The USC School of Policy, Planning, and Development and the USC Annenberg School for Communication hosted the inaugural Dennis F. and Brooks Holt Professorship Lecture in Communication and Public Policy on Feb. 11.

The Holt Professorship – a joint undertaking between the two schools – focuses on the role of communication in the policymaking process of a democratic society and market-based economy.

“The Holt Professorship is concerned with the regulation of the communications industry, the news media influence on public policy and the role of knowledge and information in addressing major public policy issues,” said Jack H. Knott, the dean of SPPD.

Established by longtime SPPD board of councilors member Dennis Holt and his wife, Brooks, the professorship will support two to three visiting scholars or prominent practitioners per year. Each visiting professor will stay at USC for a brief period to give lectures, meet with students and faculty members, and advise the deans and faculty on curriculum and research regarding communication and public policy, Knott noted.

The inaugural lecture featured Craig Calhoun, president of the Social Sciences Research Council and University Professor of social sciences at New York University. The event was also part of the USC Annenberg Series on Sustainable Innovation.

According to USC Annenberg Dean Ernest J. Wilson III, “Part of what we’re doing at the Annenberg School is to understand the notion of sustainable innovation – not just innovation once, but the capacity to generate renewable innovation. It is altogether fitting that we have this discussion jointly between these two schools.”

Wilson added that Calhoun, in his work as head of the Social Sciences Research Council, is deeply concerned with intellectual innovation and how it can make an impact on matters in the real world.

During his presentation, Calhoun explained that the concept of “interdisciplinarity” at universities is rooted in the need to address complex public challenges.

Scholars and researchers in the 1920s sought to “to tackle big social issues, which required the perspectives of many different disciplines in order to understand and resolve them,” he said.

Calhoun, who earned a bachelor’s degree in anthropology from USC, also discussed how innovation is an iterative process.

“Innovation is not just coming up with that one new idea,” he said. “It is coming up with ways of continually improving your ideas, your ability to communicate your ideas, your ability to make them effective, which means finding ways to learn from the people you think need to learn from you.”

In addition, Calhoun stressed the vital importance for academics to contribute to a “broader public discourse.”

“We ought to have a very strong commitment to informing the public,” Calhoun said. “The single biggest way we do that is through teaching. Students are the largest public most professors ever reach. They are a crucial public and an intermediary to other publics. They are the future state legislators and the future parents.

“Informing the public is why we’re here. But don’t short-circuit it by imagining it’s the same as popularity. It is about seriously researched knowledge; it is about the role of the researcher correcting public perceptions, not just pandering to them.”