Jean Kilbourne
Consultant to the Center for Partnership Studies
Jean Kilbourne has been what The Boston Globe described as “a superstar lecturer” for many years. Named by the The New York Times Magazine as one of the three most popular speakers on college campuses, she has twice received the Lecturer of the Year award from the National Association for Campus Activities. She is also sought after as a keynote speaker at a wide range of conferences, including those focusing on addictions and public health, violence, women, and the media.
Jean makes a powerful case for real partnership between women and men, and is renowned internationally for her groundbreaking work on the image of women in advertising and her critical studies of alcohol and tobacco advertising. Her films, lectures, and television appearances have been seen by millions of people throughout the world.
She is the author of the award-winning book Can’t Buy My Love: How Advertising Changes the Way We Think and Feel and So Sexy So Soon: The New Sexualized Childhood and What Parents Can Do to Protect Their Kids.
The prize-winning films based on her lectures include Killing Us Softly, Spin the Bottle, and Slim Hopes. She is a frequent guest on radio and television programs, including “The Today Show” and “The Oprah Winfrey Show.”
She has served as an advisor to the Surgeon General and has testified for the U.S. Congress. She holds an honorary position as Senior Scholar at the Wellesley Centers for Women.
She has received many awards, including the Lecturer of the Year award from the National Asociation for Campus Activities. A more unusual tribute was paid when an all-female rock group in Canada named itself Kilbourne in her honor.
In 2004 she received an honorary doctorate from Westfield State College that proclaimed, Through research informed by a deep sense of justice, your insights lead us from consumerism to consciousness. More recently, she was profiled in Feminists Who Changed America 1963–1975 and was one of twenty-one journalists, media activists, and educators included in a Media Heroes deck of trading cards. Her card said, Jean Kilbourne pioneered the critical study of images of women in advertising and the use of media literacy for public health and prevention.
The recent recipient of one of Boston University’s most prestigious alumni awards, Kilbourne has also received awards from many other organizations, including the Academy for Eating Disorders, the Entertainment Industries Council, the National Council on Alcoholism and Drug Dependence, and the National Organization for Women. The presenter of an award from the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (AFTRA) said, No one in the world has done more to improve the image of women in the media than Jean Kilbourne.
Web site: jeankilbourne.com
