Dr. Jacob Udo-Udo Jacob

Dr. Jacob Udo-Udo Jacob
Assistant Professor, Journalism

Research Interests
Jacob’s research interest is located at the intersection between communications and global change in contemporary society.   How can communications be used to solve  social, political and environmental problems in contemporary society?  How are communication interventions localised, encountered and contested in crises societies - particularly in Africa?  What are the cultural, social and political impacts of new communication technologies in contemporary society?  These are the core questions he seeks to answer. 

Education & Career
Jacob holds a PhD in Strategic Communications from the University of Leeds, United Kingdom. His doctoral research  on the UN's public information operations was supervised by the eminent Professor Phillip M. Taylor.  Prior to Leeds, Jacob studied  at the Richardson Institute for Peace and Conflict Research, Lancaster University, United Kingdom.  He has a BA (Hons) in Communication Arts from the University of Uyo in Nigeria. 

Jacob started his academic career as a Post-Doctoral Teaching Fellow at the Institute of Communications Studies, University of Leeds where he managed and taught the PG module ‘Communications and Global Change’and the UG module ‘Communications and Conflicts in the Information Age’.  

In addition to his teaching and research, he has consulted for several businesses and organisations in Europe and Africa.

Current Teaching and Research
Jacob presently teaches courses in communication research and applied communications as it relates to intercultural relations and peace journalism.  He has facilitated training on Peace Journalism for Journalists covering the Boko Haram insurgency in North-East Nigeria. He is also an accredited Intercultural Communication trainer in the Cultural Detective  Approach. 

Jacob presently leads the Radio intervention component of a USAID-funded Technology Enhanced Learning for All (TELA) project in North-East Nigeria.  He also leads the historical narratives component of the project, Protecting Human Rights and Religious Freedom Through Peace and Reconciliation in a Post Conflict Environment, funded by the Canada Fund for Local Initiatives. He has recently completed a research on Mobile Telephony and the Boko Haram insurgency as part of the ICTs & Governance in Africa research project of the Programme on Comparative Media Law & Policy (PCMLP) at Oxford University and the Annenberg School for Communication, University of Pennsylvania  (supported by a grant from the Carnegie Corporation of New York). 

Jacob is presently Chair of the Communications and Multimedia Design Program and Associate Dean in the School of Arts & Science.  He is also the AUN liaison of the Global Liberal Arts Alliance.

Select Publications
Jacob, J.U. (2016) Convincing Rebel Fighters to Disarm: UN Information Operations in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Degruyter, Berlin.

Jacob, J.U. & Akpan, I., (2015). ‘Silencing Boko Haram: Mobile Phone Blackout and Counterinsurgency in Nigeria’s Northeast region’. Stability: International Journal of Security and Development. 4(1), p.Art. 8. DOI: http://doi.org/10.5334/sta.ey

Jacob, J.U. (2015) ‘Influencing the Information Domain: The UN’s Information Intervention in the Democratic Republic of Congo’, in Winston Mano (Ed.) Racism, Ethnicity and the Media in Africa. I.B.Tauris

Jacob, J.U. (2014)‘Transforming Conflicts with Information: Impacts of UN Peace Radio programmes in the Democratic Republic of Congo’. War & Society, Vol. 33, No 4. DOI:10.1179/0729247314Z.00000000043

Jacob, J.U. (2013) ‘Energizing Visual Cultures: Sociotechnical Processes to achieve customer engagement and behaviour change’. Metering International. Issue 4:pp36-39

Macdonald, I.W. and Jacob U. J. (2011) ‘Lost and gone forever? The search for early British screenplays’. Journal of Screenwriting. 2:2, pp. 161-177, doi: 10.1386/josc.2.2.161_1

Jacob, J.U.(2011) ‘Battling Radical Islamist Propaganda in Somalia: The Information Intervention Option’. Small Wars Journal. Vol. 7, No. 5. 

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Ikechukwu Eke

Ikechukwu W. Eke
Instructor, Journalism

Ikechukwu W. Eke is a 2005 graduate of Mass Communication at the Ebonyi State University, Abakaliki, Nigeria. He also bagged a master’s degree in Communication and Language Arts at the University of Ibadan, Ibadan, Nigeria, in 2012. Prior to joining the American University of Nigeria in the spring of 2014, Eke worked as a reporter, sub-editor, book editor, copy editor, and magazine columnist in different reputable print media organizations in Lagos, Nigeria. His research interest is in Journalism, in which he has published a couple of scholarly articles.  

