Rate My Professor Matthew Pressman

Matthew Pressman is an Associate Professor in the Department of Communication, Media, and the Arts at Seton Hall University, where he joined the faculty in 2016 following his Ph.D. in history from Boston University. Prior to his academic career, he worked for eight years at Vanity Fair as an assistant editor and online columnist. Pressman teaches courses in journalism history, journalistic practice, and writing. His research centers on journalism history, exploring the evolution of news media practices and their political influences. He has contributed articles to prominent outlets including The Washington Post, The Atlantic, and TIME, providing historical perspectives on contemporary media issues.

Pressman's acclaimed book, On Press: The Liberal Values That Shaped the News (Harvard University Press, 2018), analyzes the liberal values that defined American journalism from the 1960s to the 1980s. The work earned the 2019 History Book Award from the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication and the PROSE Award in Media and Cultural Studies from the Association of American Publishers. It has been featured in Harvard's Nieman Journalism Lab, Politico, and C-SPAN's Book TV. In 2022, he received a National Endowment for the Humanities Summer Stipend to conduct archival research for his forthcoming book, The People's Paper: A History of the New York Daily News and Its Populist Politics, examining the highest-circulation newspaper in U.S. history and its populist stance. Recent publications include "Before the Summit: News Media Framing, Scripts and the Flag-raising at Iwo Jima" (co-authored with James J. Kimble, Media, War & Conflict, 2023), reviews in American Journalism (2024) and Journalism History (2025), and an encyclopedia entry on the Washington Post. Pressman's scholarship bridges historical analysis with modern media discourse, influencing discussions on journalistic objectivity and populism.