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Cupid Jamila and Joell Myescha, "Who's in the Room? A Guide to Public Relations from the Black Professional Perspective" (Kendall Hunt, 2025)
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A
Welcome to the New Books Network.
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B
Hello everyone, and welcome to the New Books Network. I'm your host, Regan Gillum, and today I'm talking to Dr. Jameela Cupid and Maisha Joel, who are authors of the book who's in the A Guide to Public Relations from the Black Professional Perspective, published by Kendall Hunt Publishing Company. Welcome to the podcast, Jamila and Maisha.
- [01:55]
D
Thank you. It's wonderful to be here.
- [01:58]
B
Yeah, thank you so much. I'm really excited to talk with you both about your book. Your book who's in the Room? A Guide to Public Relations from the Black Professional Perspective. Really is this comprehensive guide for students or new workers in public relations. And then you also offer advice, for example, to organizations as well, on how to become more inclusive. Just to say a little bit about the book, which we'll get into, but to start, I wanted to ask you both about yourselves and how you came to write this book, who's in the Room?
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D
So I am a professor of public relations, assistant professor of Public Relations at Pepperdine University. My research background has been in international intercultural and multicultural public relations and communications. So I have been specifically looking at the experiences of public relations professionals over the years. And one of the things for me personally, when I was studying in grad school, I struggled to find enough information or figure out where to find information about the experiences, the work, the campaigns, the contributions and impact that black PR professionals, practitioners had made in the field, and also just learning about work surrounding black audiences. So I think at some point I decided, you know, I would want to write and document, research and document what actually has transpired over the years, what impact these practitioners have made and be able to bring that to both the academic side and the industry side.
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C
And I'm Aisha Joel. I'm a producer and a publicist. I own my own company called Moore Street Media Communications. I've been working in the industry for about 20 plus years. And unlike Jamila, I didn't actually go to school for communications. I was an international relations major. So close, close to, but not on the mark of communications. And I experienced a lot of the topics that we covered in the book in real time in my day to day, from the microaggressions, the macroaggressions being tokenized, et cetera. And so when Jameela came to me with the book already on the way, I was eager to jump aboard and share my experience from, from the corporate side of things.
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B
Great, thank you so much. This is great. I love it. It sounds like you both wrote the book that you both needed, which it also sounds like will be so much so helpful for other people who read it as well. And so I wanted to just begin with the question of what is public relations? And so many people confuse it with marketing. But public relations or PR is its own distinct field, as you all established in the beginning of the book. And so I wondered if you could describe public relations roles and responsibilities.
- [05:17]
C
Yeah, absolutely. I could start that off and then Jameela, please feel free to jump in. And to your point, Regan, people often get PR confused because honestly, from the outside looking in, there are a bunch of different roles right within one position. PR touches on marketing, communications, branding, journalism, crisis management, even production. So it's easy for folks to blur the lines. I would say succinctly, public relations is the management, or rather the strategic management of how organizations are perceived by the public. So that focuses on building trust, credibility, long term relationships. It's not about selling the product as much as it is selling the idea around the product, shaping the reputation. Whereas marketing is more so about driving sales. PR is about shaping the sentiment. So in pr, the questions that come up are more so around how does the world see us, believe us, talk about us? You know, when PR is strong, marketing, recruiting, fundraising and partnerships all get a little bit easier because that foundational trust is already in place. And then I could quickly touch on roles and responsibilities and then, Jamil, if you have anything to add, please feel free to reputation management. Like I discussed, monitoring public sentiment, media relations, building relationships with journalists, editors, producers. That also includes pitching stories, preparing spokespeople, et cetera, messaging development, crafting clear narratives, key messages, talking points, crisis communication, right. Responding quickly and transparently to issues as they arise, internal communications, which is a big thing when we talk about DEI or deia, stakeholder engagements, the communities you're impacting, the policymakers, and then my big favorite, storytelling, highlighting the wins, the impact, the innovation through press, messaging, releases, events and the like.
