment Center at Vanderbilt University; and Dr. David Schultz, professor in the School of Business at Hamline University and a senior fellow in the Institute of Law and Politics at the University of Minnesota School of Law. “With over 1,400 entries from more than 200 contributors, I believe this will be the definitive reference book on the First Amendment for the foreseeable future,” says Vile, an expert in constitutional law. “It was heartening to have colleagues from such a wide variety of colleges and universities from many different disciplines contribute to these volumes. I am especially grateful to fellow MTSU professors and to MTSU alums who contributed.” Seigenthaler, for whom an endowed chair of excellence in First Amendment studies at MTSU’s College of Mass Communication is named, adds, “At such a time, this encyclopedia detailing and defining First Amendment rights could not be more valuable … In a real sense, [it] serves the public interest.” Following Seigenthaler’s introduction, “The First Forty-Five Words,” the encyclopedia opens with major essays by eminent scholars such as Dr. Robert O’Neil, founder of the Thomas Jefferson Center at the University of Virginia, and Judge Michael McConnell of the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

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Other distinguished contributors of major essays include C. Neal Tate, Vanderbilt University; Bruce E. Auerbach, Albright College; Robert D. Richards, Pennsylvania State University; Erwin Chemerinsky, University of California, Irvine; and Gene Policinski, vice president and executive director, First Amendment Center. Policinski, O’Neil and McConnell will talk about The Encyclopedia of the First Amendment at a panel discussion from 6-7:30 p.m. EST Wednesday, Nov. 12, at the Newseum, 555 Pennsylvania Ave., N.W., in Washington, D.C. “Arranged in traditional A-to-Z encyclopedia format, this work traces themes like expressive rights in American political and legal history, in American political thought and social movements, in political and popular culture, and in the arts, along with the classic tensions between freedom of the individual and maintenance of political order,” notes www.cqpress.com. In addition, the set has a timeline, a selection of primary documents in the appendices, a bibliography and subject and case indices.

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ATTENTION, MEDIA: To examine The Encyclopedia of the First Amendment and to arrange interviews with Dr. John R. Vile and David Hudson Jr., contact Gina Logue in the MTSU Office of News and Public Affairs at 615-898-5081 or gklogue@mtsu.edu.



CONTRIBUTORS FROM THE MTSU COMMUNITY (in alphabetical order)

Brandi Snow Bozarth Department of Political Science/Mock Trial Coach/Alumna

Mark E. Byrnes Associate Dean of the College of Liberal Arts/Department of Political Science/Alumnus

David Carleton Department of Political Science

Patrick W. Chinnery Alumnus

Paul D. Fischer Department of Recording Industry

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Sekou Franklin Department of Political Science


Roger Heinrich Department of Electronic Media Communication

David Hudson Jr. Department of Political Science/Co-Editor
Geoffrey Hull Department of Recording Industry (professor emeritus)

Gina Kerra Logue Office of News and Public Affairs

Robb McDaniel Department of Political Science

John Omachonu Associate Dean of the College of Mass Communication

Karen K. Petersen Department of Political Science/Alumna

Bob Pondillo Department of Electronic Media Communication

Steve Robertson Department of Political Science

John Seigenthaler Seigenthaler Chair of Excellence in First Amendment Studies

John R. Vile Dean of the University Honors College/Co-Editor

Virginia Vile Alumna

Clyde E. Willis Interim Chair of the Department of Political Science