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Edward R. Murrow College of Communication

Bimbisar Irom

  1. Assistant Professor
Email Addressb.irom@wsu.edu
LocationMurrow Hall 106C

Biography

Biography

Bimbisar Irom seeks to understand and improve news media practices to better serve vulnerable populations. Irom is primarily invested in identifying gaps in journalism performance across multiple media platforms ranging from newspapers to immersive Virtual Reality (VR). His work is cross-disciplinary and draws—in theory, method, and interest—upon his humanities training to address urgent communication questions. The social sciences-humanities marriage is reflected in his use of novel methodologies such as applying experiments to quantify the impact of visual frames. Irom focuses on two primary areas: humanitarian communication and how emergent media, in both its social and immersive forms, engages with underserved populations. His methodologies include thematic, semiotic, discourse, and visual analyses.

Education

  • Ph.D., University of Wisconsin-Madison (American Cultural & Literary Studies)
  • M.A & M.Phil, Delhi University

Classes Taught

  • COM 580 – Media and communication in human crises
  • COMSTRAT 563 – Ethics for professionals (online)
  • COMSTRAT 561 – Persuasion for professional communicators (online)
  • COM 440 – Media ethics (online and face-to-face)
  • COM 421 – Intercultural communication and globalization (online and face-to-face)
  • COM 400 – Communicating science and technology
  • COMSOC 301 – Foundations of Persuasion
  • COM 324 – Reasoning and writing
  • COM 105 – Communication in global contexts
  • COM100 – Foundations for excellence in writing in communication

Research Interests

  • Humanitarian communication
  • Forced Migration
  • Underrepresented Groups
  • Journalism
  • Emergent Technology (Virtual Reality)

Awards

Research

  • Irom, B. (2019). Mediating Syria’s strangers through Levinas: Communication ethics and the visuals of children. Communication Theory, 29(4), 441-462.
  • Winner of the ‘Top Journal Article Award’ at the National Communication Association Conference 2019 in Baltimore, Maryland (Philosophy of Communication Division)

Teaching

  • Nominated for Excellence in Online Teaching award by students of Com 440: Media Ethics. Global Campus, Washington State University, 2023.
  • Nominated for Best Online Instructor award by students of ComStrat 561: Persuasion for Professional Communicators and ComStrat 563: Ethics for Professionals. Global Campus, Washington State University, 2019.
  • Nominated for Best Online Instructor award by students of ComStrat 563: Ethics for Professionals. Global Campus, Washington State University, 2018.

Selected Publications

* indicates graduate student author

Irom, B. (accepted, 2023). After the longest war: Frames and themes of Afghan refugee visuals in U.S. Newspapers. Critical Studies in Media and Communication.

Irom, B. (2023). Between remediating and participating: Visuals of the Ford-Kavanaugh controversy on Instagram. Online Information Review.

Irom, B. (2023). Visual themes and frames of the Rohingya crisis: Newspaper content from three countries in South and Southeast Asia. Visual Communication Journal.

Irom, B., Borah, P. & Gibbons, S*. (2023). The Rohingya refugee crisis: Social semiotic study of visuals in the New York Times and the Washington Post, Journalism and Mass Communication Quarterly.

Irom, B., Borah, P., Gibbons, S*. (2022). Visual framing of the Rohingya refugees: A comparative examination from newspapers in four countries. Visual Communication Quarterly.

Borah, P., Keib, K., Trude, B., Binford, M., Irom, B., Himelboim, I. (2022). “You are a disgrace and traitor to our country”: Incivility against “The Squad” on Twitter.” Internet Research.

Irom, B. & Gibbons, S*. (2021). From media to hypermedia: Journalistic representations of Rohingya refugees and humanitarian communication. Journalism.

Irom, B. (2021). Virtual reality and celebrity humanitarianism: Rashida Jones in Lebanon. Media, Culture and Society.

Borah, P., Irom, B., Hsu, Y*. (2021). ““It infuriates me”: Examining young adults’ reactions to and recommendations to fight misinformation about COVID-19.” Journal of Youth Studies.

Irom, B., Borah, P., Vishnevskaya, A*. & Gibbons, S*. (2021). News framing of the Rohingya crisis: Content analysis of newspaper coverage from four countries. Journal of Immigrant & Refugee Studies

Borah, P., & Irom, B. (2021). To donate or not to donate: Visual framing of the Rohingya refugees, pre-support for refugee policies, and donation intentions. Journal of Refugee Studies

Irom, B. (2019). Mediating Syria’s strangers through Levinas: Communication ethics and the visuals of children. Communication Theory, 29(4), 441-462.

Irom, B. (2018). Virtual reality and the Syrian refugee camps: Humanitarian communication and the politics of empathy. International Journal of Communication, 12, 4269–4291.

Irom, B. (2016). Binodini’s Sri Bhavana: A prefatory essay. The Visva-Bharati Quarterly, 24(4), 21-26.

Irom, B. (2016). Towards a worldly post-9/11 American novel: Transnational disjunctures in Joseph O’Neill’s Netherland. Journal of Transnational American Studies 7(1).

Irom, B. (2012). Alterities in a time of terror: Notes on the sub-genre of the American 9/11 novel. Contemporary Literature, 53(3), 517-547.

Irom, B. (2012). Between “Retreat” and “Engagement”: Incomplete revolts and the operations of irony in E.L. Doctorow’s The Book of Daniel. Studies in American Fiction, 39(1), 61-85.

Irom, B. (2012). “moves to places not quite on the schedule”: Irony and the ethics of action in Joan Didion’s Democracy. Critique: Studies in Contemporary Fiction, 53(1), 66-81.

Irom, B. (2011). Genre and political transition: The problematic of the collective novel in Norman Mailer’s The Armies of the Night: History as a Novel, The Novel as History. Genre: Forms of Discourse and Culture, 44(1), 29-53.

Irom, B. (2010). Writing in from the outside: Reflections on the “Oh No! Syndrome” and writing pedagogy from a non-native teacher. Iowa Journal of Cultural Studies,12, 131-135.

Refereed Book Chapters (Invited)

Irom, B., Vishnevskaya, A*., Yel, E*. (in press). News frames of the Rohingya crisis: Content analysis of newspaper coverage from three countries in South and Southeast Asia. In Nasir Uddin & Md. Delwar Hossain (Eds.), Representation of refugees in media: Local and global perspectives. Palgrave Macmillan.

Irom, B. (2014, reprint). Towards a worldly post-9/11 American novel: Transnational disjunctures in Joseph O’Neill’s Netherland. In Winfried Fluck & Donald Pease (Eds.), Towards a post-exceptionalist American Studies. REAL: The yearbook of research in English and American Literature, 30.

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