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B
Jamila, do you have anything to add?
- [07:24]
C
Sure.
- [07:25]
D
The only thing I would add is that everything Maisha mentioned we use to build relationships. We try to build relationships with all of our audiences and partners that are going to be as transparent as possible. And really more so are more importantly truthful, honest, so that we can build trust. And so if that means trust with donors, trust with customers, but supporters, followers, right, so that they can feel comfortable becoming loyal to the organization or the brand or the person and wanting to continue to engage. I think in the big picture, we do hope that that translates into more sales, right? Increased revenue. But the goal is really connecting with people, even when we're looking at media, right, like media professionals and making sure that we have good relationships and we're well connected with them. So that information that we push out is actually getting picked up, covered, and that they're speaking about our organization in the best light.
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B
So you locate the history of public relations to ancient Greece and other historical times, but you also view PR in black history. And I never thought about Ida B. Wells or the civil rights movement through the lens of pr. So I really appreciated that perspective. And so how was public relations enacted in the black past?
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D
So it's actually, it's really interesting. I think that what Ida B. Wells, a lot of times people kind of overlooked her in the PR field initially because she was a journalist, right, by trade. But when she started to do the anti lynching campaign work, that is where we see her really like shift into a more persuasive, strategic manner of covering what's going on and she's raising awareness and she wants people to understand that what's happening is wrong. Right. And she starts to serve as an advocate in a way. All right, not just like some, like providing information objectively, but serving in an advocate, as an advocate to say this is what's going on, you know, near you, maybe locally and nationally. And these are the things that you need to look out for. And we want to stop it. Right. Just the fact that it is an anti lynching campaign. So she has taken a stance in that. And that is inherently PR work. And so looking at where much of the work that black public relations professionals did, we see that in the earlier days of modern pr, it is focused in human rights, civil rights. We see Maggie Lena Walker where she is advocating for the poor and the elderly, those who are sick and shut in. We see Bayard Reston who built out specific, like specialized strategies in public relations around the civil rights movement. Right. But we have great range, like if you look at say Ophiel Dukes or Ines Kaiser or Joseph RNA Baker, like you will see that they were doing public relations work for big business corporations like banks and industry, major industries. Coca Cola. Right. Like big brands that we still know today. And then we also have those who worked it, who work in and worked in public affairs. So coming across like J. Terry Edmonds and Kristin Clark Taylor and of course Karine Jean Pierre, who was the last, the, the previous press secretary for the White House, we see that there are black PR professionals across all of these different industries and sectors. And they have been doing the work, they've been doing excellent work. They've been making huge impacts in the society and the culture. And sometimes it's just been, oftentimes it's been overlooked. Right. They've. They've been kind of footnoted or completely excluded.
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B
Yeah, I love that perspective of re. Viewing black history through a different lens, through a lens that I wouldn't have previously thought of pr. But then, and then also bringing in these other figures who, who have been, as you said, overlooked in the, in the industry. And then you also bring this other perspective to the area of diversity, equity, inclusion, or dei, which has come under a lot of scrutiny as of late. But you add to the DEI framework the idea of idea or idea, and this stands for inclusion, diversity, equity and access. And so I wondered if you could describe this framework that you're contributing.
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D
Sure. So really we're looking at the ways that, that of course just being able to be more inclusive, considering how you go about getting the best professionals, right. Hiring the best employees, making sure you are providing the right opportunities for them, access to the Best opportunities and training, getting them in the best position to be successful, and then moving up the ladder or into the spaces that they are best suited for and that they are trained for and that they would not just excel in personally, but also serve the organization best. Right? So I think when we first started out, we were like, oh, yeah, you know, dei. Everyone talks about dei. And as we were going, we were like, you know, we don't know that we. DEI itself or even IDEA is the most important thing. I think we came to the understanding that this is really a structure. If you are like, I don't know where to start. I can identify that our organization is not built out in such a way that it is organically inclusive, then this is something, a framework that can help us to get started and set things up, lay a foundation. However, the goal is always that the organization, like you, would want the decision makers and the gatekeepers to be mindful, consider it decent, right, humane. And so you would want to see that organically it will either develop on its own, and if it's not, then you can build on a framework like this and eventually get to a point where it is happening naturally. It should be that you cast a wide net, that you go searching for the best talent from different backgrounds and experiences, understanding that your audiences are not homogeneous. Right. So then the makeup of your public relations teams and agencies and departments should reflect that as well. That there would be so many different experiences, different voices, understandings, cultures, representations that would be necessary in order to do the work with the highest, the greatest intent and at the highest caliber.
