Scholars Circle Team
Maria Armoudian – host/producer is the author of two books, Reporting from the Danger Zone: Frontline Journalists, Their Jobs and an Increasingly Perilous Future and Kill the Messenger: The Media’s Role in the Fate of the World. She is a lecturer at the University of Auckland in New Zealand, the host and producer of the syndicated radio program, The Scholars’ Circle. She is also project’s founding director, political scientist for The Project for Media in the Public Interest (PMPI) and it’s website The Big Q. Maria served as an environmental commissioner for the City of Los Angeles for five years, on the Board of Taxi Cab Commissioners for two and worked on environmental protection, government oversight, poverty reduction, civil rights, and corporate reform legislation for the California State Legislature for eight years, Her articles have been published by the Columbia Journalism Review, New York Times Syndicate and the Los Angeles Times Syndicate, The New Zealand Herald, the Los Angeles Daily News, Grist, the Progressive, Salon.com, Truthout, Alternet, Inc., Daily Variety, and Billboard. She also a songwriter & musician. Her CD is called Life in the New World.
Douglas (Doug ) Becker – host/producer.
Dr. Douglas Becker is Assistant Professor at School of International Relations , USC. He received his Ph.D from University of Cunnecticut in 2002. His research interests involve historical memory as a research tool on foreign policy analysis and public diplomacy. He teaches courses on peace and conflict: On the importance of historical memory as elements of public diplomacy and image in foreign policy analysis, On international political economy of multinational corporations.
His recent publications: The Rationality and Emotion of Russian Historical Memory: The Case of Crimea in Crisis and Change in Post-Cold War Global Politics: Ukraine in a Comparative Perspective ( 1st edition 2018 ).
He servers on the Executive Board of the Active Learning in International Relations (ALIAS).
Lilian Ng – guest host
Ankine Aghassian – Producer and Editor, Journalist with production responsibility including: Organizing weekly program of The Scholars’ Circle, Engaging with Hosts and Guests for the weekly show, Research on program material for hosts, Organizing interview at studio, virtual – phone, online conference ( such as zoom ), Editing raw audio interview for radio play. Also Engaging on social media to inform the weekly program followers.
Melissa Chiprin – Producer
Sudd Dongre – Technical Support, Web Master of Scholarscircle.org and armoudian.com. He is a freelance software developer and webmaster. Interested in kinder and informed world.
Mike Hurst – Technical Support, The Big Q production.
Tim Page – Technical Support, The Big Q production.