Shannon A. Bowen
Associate Professor, Public Relations, School of Journalism and Mass Communications
School of Journalism and Mass Communications
University of South Carolina
@drbowen

Dr. Shannon A. Bowen is associate professor tenured in the School of Journalism and Mass Communications at the University of South Carolina. She returned home to South Carolina after several years achieving tenure in the Public Relations Department of the S. I. Newhouse School of Public Communications, Syracuse University. Shannon specializes in communication ethics, strategic communication management, issues management, dominant coalition decisions, public relations theory, organizational communication, social media and engagement, and the intersection of organizational culture with ethics. In 2012, Shannon was elected into membership in the Arthur W. Page Society, an organization for the highest-level corporate communication professionals and select academics.

Shannon won the 2011 Jackson Jackson and Wagner Behavioral Science Research Prize for her program of research on ethics in organizations. Her work has contributed numerous decision-making models to the field, based on the rigorous analyses of the modern period of moral philosophy. She sits on the board of directors of the nonprofit International Public Relations Research Conference (IPRRC), was the 2010-2011 chair of the Media Ethics Division of AEJMC, serves several journal editorial boards and is a contributing editor of Media Ethics, and is a member of PRSA. Shannon is an elected member of the Commission on Measurement and Evaluation, and is chair of the Task Force on Ethics and Standards that designed an ethics statement to guide the research industry. Shannon is joint editor of the top-tier journal Ethical Space: The International Journal of Communication Ethics.

In her work on public relations ethics, she won numerous top faculty paper awards (including the Robert L. Heath Award), and published research in Journal of Business Ethics, Journal of Public Relations Research, Journal of Public Affairs, Public Relations Review, Journal of Applied Communication Research, Journal of Communication Management, Journal of Mass Media Ethics, Journalism History, International Journal of Strategic Communication, Ethical Space, P.R. Journal, and so on. She served as an editorial advisor to the Sage Encyclopedia of Public Relations, first and second editions. She helped revise the 9th edition of Cutlip, Center, and Broom’s (2005) Effective Public Relations, and authored the book An Overview of the Public Relations Function, (with Brad Rawlins and Thomas Martin), and is currently writing a public relations textbook.

As a quantitative research analyst for a polling firm in Washington, D.C., Shannon designed research and strategy for numerous corporate clients, working on crisis management strategy. She also served as a quantitative and qualitative analyst to numerous political candidates.