Northeastern University communications professor Adriana de Souza e Silva studies communication technologies used across the globe, from the slums of Brazil to the high-tech regions of the United States
As director of the Center for Transformative Mediaat Northeastern, De Souza e Silva researches how technologies such as cellphones have transformed society
“Today, we are all carrying the Internet with us, everywhere we go,” she told Northeastern Global News. “The idea is to study how new media can transform society,” she said. “Look at the printing press and how it caused a transformation, accelerating communications on a global scale.”
De Souza e Silva was one of only a dozen people across the globe recently named a fellow by the Washington D.C.-based International Communication Association, or ICA, which is a global group with more than 5,000 academic members from about 80 countries
The 75-year-old group, which publishes six major peer-reviewed journals, honored the professor this summer for her body of academic research over the last 20 years in the communications field
The mission of the ICA is to advance the scholarly study of communications. Being named a fellow positions De Souza e Silva in an elite group, her colleagues said
She said the printing press even triggered modern science through the sharing of ideas and data
Northeastern Global News, in your inbox
De Souza e Silva also focuses on disparities in communication technologies across the globe, including looking at creative ways people in the slums and favelas of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, use technology
“Here in the Global North we have computers, iPads, everyone has two phones,” she said. “But it’s very different in the Global South,” she noted, referring to the classification for countries that are primarily developing, less industrialized, or historically marginalized. “People might have just one cellphone for the family. They have to become creative.”
De Souza e Silva also focuses on disparities in communication technologies across the globe, including looking at creative ways people in the slums and favelas of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, use technology
“Here in the Global North we have computers, iPads, everyone has two phones,” she said. “But it’s very different in the Global South,” she noted, referring to the classification for countries that are primarily developing, less industrialized, or historically marginalized. “People might have just one cellphone for the family. They have to become creative.”
It is directly changing how we write,” she said. “You can use AI as a writing partner. You can talk to it and say, I want to create a text on such-and-such. It’s like Google on a higher level.”
Brooke Welles, a colleague at Northeastern University and a communications professor and senior associate dean, said she has known de Souza e Silva by reputation and her work long before NU recruited her to Boston
“I’ve known her for over 10 years and I had known her work before then, it stood out,” Welles said. “She mentors graduate students, she brings top experts in the field to campus. She’s always thinking about communication technology and how it intersects with humanity.”
Susan Mello, interim chair in the Department of Communication Studies at Northeastern, described being an ICA fellow as one of the highest honors in our discipline, awarded to scholars whose work has made a lasting impact on communication research and theory… it’s a small, incredibly elite group.”
Mello said that beyond De Souza e Silva’s teaching and mentoring of an exceptional number of students at all levels, “her research and creative output, from peer-reviewed publications to major digital projects to a forthcoming book with MIT Press, shows remarkable momentum.”
“She’s an incredibly valued member of our community, and we’re fortunate to have her,” she added
