PEER-REVIEWED JOURNAL ARTICLES

• DasSarma, A., & Fisher, L. D. (2023). The Persistence of Indigenous Unfreedom in Early American Newspaper Advertisements, 1704–1804. Slavery & Abolition, 44:2, 267-291. https://doi.org/10.1080/0144039X.2023.2189517

ENGAGED SCHOLARSHIP

• DasSarma, A. (2023). The Eastern Echo & The Umpire: Contextualizing The Penal Press of Eastern State Penitentiary – Center for Media at Risk. https://www.ascmediarisk.org/media/the-eastern-echo-and-the-umpire-contextualizing-the-penal-press-of-eastern-state-penitentiary/
• DasSarma, A., Dillard, C., Gill, S., Isch, C., Mbock, N., Muzekari, B., Probol, D., Proust, V., Teliz Martinez, S.A., Smith, T. L., Ye, Q., . Building a National Memorial to Journalists Who Died in Pursuit of the Truth. A Report Commissioned by the Fallen Journalists Foundation, May 9, 2023.

ACADEMIC EXPERIENCE 

COMPASS Fellow, Free Press, June 2024 – August 2024 (forthcoming)

Teaching Fellow with Prof. Barbie Zelizer, University of Pennsylvania, January 2024 – Present

• Working as a Teaching Fellow for Professor Barbie Zelizer’s undergraduate course, COMM 3390: Critical Perspectives in Journalism.
• Presented two guest lectures on critical journalism history and digital news ephemerality.

Research Fellow, Free Press, January 2023 – Present

• Working under Joseph Torres to produce articles related to the complicity of the Federal Communications Commission in racist policy.

Research Fellow with Prof. Sarah Jackson, University of Pennsylvania and Free Press, August 2023 – December 2023

• Worked under Professor Sarah Jackson and Media 2070 (housed under Free Press) to research racism in the early FCC commissions, focused on actors like Eugene O. Sykes, Frank McNinch, and Frederick Thompson.

Research Fellow with Prof. Barbie Zelizer, University of Pennsylvania, January 2023 – May 2023

• Worked with Professor Barbie Zelizer on a literature review and project focused on revisionist history about journalism and slavery.

Research Fellow with Prof. Joseph Turow, University of Pennsylvania, August 2022 – December 2023

• Assisted Professor Joseph Turow with research for projects and lectures, including the 15th annual Berkeley Center For Law & Technology Privacy Lecture: Playing the Long Game.
• Worked with Prof. Turow on media literacy education and data privacy that resulted in my contribution to a report entitled “Americans Can’t Consent to Companies’ Use of Their Data.”

Course Assistant with Prof. Linford Fisher, Brown University, January 2022 – May 2022

• Worked as an assistant for History Professor Linford Fisher’s course, “Captive Voices: Atlantic Slavery in the Digital Age.” 
• Held office hours and serves as a resource regarding slavery studies and digital humanities work for undergraduate students at Brown.
• Planned trips for students to interact directly with historical archives at the John Carter Brown Library, John Hay Library, and the Rhode Island Historical Society
• Conducted and facilitated archival research related to the course and provided administrative support to Professor Fisher.

Research Assistant with Prof. Linford Fisher, Brown University, August 2021 – May 2022

• Worked under Professor Linford Fisher on the Stolen Relations project, a database that aims to archive stories of indigenous enslavement.
• Compiled articles mentioning indigeneity from colonial newspapers (1704 to 1804).
• Utilized primary source material to answer research questions: In the United States, what did the relationship between journalism and indigenous people look like before 1800? What do “objectivity” and “silence” represent within journalism? How is journalism a form of public memory and who has historically conveyed narratives and who has been omitted from narrative-making?

