Jessica Retis is the Director of the School of Journalism at the University of Arizona. She is also the Director of the school's Bilingual Journalism M.A. She holds a Major in Communications (University of Lima, Peru), a Master's in Latin American Studies (National Autonomous University of Mexico), and a Ph.D. in Contemporary Latin America (Complutense University of Madrid, Spain). Prior to entering academia, Retis worked for more than two decades as a journalist in Peru, Mexico, and Spain in various print and broadcast media outlets. She has three decades of teaching experience in various universities in the United States, Spain, and Mexico. Her international academic training has led her to become a recognized scholar in the U.S. and abroad.
Dr. Retis maintains an active research agenda. For the last two decades, she has studied international migrations, transnational communities, and the news media in Europe (Spain and UK), North America (United States), Asia (Japan), and Latin America (Brazil and Peru). She places her findings within a larger theoretical, intersectional, and interdisciplinary framework, shedding light in particular on issues of territoriality, hybridization, and heterogeneity; the last introduces issues of gender, race, and class. Her areas of research include Latin America, international migration, diasporas, and transnational communities; cultural industries; ethnic media; diversity and the media; Latino media in Europe, North America, and Asia; bilingual journalism, journalism studies, and journalism education.