- [15:43]
C
And if I can also jump in and just add to your point, we all well know that DEI or deia or ideas under scrutiny. But the data, we might get into it a little bit later is showing still to date, as of this year, that Americans in particular still expect dei. Deia, however you want to phrase it. Americans across the board, not just one race or ethnicity, still expect dei. But of course, there's still a disconnect between what they expect and how organizations are adjusting to that. So our idea, regardless of what the scrutiny and the critiques were, was that we were still going to supply this framework regardless because of those facts.
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B
Yeah, no, absolutely, absolutely. And this kind of leads to the next question then, because black professionals do face significant challenges and barriers in the field. And in reading your book, I was struck by. You have many examples in the book of different people's voices. But on page 159, you interview Nayri Wright, who mentions that she kept a journal of Microaggressions that she faced over 25 years. I mean, and that. That example just really stuck with me. And so I wondered, what are some of the barriers and challenger challenges that black PR professionals face?
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D
There are a lot, I would say we were able to kind of categorize them, kind of determine some patterns or themes that came out. So implicit bias, right? Like, I think is probably the key barrier where people are walking around with ideas in their mind. Stereotypes, maybe that they're. They learned early on or over time. And so they have this idea of what it means to be black, especially black in America, but in other countries, too. Assumptions about what your experience is, what your intention is, and a disconnect from, you know, like something that you may do or the way you may express yourself, that may be cultural, but because they have never encountered it or do not understand it, then an assumption about who you are and what that means about you and. And your intelligence, right? Instead of understanding, it's just a difference between the two people. So I think the implicit bias is one of the key ways that we see it. Show up resources, right? Like, how are resources allocated? And I think we've seen in more recent years this idea of diversity fatigue coming up when people are like, oh, they hear about DEI all the time. Everyone's talking about diversity. Why do we have to focus on this? Why? Why can't it just happen? Why can't we just let it happen naturally? And I'd like to point out that when we asked for it to happen naturally many moons ago, it did not. Right? And the effort was not there to make it part of the culture of different organizations, different workspaces. So. So then people are like, okay, we need something. We need something in place that will. Like a framework that will help, you know, to start guiding this. And I think that is an important point to pull out, because I don't think most people want to have to keep having the diversity conversation. But if everyone goes, I'm tired of it, then it becomes easy to say, well, we could stop doing it. We could put the funds to something else. We could put our resources to another project or initiative that has a completely different focus. And so then what happens in terms of continuing to cultivate environments that are supportive, inclusive, where people feel like they're heard, seen, they belong, and that the work they're doing matters, right? And also that they're supported and they can grow in those roles. No one wants to enter these careers or these jobs and find that they immediately come to a standstill and just have impeded growth across the board. So I think those are some of the main ways that it shows up and then lack of accommodations at think that is also something to consider. A lot of times we can see where if someone has been excluded or at a disadvantage in other areas of society, not that we're always necessarily great about it, but we can understand that they would need additional support or we would need to make things more equitable, right that everybody is getting what they need in order to be set up for success. And then when it comes to specific groups then suddenly we don't understand and it sounds like they're just complaining and it's frustrating and it's annoying and they're too demanding and then we don't want to have to do that. We feel forced to do this work becomes the sentiment and really what needs to happen is greater understanding, a willingness to learn, expand and again be more inclusive of different experiences, different people from different backgrounds. Great.
