John L. Jackson, Jr. Named Dean of Penn's School of Social Policy & Practice

John L. Jackson Jr., Richard Perry University Professor at the University of Pennsylvania and Senior Advisor for Diversity in the Office of the Provost, has been named dean of Penn’s School of Social Policy & Practice. His new position will become effective July 1.

Jackson, who has primary appointments in the School of Arts and Sciences and the Annenberg School for Communication, as well as a secondary appointment in the School of Social Policy & Practice, is a noted cultural anthropologist who has written and taught about the impact of mass media on urban life, globalization and the remaking of ethnic and racial diasporas, and racialization and media technology.

Jackson joined Penn in 2006 as its first Penn Integrates Knowledge (PIK) University Professor, a program developed to recruit preeminent faculty who have appointments in two Penn schools and who harness tools from different disciplines and professional perspectives to address compelling societal challenges.

Jackson earned his B.A. in Communication summa cum laude from Howard University as a University Merit Scholar and received his M.A., M.Phil., and Ph.D. with distinction in anthropology from Columbia University. He was a Junior Fellow in Harvard University’s Society of Fellows and a faculty member in Duke University’s Cultural Anthropology Department before coming to Penn where, in addition to his appointments in Anthropology, Africana Studies, and Communication, he is also affiliated with the School of Social Policy & Practice, the English department, the Graduate School of Education, and the Penn Institute for Urban Research. In 2009, Jackson served as a Visiting Professor of Law at Harvard Law School.

Jackson has served as program chair for the American Anthropological Association’s annual conference and on the editorial boards of highly respected journals including Cultural Anthropology, Cultural Studies, and Souls: A Critical Journal of Black Politics, Culture, & Society.

Jackson succeeds Richard Gelles, who has served with distinction as dean since 2001. 

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