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(sent to IAMCR listserv by 14 June 2007)
Jim was an outstanding scholar in our field; an inspiration for IAMCR members for a very long time; and a great friend to many. He will be missed greatly. On behalf of all IAMCR members, I offer condolences to Jim's family.
Robin Mansell, President IAMCR on behalf of all members.
I would like to join … - and all of IAMCR - in saluting Jim Halloran, a genial intellectual if ever there was.
Jim sought to expand IAMCR into new worlds. I recall receiving a personal invitation from him to join, in 1980, when I was living in Colombo, Sri Lanka.
Jim will be with us in spirit in Paris, sitting quietly at a table, nursing the proverbial glass of burgundy, smiling gently as he watches the hustle and bustle around him.
Naren Chitty
Jim was important to the field globally and these exchanges contribute pieces of (auto)bio histories.
Brenda Dervin
I was saddened to hear of Jim's death. I first encountered him in 1965 at a special screening of Peter Watkins' TV documentary The War Game on nuclear war effects, which the British Home Office banned the BBC from televising because of its realism.
He spoke in energetic defence of the documentary and its importance. Thereafter our paths crossed at intervals, mostly at the IAMCR. He was in many ways larger than life, a great raconteur, a distinguished aficionado of Scotch and other life- enhancing concoctions, an amazing fund-raiser, and did us all particularly proud by his pioneering and highly original work in forming the "Three Worlds" IAMCR.
John Downing
On behalf of the local organizing committee here in Paris, I would like to say that we are very sad not to count Jim Halloran among the participants of the forthcoming celebrations in Paris. We were looking forward to having a long distance satellite communication with him in plenary, but he has made the distance too long for us to keep up.
He was a very significant person for our NGO for a very long time, at crucial moments. His memory will be commemorated on the 25th of July, during the final ceremony. You are welcome to provide anecdotes and testimonies for us to add on our website section "back to the future". We are open to other suggestions coming from the board or the international council.
The local organizing committee 2007 Paris, Divina Frau-Meigs, Josiane Jouet, Michael Palmer, Nathalie Sonnac
I am saddened to learn about Jim's death.
He was my first point of contact with IAMCR (the IA of MASS Comms as I will always think of it!). We (and others of course) worked together (endlessly it seems now) on the revision of the constitution and the internal standing orders (gripping stuff...).
He was a giant of a man, intellectually and physically. My fondest memories of him, and his larger-than-life presence, are all connected with being sat round tables at various Leicester restaurants, etc. enjoying his exuberant presence and boundless hospitality.
David Goldberg
I would hope that one of the many journal editors in our field would organize a special issue on James Halloran and his contributions to the field, as a scholar and as a supporter of international cooperation.
hanno hardt
I agree with all of your suggestions regarding the paying of tribute to a very important ex-chair of the association. I met him very briefly but I knew of him and of his contribution to IAMCR of the three worlds!
Sophia Kaitatzi-Whitlock
It is sad news. I know Jim for more than 30 yearas. He build bridges between East and West in difficult times. Both his academic style and British humour made hzim an unforgettable friend.
We will miss him.
Wolfgang Kleinwachter
Jim was a tremendous source of inspiration to a whole generation of Indian students who joined the Centre for Mass Communication Research to do their Master's or Ph.D. studies. When I happened to land up at Lecester in the mid-1980s to do my doctorate, Jim readily accepted me as his Ph.D student.
During the few months that he guided me it became clear to me that he was a rigorous and challenging scholar who would brook no simplistic (what he liked to term 'journalistic') approach to research. I recall how terribly nervous he was about visiting India and organising the 1986 IAMCR conference in New Delhi - the first time I believe that IAMCR dared to conduct its conference in Asia or Africa. But once the conference was over, he grudgingly admitted that it was perhaps the most enjoyable and inexpensive conference. He would invariably remind me and other Indian colleagues of this whenever I bumped into him at subsequent conferences.
But the memory of Jim that I will always cherish is that cold January afternoon of 1988 whe, after interrogating me for over an hour during g my Ph.D. viva, he walked up to his 'cabinet', got a bottle of the choicest scotch, and poured out a chotta peg for me. I don't think I've tasted anything more blessed since! That was the Jim Halloran I knew: tough -as- nails when it can came to academic rigour, but always a warm and gentle friend. He will be sorely missed.
My heartfelt conoldences to his family and to his many friends in Leicester and around the world.