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B
Thank you for that.
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Rules and restrictions may apply and so in chapter six you discuss the effects on black professionals mental health in these environments. Because often people are working in these Environments where they're devalued, they're overlooked, they're neglected. And I thought this was really important to talk about the mental health, because I think that's something you hear about less. So I think as a professional, or if you're actually going through this, and then you might respond to the environment thinking, like, well, I just got to work harder, or, you know, I just have to just be. Be better or. Or it's me, or something like that. And so, you know, and so we don't talk about like, but actually, like, this is eroding your mental health. And so I wondered if you could also speak to this, the mental health aspect of it or the ways that people's mental health suffers in these. In these environments.
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C
Yeah, we can talk ad nauseam about it, so I'll try to be succinct. But to your point, working in an environment, whether you're black or of any race, feeling undervalued or overlooked can take a real psychological toll. That could show up in several ways. And unfortunately, as we know, this disproportionately affects black people and people of color in general. So I'll just touch on a few of the ways in which that could show up. First, there's chronic burnout. We mentioned Lisa Osborne Ross, who was one of the first black women to lead a major PR firm. She mentioned going through burnout around the height of 2020. And that's someone who's at the very top of her game and was experiencing that. You know, when you're constantly battling microaggressions or having your expertise second guess, your nervous system takes a real hit. It takes a real hit. You know, what we're also seeing from all of the people we spoke to in our research is emotional exhaustion. From being in spaces that don't fully see you. It chips away at your confidence, confidence, your sense of belonging, your belief that workplace is a safe space for you. You know, which over time leads to anxiety, depression, and even physical symptoms. As we know, the body keeps the score, right? There's also the internalized pressure. When you're told, directly or indirectly, that you have to be twice as good, that thing that all of us carry, you start to create these unrealistic standards for yourself, even if you're not aware of it. So instead of recognizing the environment as the problem, as you pointed out, Reagan, people start to look to themselves. They start to blame themselves. That shows up as perfectionism, overworking. You're always the one at the office late at night, right? Withdrawing or even Leaving the industry altogether. And I kind of touched on that at the very top when I spoke about my background. I left my firm because I was prepared to leave the industry altogether, truth be told. And I'm just one of many examples. And then Jamila also spoke about the structural inequities and how that can create mental strain. One of the things we also find in our research, but we know to be true through our lived experience is black owned PR firms are often pushed to the fray, right. They're often forced to stay small. They're left out of the long term contracts, boxed into these niche categories which, which creates financial stress, which then of course leads to mental health instability and other issues. So it's really unfortunate because to your point, we don't speak about it often because it's an invisible. It's a silent killer. It goes unchecked, unregistered by both parties. Right. And that's something that probably, I would say, Juma, correct me if I'm wrong, almost everybody we interviewed had experiences at one point in their career or is consistently experiencing in some form or fashion. So we did feel it was very important to address this. And I'm sure we could have wrote a whole nother book just to talk about this one topic.
- [27:06]
D
So, yeah, I think we both experienced it. And so we kind of knew to expect. We didn't want to impose our experiences on. Right. Like our interviewees, but we just kind of knew it was coming because when we talked we were like, this is so. Not just for us, but for so many black practitioners. We knew it was common. It was too common. And like Maisha, you know, I worked in the industry, I worked in public, in the field of public relations for several years. And then I got to a point where it was like, hmm, you know, I, I got the opportunity to start teaching and I was like, well, honestly, out of the two, even though I had dedicated so much to working in public relations in like practically, it was like, I think I would just enjoy teaching so much more. Even though I love the work, the treatment that you receive is just sometimes unbearable until you find yourself actually leaving. And so that's. That happened with me as well and so many others, you know, yeah, it's.