CENTER AFFILIATIONS

Doctoral Fellow at the Center for Media at Risk, University of Pennsylvania, September 2022 – Present

• Participant and member of the Center for Media at Risk.
• Attends programming and workshops.
• Developing research under the Center, aligned with the goal of protecting and querying the role of the press in American society.
• Assisted in data migration while updating the Center’s website.
• Assisted in planning the 2023 Annual Symposium

Doctoral Fellow at the Center for Advanced Research in Global Communication, University of Pennsylvania, October 2022 – Present

• Participant and member of the Center for Advanced Research in Global Communication, or CARGC.
• Attends seminars and colloquia, monthly workshops, and events.

Doctoral Fellow at the Media Inequality and Change Center, University of Pennsylvania, November 2022 – Present

• Participant and member of the Center for Media at Risk.
• Attends programming and workshops.
• Focused on driving research around media, democracy, technology, policy, and social justice.

CONFERENCES

• Invited Presenter, Narratives of White Normativity and the Political Economy of Slavery: Revisiting Publick Occurrences, The Boston News-Letter, and the Origin Story of America’s Early Press, Rethinking our Communicative Pasts: Reparatory and Radical Perspectives, London, England, Forthcoming (April 2024)
• Organizer, 2024 Workshop Series: Introduction to Archival Methodology, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, March – April 2024
• Organizing, Center for Media at Risk and Annenberg C3 Symposium: When Media Put Social Justice at Risk, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, December 2023
• Social Media, Turning Points: The Long 1990s in Internet History, Center for Advanced Research in Global Communication, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, October 2023
• Organizing, Union for Democratic Communication, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, October 2023
• Paper, White Normativity, Slavery, and “the Charming of that Spirit of Lying”: Revisiting Publick Occurrences and the Origin Story of America’s Early Press, International Association for Media and Communication Research, Lyon, France, July 2023
• Paper, “We are deeply and profoundly sorry:” A case study in querying efficacy of institutional apologies for perpetuated racism, International Communication Association, Toronto, Canada, May 2023
• Attendee with post-reflection, Imagining the Online as the Offline: Metrics, Journalism, History, and Teetering at the Abyss, Milton Wolf Seminar, Vienna, Austria, April 2023
• Paper, Structures of Power and Sites of Resistance: Repositioning and Retelling the History of the Earliest Newspapers in “America,” Lisbon Winter School, January 2023
• Poster, The Persistence of Indigenous Unfreedom in Early American Newspaper Ads, 1704–1804 at the American Historical Association 2023 Conference, January 2023, with Professor Linford Fisher
• Paper, Relinquishing the “Newness” from the News: Historicizing Hegemonic Journalism’s Relationships with Truth, Whiteness, Slavery, and Ethics at the 2022 American Studies Graduate Conference at Brown University, May 2022

MEMBERSHIPS / AFFILIATIONS 

• International Association for Media and Communication Research (2023-present)
• International Communication Association (2023-present)
• American Historical Association (2022-present)
• Asian American Journalists Association (2020-2021) 

HONORS / AWARDS 

• Appointed as Social Chair, Graduate Council, Annenberg School for Communication (2023-present)
• Selected as an Emerging Scholar Fellow to the Milton Wolf Seminar in Vienna Austria (April 2023)
• Elected to the Events Committee, Annenberg School for Communication (2022-2023)
• Elected Humanities Senator (2017-2021) 
• Represented the University of Maryland, Baltimore County at the College Media Association conference in Minneapolis, Minnesota (June 2020) 
• Invited to speak at the Howard County Community College newspaper (HCC Times) retreat (August 2020) 
• Invited to speak at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County Media and Communications Council of Majors panel on internship success (October 2020)
• Established The Retriever Weekly Advisory Board with outstanding journalists from the Washington DC-Baltimore community
• Article selected for syndication by the Associated Press Wire published in 54 newspapers across the United States and abroad 
• Student representative within administrative COVID-19 pandemic planning meetings at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County 
• Featured in the Chronicle of Higher Education for work as a student journalist during the pandemic 

TRAINING

• Completed Social/Behavioral Research Course through the Collaborative Institutional Training Initiative (2022)
• Completed Brown University’s Teaching Essentials for Graduate TAs (2021)

PROFESSIONAL/NON-ACADEMIC EXPERIENCE

Editor-in-Chief, The Retriever Weekly, University of Maryland, Baltimore County, May 2020 – May 2021 

• Oversaw staff of over 80 reporters, editors and technicians.
• Acted as a representative of the paper.
• Approved all articles before publishing and makes editorial decisions for the paper as a whole.
• Managed relationships with other campus organizations and worked to communicate with university administrators.
• Made all final editorial decisions.
• Organized full transition to online content and social media.