I would like to propose that at its forthcoming 50th anniversary celebrations in Paris, IAMCR establish an award /scholarship/fellowship in the name of Professor Jim Halloran.
Keval Joe Kumar
Ph.D Student at Leicester (1984-87)
I am so sad to hear about Jim's death. I first met Jim at IAMCR in 1974 and over the years, we became good friends. He was one of the featured critical researchers in my edited volume, A Different Road Taken. I appreciated Jim's candidness, honesty, and good humor. I often kidded him that I particularly enjoyed IAMCR under his "benevolent dictatorship." Jim brought IAMCR up from a shoestring, ensuring that it represented all factions during those Cold War years and that it was not dominated by the empiricists of U.S. academia. He called the shots the way they were and you can't ask for more than that. He will be sorely missed.
John A. Lent
I was saddened to hear about Jim's death. During my many years with the Canadian Commission for UNESCO we had many late night chats about NWICO. I also nominated him for the McLuhan-UNESCO award, which he won and it was presented to him in Ottawa by Marshall's wife Elizabeth, an actress from Texas, who married him in St.Louis, Missouri in the late 1930s.
Tom McPhail
I feel very sad about this in many ways. Jim gave me my first chance to speak at an IAMCR conference on a platform that was outside the section format (Bled conference) and despite the fact that I was very inexperienced then at speaking to a larger audience, he was extremely positive afterwards. That was for me the hallmark of someone with a very big heart.
Robin Mansell
I am very sad that Jim Halloran has died in the 50th year of IAMCR's existence. I recall that I gave a lecture in his honour at Leicester several years ago after which he said at a party at Annabelle Sreberny's that the Australian wine was bottled sunshine. That attitude and his wink were crucial.
I cannot be in Paris but I trust that he will be commemorated.
Frank Morgan
A brief note of tribute to Jim Halloran. Jim's contribution to audience research and to the establishment of media studies as a research field cannot be overestimated.
I studied at the Centre for Mass Communication Research at Leicester in 1978/79, and subsequently worked with Jim on a Prix Jeunesse project (1979/80). This was a far from easy experience, but also proved to be an exciting introduction to an academic career. Working with Jim helped me understand the complexity of academic life and proved instrumental in defining the direction of my academic research - not to mention introducing me to IAMCR. There were moments of generosity and assistance during a few life-changing years in my life that I will always remember.
Virginia Nightingale
The death of James D. Halloran means the disappearance of one of the most distinguished leader and scholar in the field of the comunicacion sciences, principally in the critical research. He exerted the presidency of IAMCR with a sense of authority and pragmatism, as I have been able to check in the different Conferences in which I have participated. I got to know him in the Conference of Leicester in 1974, and since then we have always kept a cordial relationship. When we presented the candidacy of Barcelona as the organizer of the 1988 Conference, we have received a strong and kind support from him. Let me emphasize the role played by Peggy Gray in the preparation and celebration of this event. Again, in 1996, when I have been the candidate to the presidency of the Association, he expressed me his warm support. Every Christmas I have received his kind and ponctual greetings card. He deserves a homage and I believe that all formulated proposals are pertinent, specially that of Kumar.
Manuel Parés i Maicas
It is indeed a great loss to the field of media studies. He was a great source of inspiration and an outstanding motivator. We in India will certainly miss him and at this juncture on behalf of all the media scholars we convey our deepest condolences to the family of Prof. James Halloran. May god take him in his feet and bless the departed soul.With great respect
Prof C.Pichaandy, India
I agree with … that we should mark Jim Halloran's passing. He not only made significant contributions to the very special international communication organisation that is IAMCR. He was also one of the key founding figures in the communication studies field in Britain.
Thus, I agree that some form of tribute at the anniversary conf in Paris would be very appropriate
Paschal Preston
I try to avoid overloading e-mail circuits, but the passing of Jim Halloran is a historic moment for IAMCR, and I hope the organization will capitalize on it in Paris. I will not be able to attend this year and the thought of missing a truly fitting tribute to Jim, the real genius behind the development of IAMCR, makes my non-attendance hurt even more.
Because Jim was such a successful leader - at Leicester, in IAMCR - his intellectual prowess was sometimes overlooked. But he was the one nurturing the involvement of Herb Schiller, Gigi Robinson, Graham Murdock, Yassen Zasourski, Karle Nordenstreng, and so many crucial to the true impact of IAMCR. What he did behind the scenes to develop the support of UNESCO and to nurture the "three worlds" of IAMCR, as Doug Kellner put it, was a work of genius. When I first stopped by Leicester in 1976 and met Jim, Peggy Gray (whose IAMCR contribution should not be overlooked), Graham, Peter Golding, and others, no one could have been more gracious and accepting of a hopeful but unknown young communication prof than Jim. Over the years, he continued to support, inspire, entertain, and work with me and so many scattered all over the world.
