TJ Billard

TJ Billard is an associate professor in Northwestern University's School of Communication and, by courtesy, the Department of Sociology. They earned a PhD from the Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism at the University of Southern California and a BA (Hons) from the School of Media and Public Affairs at The George Washington University. Billard's research centers on the role media plays in the social and political equality of transgender people in the United States and globally, with a focus on digital media strategies social movements employ to advocate for and against transgender equality. Spanning political communication, the sociology of social movements, and transgender studies, their work also explores typography and graphic design in political branding. A William T. Grant Scholar (Class of 2028), Billard leads the project Cisinformed: Disinformation and the Media War on Transgender Rights. They are affiliated with Northwestern's Center for Communication & Public Policy, Institute for Sexual and Gender Minority Health and Wellbeing, and Institute for Policy Research.

Prior to joining Northwestern, Billard held positions as Consortium on Media Policy Studies Fellow and Archival Fellow at the National Center for Transgender Equality, where they created the Trans Equality Archive, the largest collection of transgender political history in the United States. Billard founded and serves as executive director of the Center for Applied Transgender Studies in Chicago and is editor-in-chief of its journal, the Bulletin of Applied Transgender Studies. They authored Voices for Transgender Equality: Making Change in the Networked Public Sphere (Oxford University Press, 2024) and co-edited Public Scholarship in Communication Studies (University of Illinois Press, 2024, with Silvio Waisbord). Notable publications include “Deciding What’s (Sharable) News: Social Movement Organizations as Curating Actors in the Political Information System” (Communication Monographs), “Together We Rise: The Role of Communication and Community Connectedness in Transgender Citizens’ Civic Engagement in the United States” (Mass Communication and Society, 2022), “Toward a Transgender Critique of Media Representation” with Erique Zhang (JCMS: Journal of Cinema and Media Studies, 2022), and “Movement–Media Relations in the Hybrid Media System: A Case Study from the US Transgender Rights Movement” (International Journal of Press/Politics, 2021). Billard's scholarship appears in leading outlets such as Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly, Media, Culture & Society, and Politics, Groups, and Identities.

Professional Email: billard@northwestern.edu