- [28:25]
B
So important to hear those, hear those experiences. And as you said, you could talk about the experiences ad nauseam. And that's because the book, it really does an excellent job of like breaking everything down, going into these examples and explaining it as well. And so you. And as I said, you know, each chapter gives us the like the mental health issues, the barriers and things like that. So, you know, you all do an excellent job. I know the reader is going to gain so much from sitting down and, you know, taking in what it is that, that you all are communicating. And then the book also, you know, lays out these challenges and it affects on people, its effects on people. But there's also these best practices that can, that organizations and companies can implement. And so what are some of the ways that companies or workplaces can address these issues? Through policies or practices?
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C
Yeah, I can jump in and start this one. As I was mentioning earlier, there was a study that we came across recently from Gallup Business, and I'm just going to read it as it is. 69% of US adults say it's extremely or somewhat important, important for businesses to promote DEI, the lowest level since tracking began in 2022. However, only 35% say businesses are doing an excellent or good job at it. Another new low. So we sat with that and dissected that and tried to analyze what that is showing us. And what we can ascertain is there's clearly a lag time between awareness, policy and lived culture. You know, DEI awareness has accelerated for sure. Everyone is aware of it. But organizational culture, as we mentioned earlier, is moving at an exponentially slower pace. Right. What else we can find from that data is that it's not enough to say you care about dei. There's a lot of performance going on, but employees need to see it in action. It needs to show up in meetings and hiring and the daily culture. The data also implies that there's not a strong connection between DEI initiatives and real accountability metrics. Or if there are, employees aren't being made aware of them. And also what counts as quote, unquote, doing a good job may be shifting as employees are now expecting more nuanced aspects like intersectional equity, accessibility, neurodivergence, inclusion, pay, transparency. The list goes on and on. And so we go through a series of best practices, this throughout the whole book. But I think it's important for organizations to understand this is a living, breathing, moving practice. It's not something that you can isolate to hr. It's something that you have to have an overall, an encompassing awareness of. Right. So in short, I could say cultural change moves slower than public awareness. It's important as an organization to understand that give yourself grace, but to also set your team up for success, to be aware that people can tell the difference between these performative gestures. Hiring the black or brown person versus giving them the Tools to succeed in that space. Right. Clear and consistent leadership, communication. The fish rots from the head, as they say. Leadership needs to be on board with this and communicating that. And then finally, like I said before the bar, for quote, unquote, good, DEIA is shifting. And so even though you may have covered one topic, this is an evolving thing. And so there's other considerations to keep in mind. So, Jamila, if you want to jump in and add anything, but.
- [32:17]
D
Yeah, I mean, I would say one of the things that we kept seeing that the research, in more than one study, multiple studies showing, was that black people actually do not seem to. Black professionals do not seem to benefit from IDEA or DEI all that much compared to other groups. The top group is actually white female professionals, especially in public relations, where they are already the majority of the workers in the field. So I think being able to be more expansive. Right. Is one of the things we realize that your efforts, whether you are doing diversity, idea, dei, whatever you want to call it, you know, you're looking at just building community. You want it to happen naturally or organically, or you want structure that will set you up for success in it and hold yourself accountable, be able to evaluate, however you structure this or whatever approach. Approach you take, be more expansive in the idea of what it means to include more people from different walks of life. We have, of course, we. In our book, we are focused on black PR professionals, but we're looking at, you know, this is the issue across industries. We're looking at it as. This is an issue across demographics, you know, persons with disabilities, Native American people, like the people of different religions. Right. Like, there are all of these different ways that diversity really shows up or could show up that we're not doing a great job of in our field. And so being able to take a closer look at that and what structural issues may serve as challenges or barriers to actually cultivating that would be ideal. And then, you know, being intentional about how you approach it.
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C
And lastly, I'll say doing all of this to bring a full circle will ensure there's mental safety.
- [34:35]
D
Right.
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C
That your employees are able to thrive in that space.
- [34:39]
D
Yeah.
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B
So the book is very. It's very meticulous in its citations, its statistics, its definitions, and in its personal experiences. And I can even hear it echoed through the interview where you both, you know, you had. You have your. Your statistics, the studies, etc. And so I wondered, how did you go about doing the research for the book? Oh, boy. Oh, boy.
