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Professor emeritus Giffard retires with honors
January 19, 2011
The Department of Communication thrives because of the excellence of its educators, so when professor emeritus Anthony Giffard retired in December, it was a loss for the department. However, the incredible work he has contributed during more than 30 years has helped to put us where we stand today, as one of the leading communication departments in the country. It’s possible that without his invaluable work, UW’s Department of Communication might not exist today.
Giffard joined the faculty in 1979, when the Department was the School of Communications, but he had previous history with the University of Washington. In 1964, he earned his master’s degree at the UW, and in 1968 he completed his PhD in English literature. He returned to South Africa that year, his homeland, where he founded and directed the Department of Journalism and Mass Communication at Rhodes University for ten years.
Having 20 years of experience working as a reporter, editor, and copy editor for the South African Broadcasting Corporation, the London Times, and the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, as well as working for other well-known educational institutions, Giffard was offered a professorship at the UW School of Communication in 1979.
It was he who inaugurated the Department’s annual three-month study-abroad program in Rome, “which was our first really substantive department study-abroad,” said Professor Jerry Baldasty Vice Provost and Dean of The Graduate School. In its first year, 12 students attended and, ever since, an overwhelming number of students apply each year.
In 1994, Giffard took charge when the School of Communications was in dire need of help. Due to a budgetary crisis, the College of Arts and Sciences proposed closing down the School of Communications and the Department of Speech Communication as they were deemed “no longer central to the goals of the College and the University,” said David Domke, Department Chair.
Giffard stepped up to the plate to prevent this from happening. “He really pulled the faculty together to respond to that proposal and to demonstrate the value of the program,” said Baldasty. Because of Giffard’s efforts, faculty worked to develop curriculum for the School and Department, cutting back on emphasis of professional training for courses in advertising and public relations, and instead focusing on theory.
In a 1996 newspaper clipping that Giffard had saved, Seattle Times senior vice president and executive editor Mike Fancher is quoted saying, “Tony led the fight to save the school, so he earned the right to lead it into its next era,” which is exactly what Giffard did when he was appointed Director of the School of Communications. Giffard’s leadership after the budget crisis earned him much admiration and support from his fellow colleagues making him the top candidate for the seat.
As director, he put the gears in motion for the new curriculum with courses in journalism, new media, political communication, international communication, and media history and law. “He was really the architect of the more modern approach to communication,” said Baldasty. Under Giffard’s direction, the School of Communication extended outreach into the professional community, faculty oversaw the remodel of the Communications Building, endowments for research and scholarships increased drastically, and the MCDM program was launched.
In 2002, Giffard’s last year as director, a successful negotiation took place merging the School of Communication and the Department of Speech Communication. The Department of Communication was born, a step that would make the new department “even greater than the sum of the two individual units,” Giffard wrote in the May 2002 Communication newsletter.
Throughout his years as professor, Giffard has been a teacher of true value for undergraduate and graduate students, a productive researcher in international communication, and his many contributions yield high-quality results for the Department to this day.
Along with his students, Giffard has managed to also teach his colleagues a lesson or two. Baldasty said he taught him, “to not take yourself too seriously. He has a good sense of balance in his life. He’s a great educator and researcher but he also takes time to hike, travel, and drink beer.” With plenty of free time ahead of him, Giffard will surely be able to do all three; perhaps even at the same time.
