![Erika Polson](/sites/default/files/2023-01/mfjs-erika-polson.jpg)
Erika Polson
Associate Professor
Director of Internships
303-871-3831 (Office)
Mass Communications Building, 2490 S. Gaylord St. Denver, CO 80208
What I do
Associate Professor, Media, Film and Journalism StudiesDirector of Internships for MFJS
Specialization(s)
globalization, digital media, cultural communication, digital placemaking, geomedia, media and status
Professional Biography
Degree(s)
- Ph.D., Mass Communication, The Pennsylvania State University, 2009
- MA, Integrated Marketing Communications, Emerson College, 1999
- BA, Liberal Studies, Oregon State University, 1996
Professional Affiliations
- International Communication Association
- International Association of Media and Communication Research
- Association of Internet Research
Research
In a chapter written for Papacharissi's The Networked Self, Vol 2 (2018), Polson explores how, as travel experiences pass repetitively through social media channels, they seem increasingly staged or cliché; as travelers seek new ways of obtaining unique experiences, such authentic travel experiences are increasingly sought through efforts to “live like a local”. She critically considers how AirBnb, EatWith, Tinder, and similar apps are used to connect travelers to local experiences. In another chapter (in the Routledge Companion to Media & Class (2020) co-edited with Lynn Schofield Clark and Radhika Gajjala), she analyzes a range of discourses about being or becoming a digital nomad, critically considering them in a political-economic context of labor and mobility. More recently Dr. Polson co-authored a study of how AirBnb Experience hosts shifted their work to Online Experiences to help 'travelers' experience place through virtual experience in the early days of the Covid-19 pandemic, as part of a Special Issue on the topic of "digital placemaking" (which she co-edited with Germaine Halegoua) in the journal, Convergence: The International Journal of Research into New Media Technologies (2021).
Closer to home, Polson examines street art murals in Denver’s RiNo Art District, and explores how practices of circulating the images on Instagram may play a role in the gentrification of the district for an article in a special issue of Space & Culture on the topic, "gentrification and the right to the geomedia city."
Areas of Research
Featured Publications
Presentations
Awards
- Honorable Mention: IAMCR Urban Communication Award , IAMCR
- Dean's Award for Excellence (DAFE), $5000, CAHSS