- [35:05]
D
So, I mean, this took years, a few years. We of course, you know, searched. We scoured the Internet. We had research assistants help us with, like, trying to find some initial information, trying to find people who may be even interested in talking with us. And we also started digging through, like, what was available from different organizations, research in the industry, going through the databases and finding research and articles and so on the academic side as well, of course. And then there was real heavy lifting, like, after some of those initial searches and gathering information, data, you know, actually going on site, making connections, building relationships, and going on site to the National Museum of African American History and Culture, going to the Museum of Public Relations, the Library of Congress, just the Schomburg Center. So trying to find the people, the names, the experiences, the campaigns that we know had to have existed, we heard about, but we need the evidence we need to document. So it was. It was time consuming. It was quite. It was intricate in going through all, like, everything and kind of sorting, sorting it and making sense of it and then organizing it. And we know that there's still more, right. We hope that even in talking about the book, that it brings out other stories and mention of other people that may have been overlooked. One of the things that I realized, I was at the National Museum of African American History and Culture, and the librarians there are phenomenal. And so they pulled books for me based off of what we had, you know, told them that we would need and what we're looking for in the work we're doing. And I sat there combing through books, and they had some that I had as textbooks when I was in school, but then they had some that I'd never heard, I've never seen, even after doing so much research. And one of them stood out. It was by Kristin Clark Taylor. And I was like, I've never heard of her. How could I have never heard of her? I was like, who is she? And so I open her book and I start reading, and I'm like, everyone should know who this is. This is the first media director of White House, the first African American female media director of the White House that we've ever had. And I've never heard her name, right? And so, and. And even searching through databases, searching online, she didn't just automatically pop up. Like, I had to go digging for her. So there was quite a lot of digging. There was extensive research, but I think it was worth it. I think we found much of what we were looking for and were able to set things up so that there's a platform for these different voices, these different experiences, and to really get the conversation going. Right. That the discourse would now be more informed and enriched and we would be able to find what we're looking for and also be inspired. Right.
- [39:03]
B
And so I wanted to ask also about co authorship. How did you write the book as a team? Like, how did you divide the work up, make decisions, even draft chapters, you know, whatever you want to share? I actually don't have a lot. I don't get to interview dual authors very often. So anything you want to share about how you went about, like, you know, putting this project together as two authors, that would be, I think, great for the listeners to hear.
- [39:34]
D
Well, I would love to just say it was fun. I mean, until it got tedious and challenging. It was actually really fun to start. We, and I feel like we don't often get to talk about it in that way that we actually set up time, held space for each other, connected, worked through things that we were, we were experiencing in our own work, challenges that we had, and then also being able to sit and, you know, strategize. Like, we created our outline, we figured out what we want to cover in each of these sections and in each chapter. And then we started to start. We started with the chapters that we knew we both would want to contribute probably equally to, and then from there divided the chapters that we felt like each of us had more. More experience or more to say or even maybe more passionate about. Right. We both have industry experience, we're both trained, so. But it looks very different for each of us. And so we kind of took on chapters based off of that understanding of the differences in our experience and our backgrounds. And then once someone, one of us would write a chapter, the other would, you know, afterwards, after everything, take a look and see what could be added or improved or maybe even trying to figure out if we should remove anything.
- [41:16]
C
I would also jump in and just share that the tea, the real tea behind some of it, which is that it was great to have a partner in this because I have to say, hats off to anyone who listens to this, who's written any kind of a book for any reason. A hats off to you. It is a true, true labor of love. And frankly, you know, as we were writing the book, we were experiencing still some of these things we were writing about in real time. So it was interesting because it was like, bittersweet. It was cathartic in a way. Some of our writing sessions, honestly, were just the two of us holding space for each other so that we could show up to the next writing session. And actually write. And so that's just a little bit like of the real, real behind the scenes. And some of it was just, yeah, very emotionally taxing and ultimately rewarding and why we call it a labor of love.
