Communication Colloquium: Free Speech and Academic Freedom with Jason Mazonne and Emily Knox

For our first colloquium of the year, communication professor Ned O'Gorman will moderate a panel discussion on free speech and academic freedom featuring Jason Mazonne from the College of Law and Emily Knox from the School of Information Sciences.

Jason Mazzone is the Albert E. Jenner, Jr. Professor of Law at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and director of the Illinois Program in Constitutional Theory, History, and Law. Mazzone’s primary field of research and teaching is constitutional law and history. He works principally on issues of constitutional structure and institutional design with a particular focus on relationships between structural arrangements and individual rights. His groundbreaking work on the Constitution of the United States has appeared in dozens of prominent legal journals. He regularly advises litigants on a pro bono basis in cases before the Supreme Court of the United States and other courts. Mazzone received his undergraduate and law degrees from Harvard University, a master’s degree from Stanford University, and a master’s and doctorate from Yale University.

Emily Knox is interim dean and professor in the School of Information Sciences at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. Her research interests include information access and intellectual freedom and censorship. She is a member of the Mapping Information Access research team. Her most recent book, Foundations of Intellectual Freedom (ALA Neal-Schuman), won the 2023 Eli M. Oboler Prize for best published work in the area of intellectual freedom. She has appeared in media outlets such as NPR and The New York Times and also testified before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee on book banning. Knox serves on the National Coalition Against Censorship Board of Directors and is the editor of the Journal of Intellectual Freedom and Privacy. She received her PhD from the doctoral program at the Rutgers University School of Communication & Information.