Noted Adviser, The Wall Street Journal, June 2020 – May 2021 

• Was a member of the Wall Street Journal’s digital magazine as a consultant and adviser.
• Participated in live sessions with the WSJ Noted staff via Google Hangouts
• Provided feedback about issues and reporting topics.
• Earned a LinkedIn certificate for completion of the program.

Maryland-Delaware-DC Reese Cleghorn Editorial Intern, The Baltimore Sun, June 2020 – August 2020 

• Wrote 1-2 editorials per week for the Opinions page, including political columns, media criticism and Baltimore/Washington news critiques.
• Assisted in fact-checking, editing and reviewing Op Eds and letters to the editor
• Worked in a professional newsroom and met daily deadlines to create fast-paced and high-quality content.

Public Relations Intern, The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, January 2020 – May 2020 

• Commuted and worked in Washington DC to help pitch and place stories about Museum public programs, events, artifact donations, survivor research news, etc. in local, regional and national outlets.
• Aided in updating/creating lists of journalists and potential reporters who might cover our major fundraising events, Museum statements and other initiatives.
• Monitored media coverage for the Museum’s public programs in various cities Posted stories about the Museum from national media outlets on our internal website for Museum staff.
• Assisted communications team in overseeing documentary filming and broadcast interviews of Museum staff and survivor volunteers.
• Served as liaison between journalists and survivors.

Opinions Editor, The Retriever Weekly, University of Maryland, Baltimore County, February 2019 – May 2020 

• Oversaw staff of 3-4 students to ensure the best quality editorial articles were produced and worked with students to provide constructive and helpful feedback.
• Used InDesign for creating layout in order to publish a print newspaper every other week, and weekly online.
• Examined and disseminated the agenda for the newspaper by managing the editorial board.

Ambassador, Study Abroad Office, University of Maryland, Baltimore County, September 2019- December 2019 

• Worked as an ambassador sharing my experiences as a student at King’s College of London.
• Wrote about current events including Brexit, economic and climate crises and a terrorist attack that occurred.
• Wrote blog posts about KCL activities and life in London.
• Utilized University of Maryland, Baltimore County social media to engage students in an international experience.

Marketing Intern, Atwater’s, July 2019- September 2019 

• Aimed to solve the food insecurity crisis with advertisements of healthy food grown within urban gardens in Baltimore.
• Carried out digital marketing campaigns using Instagram, Facebook, and email and established brand presence on Pinterest.
• Practiced writing effective blogs and using SEO practices to boost website speed and Google rankings.

Communications Intern, Newseum, September 2018 – January 2019 

• Worked with educators in order to propel the mission of the Newseum to uphold the five freedoms of the First Amendment.
• Presented the Newseum online through scheduling social media posts, created using Canva and Photoshop.
• Extended the outreach of the Newseum and assisted in the planning of events, including the 2018 Teacher Open House, which provided educators with media literacy tools to empower themselves and their students.

Reporter, UMBC Alumni Magazine, University of Maryland, Baltimore County, May 2018 – December 2018 

• Worked as a features reporter to headline outstanding faculty and students at UMBC.
• Wrote extensive personal opinion pieces regarding topics including the Capital Gazette shooting in 2018.
• Received edits directly from the editor-in-chief of the magazine.

Digital Marketing Intern, Division of Professional Studies, University of Maryland, Baltimore County, January 2018 – August 2018 

• Worked in the Division of Professional Studies to analyze data analytics, create spreadsheets with technical information and monitored the professional program websites at UMBC.
• Utilized online tools and Adobe Suite in order to communicate about DPS events and programs and represented DPS on campus by setting up advertising.