Gregory J. Downey
Ph.D., Johns Hopkins University
Associate Professor

Education:
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
B.S. Computer Science, 1987
M.S. Computer Science, 1989

Northwestern University
M.A. Liberal Studies, 1995

Johns Hopkins University
Ph.D. History of Technology and Human Geography, 2000

Courses:
Introduction to Mass Communication
Cyberspace and Hypermedia
Special Topics: Maps, GIS and Mass Media
Special Topics: Digital Divides and Differences

Research areas:
History and geography of information/communication technology and labor

Recent publications:
Greg Downey, Closed captioning: Subtitling, stenography, and the digital convergence of text with television (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2008).

Greg Downey, “Engaging human geography with library/information studies,” Annual Review of Information Science and Technology 41 (forthcoming, 2006).

Greg Downey, "Constructing 'computer compatible' stenographers: The transition to realtime transcription in courtroom reporting," Technology and Culture 47:1 (2006), 1-26.

Greg Downey, "The place of labor in the history of information technology revolutions," in Aad Blok and Greg Downey, eds., Uncovering labor in information revolutions, 1750-2000 (Cambridge University Press, 2004), 225-261.

Greg Downey, Telegraph messenger boys: Labor, technology, and geography, 1850-1950 (New York: Routledge, 2002).

Biography: Greg Downey is an Associate Professor with a 50 percent appointment in the School of Journalism & Mass Communication and a 50 percent appointment in the School of Library and Information Studies. He joined the UW faculty in 2001. Downey holds a B.S. and M.S. in computer science from the University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana, an M.A. in liberal studies from Northwestern University, and a joint Ph.D. in history of technology and human geography from the Johns Hopkins University. Before coming to Madison, Downey spent a year as a postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Geography and the Humanities Institute at the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities.

Downey’s research focuses on information and communication technology and the human labor behind it. His first monograph, Telegraph Messenger Boys (Routledge, 2002), followed the story of a particular category of young information workers through a century of changes in the U.S. telegraph network from 1850 to 1950. His second monograph, Constructing Closed-Captioning (Johns Hopkins, forthcoming 2007) explores the way film subtitling, courtroom stenography, and deaf/hard-of-hearing education were intertwined into a technological system to link text to television, from the 1930s to the present.

At Madison Downey has taught classes on digital divides, geographic information systems, mass communication geography, and cyberspace/hypermedia. He is also one of the two professors currently teaching the undergraduate writing-intensive survey course "Introduction to Mass Communication" (J201). He has mentored undergraduate research on topics such as digital public radio and blogging the Iraq War, and graduate research on community information networks. Downey was the recipient of the 2007 William H. Kiekhofer Distinguished Teaching Award, the oldest award for teaching on campus.

Downey is an active member of the Society for the History of Technology. His published work has appeared in Technology and Culture, Knowledge and Society, The Professional Geographer, the International Review of Social History, and the Annual Review of Information Science and Technology.

Downey’s industry experience includes three years at the Leo Burnett advertising agency in Chicago, and three years at Roger Schank’s Institute for Learning Sciences at Northwestern University. He has volunteered summers with both the Center for Neighborhood Technology in Chicago and the Community Information Exchange in Washington D.C. He lives in Madison with his wife, his two children, his two cats, and not enough bicycles.

For more on Downey’s background, courses and research projects, please visit his Web site.