I wish to offer not only a tribute but also a toast to our mentor and guide, Jim! You don't have to be Irish (though it helps) to know that he would appreciate that. Those of us remaining will have a hard time compensating for the loss of Jim Halloran, Jim Carey, Roger Silverstone, George Gerbner, Herb Schiller, and our other departed mentors who opened up new ways of being critical communication scholars in the world.
Michael Real
I would also like to contribute my thoughts on Jim Halloran who was little more than a name in a bibliography when I joined CMCR in the mid-1990s. On meeting him for the first time in the place he called his second office - the local wine bar as I recall - I was impressed by his friendliness and approachability and it was only later that I properly realised the intelligence which lay beneath the jokey bonhomie. His past thoughts inform our present thinking and thereby, he lives on.
A good life lived well.
Karen Ross
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I am very sad to hear that Jim Halloran has passed away. He was a tireless leader and scholar who inspired many like me. He encouraged and made it possible for me and a lot of other people to join IAMCR. He will definitely be missed. My sincere condolences to Jim's family. We should sure commemorate his contributions to IAMCR and to the field of communication/mass communication in Paris.
Mohammad A. Siddiqi
Professor Jim Halloran will be remembered for his charm and humour, for his intelligence and commitment to the international community of communication researchers, and especially ... for raising the right questions.
"Research in the West ... is research of social control ... [It] tends ...
to reflect the values and reinforce the system within which it is conceived, supported, and executed ... [It] is not marked by speculative and reflective approaches ... consideration of alternatives, or caution and tolerance ... but by dogma, doctrinaire statements, selective use of evidence, unsubstantiated assertions ... arrogance and hostile intolerance ... The positions, firmly held by the new high priests, brook no contradictions, and evidence must not ... get in the way of faith."
"It is now suggested that research ... should be shifted away from such questions as 'the right to communicate' to 'more concrete problems.' But what are these 'concrete problems?' They are the same as, or similar to, the safe, 'value-free' micro questions of the old-time positivists who served the system so well, whether or not they intended or understood this. All this represents a definite and not very well disguised attempt to put the clock back to the days when the function of research was to serve the system as it was -- to make it more efficient rather than to question it or suggest alternatives."
HALLORAN J. D. (1981), "The Context of Mass Communication Research"
Jan Servaes
I would also like to pay tribute to James Halloran, not only for his astute leadership of IAMCR through a difficult era in geopolitics, but even more widely for his pioneering contribution to the building of the whole field of international media and communication research.
John Sinclair.
Jim was a foundational figure in the field, helping to establish the study of the media as a legitimate subject in British universities and building up the international collaborative academic network that is IAMCR.
He leaves an enduring legacy, which we might commemorate in Paris.
Annabelle Sreberny
I have interacted with Jim Halloran at IAMCR Conference in New Delhi and he was responsible my membership and involvement with IAMCR. I had joined media academics after years in media profession and did not have much regard for media academics. It was Jim who persuaded me to be part of IAMCR.
Besides being inclusive academician he was a very good human being.
I later inteacted with him at CMCR when he was handing over the charge to his successor and several IAMCR conferences and found him jolly good fellow who would usually drink his lunch.
May his soul rest in peace!
K.M.Shrivastava
I want to express my sincere sadness on learning of the passing of Jim Halloran, who was an unforgettable and forceful leader of IAMCR for many years and a provocative, influential scholar.
Jim told me in a card this past December that he hoped to come to IAMCR's 50th anniversary meeting in Paris this July. I wish he had been able to, and I look forward to seeing many of you again there.
Dave Weaver
Being on the move, I am hopefully not too late and not the last one to commemorate, too, the death of our former president. I remember him since I first attended the Warsaw conference of IAMCR 1978, where I began to be impressed by his ability to overbridge the deep political divide within the organization. He was an excellent tactician, but nevertheless a distinguished researcher. Unforgettable to me is the "Demonstrations and Communication"-study which was an important step in reconsidering the influence of journalists on how we do perceive events. I hope very much that Jim's draft of the history of IAMCR will be finished by others.
Juergen Wilke
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