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t- +234 807 209 1974

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Abubakar Abba Tahir

Abubakar Abba Tahir
Assistant Professor

Abubakar Abba Tahir is currently a doctoral research fellow in Mass Communication at his alma mater, the University of Maiduguri from where he earned a foundation degree in the same area in 1989. He also holds an MA in Special English from Federal University of Technology Yola. He pursued a journalism and PR career for 31 years spanning radio, television, newspaper press and institutional PR. He began as News Assistant with NTA Yola in 1983; served as Information Officer in the Nigerian Presidency in Lagos (1989-1990); worked as Senior Staff Writer for Hotline Magazine Kaduna (1990-1991); Reporter, News Editor, Foreign Affairs Editor, etc. with Voice of Nigeria Radio Lagos (1991-1999). From 1999-2003 he served as General Manager and CEO of Adamawa Broadcasting Corporation Yola. Abba has been an Editorial Advisor and Columnist for Newspage Newspapers Abuja from 2008 until 2009. He has been a Director on the Board of Gotel Communications since inception in 2008. At the start of AUN in 2003, he founded the PR and Admissions departments and led the intuition's inaugural campaign to select the first set of students from around Nigeria, Cameroun and Ghana. In the first seven years at AUN, he variously served as Interim Director of Admissions (2004-2005), Director of PR & Marketing (2004-2005), Director of Public Affairs (2006-2009), and Associate Director for Enrolment Services (2009-2010), Director of PR & Communications (2010-2011) and in April 2011 he was promoted to the post of Assistant Vice-President for Public Affairs. He has attended several professional development courses in Nigeria and abroad: TV College Jos (1983); Radio Nigeria Training School (1994)); Administrative Staff College of Nigeria Badagry (1996); Deutsche Welle Broadcast Academy, Cologne, Germany (2000); American University Washington (2006); Centre for Strategic & International Studies (CSIS), Washington (2007). His teaching interests cover public speaking, broadcast journalism, public relations and marketing communications. Abba is Founding President of Konngol Silvertongue, a Public Speech Training and Event Management outfit in Yola.

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t- +234 806 200 0067

 

Presly Ogheneruke Obukoadata

Presly Ogheneruke Obukoadata
Chair, Communications & Multimedia Design Program

Presly Ogheneruke Obukoadata, who was recognized as the Outstanding Faculty of the Year (2017), earned his degrees in mass communication and has put in over a decade in guiding students achieve their educational goals at the Delta State Polytechnic, Ogwashi-Uku, International Institute of Journalism, National Open University of Nigeria and American University of Nigeria, Yola. He has equally committed considerable time to field experience as a newspaper reporter and radio presenter He has research bias for media studies, marketing, and developmental communications, in which he has published over thirty papers in peer-reviewed journals. He reviews for several communication and media related journals.

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t- +234 806 005 1572

 

 

 

 

 

Ibanga Isine

Ibanga Isine
Multimedia Journalism Instructor

Ibanga Isine is one of Nigeria's best investigative journalists and editor and holds a Bachelor of Arts Degree in Communication Arts and a Master of Arts Degree in Mass Communication from the University of Uyo, Akwa Ibom State.

With extensive experience in print, broadcast and multi-media journalism, Mr. Isine has a keen instinct for investigations and special reports.

He has worked for the Nigerian Television Authority, Channel 12, Uyo, and Punch Newspapers, moving from correspondent to chief correspondent and bureau chief.

He took on a government role as special assistant, media and administration to the Hon. Minister of Lands, Housing and Urban Development but returned to Leadership Newspapers in 2012 where he was appointed Group Editor Investigations and later served as pioneer editor to the new weekly ‘Government’.

He moved to GuardPost as editor in 2013 and is currently Regional Editor, South at Premium Times - Nigeria’s most respected and authoritative newspaper.

Mr. Isine has published three academic journal articles including one in an international journal.  

He has escaped several attempts on his life, arrested, beaten and detained on many occasions by security agents on account of his investigative reports and was listed among the world’s endangered journalists as far back as 2004.   

He was honoured at the Wole Soyinka Award for Investigative Journalism in 2014 and in 2015; he won the CNN Multichoice African Journalist Award in the News Impact Category.

Apart from his remarkable investigative reports, he has interviewed two sitting Nigerian Presidents - Mr. Goodluck Joanthan and Mr. Muhamadu Buhari.

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Lionel Rawlins

Lionel Rawlins
Forsensic Criminologist, Security Consultant

Lionel Rawlins is a Forensic Criminologist, Security Consultant & former US Marine. He has consulted for various organizations & countries and led seminars on security & safety. He delivers guest lectures on Intercultural Communications, Identity & Conflict.

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