- [42:21]
D
Right.
- [42:22]
C
But that was, that was part of the experience as well, for sure.
- [42:27]
B
That sounds both nice and then also like generative and as you said, like a release as well. And then in the book you make this big push for mentoring Black PR professionals. And then, you know, you also, in the book, I just wanted to give a plug for you have these, you know, you talk about public relations campaigns, networking profiles of successful black PR professionals. I was thinking that the book itself is kind of this mentoring intervention in the field of pr. But I also wondered what, what you wanted readers to take from the book.
- [43:02]
D
Well, I, I could start. I, I feel like Naisha also has her perspective on it as well. But I think that, I think we really aimed for everyone across different levels and points in their careers, right. To be able to use the book. And so we want for the students who read the book to be able to use it in such a way that they can start. It does feel hopefully like mentorship for them. And they kind of get some guidance and understand some of the things that they would need to do to guide their path, direct their path, and get to the career that they want to build out for themselves. We had hoped that faculty would be able to use it so that they could actually guide instruction, help students, have, like, viable examples, be able to include the, Be more inclusive in the history that they teach, provide greater context for some of the examples that they pull out historically and currently, and think about all of the different people or groups that are involved. And I think we would like to, for those who are building careers in the industry, those who are at entry level, those are mid career, those who are at the top, at the height of their career, executives. And those who are kind of like now winding down and are like, okay, you know, but they're still perhaps in the position of decision makers or gatekeepers, right? So all of those being able to say, hey, this gives me a sense of direction on how I can set myself up in the best way. And also for those who are looking at it as, hey, I have all of these different teams underneath me and I am trying to figure out how to help them to be the most effective and most successful in the work they're doing, of course, with consideration of their own careers, but also what they produce for the organization. Right. As representatives of the organization. So I think we want that vastness that catches all of public relations professionals. And we are hoping that it's not something that people look at and go, oh, it says black on the book cover. So it's for black people that they would understand that this is an opportunity for everyone to start to pull in more. More information, more. Be more inclusive, be more expansive, and look at the greater occurrences, the greater culture, the greater experience that we have in our field.
- [46:19]
C
Yeah, you hit the nail on the head. May just be echoing your sentiments, but I'll say since succinctly, I definitely hope it helps to diversify the pipeline. I think that's a crucial one, not just for pr, but industry, period. I really hope that now that it's been written, these voices and names will be remembered and documented in history, including the current practitioners that we interviewed and referenced throughout the book. And then lastly, to Jamila's point, we people of color, we know these problems. We see ourselves in some of the information we share. But I really do hope those organizations that may be struggling with diversity don't have a lot of diversity and leadership can use this as a tool and not let their guilt or shame get in the way of taking action. And we were intentional about writing this book in a way that was honest but wasn't about blame. And so I hope that that is what readers of various backgrounds take away from the book.
- [47:29]
B
And I'm sure that people will gain so much as they read this book and sit with it and sit with all of the perspectives that you bring. And so I was wondering for the last question, what are you now that who. Who's in the room is out in the world, what are you either working on next or, you know, what projects do you have going on, or are you thinking about working on in the future?
- [48:00]
D
Well, I could say that, Reagan, you know, my work has an international scope, and I really am looking to get back to that. So looking at which country is next that I want to look at in terms of public relations professionals and their experiences. And I think. I think that I will continue to kind of go back and forth like between what's going on here. I care very much about what's happening with our people here and what's happening with our people across the Diaspora. And so I think that my. My work, when my next project already that I'm working on is looking to expand back into Caribbean and South America. And just looking at what public relations looks like there in those spaces.
- [48:50]
C
Again, you know, for me to work from the same cloth for me, as I mentioned earlier, I'm a publicist and a producer. And so concurrently, somehow, towards the tail end of writing this book, I started working on a docu series in Mexico. I was living there for three years. I just came back to the the States end of July. The docuseries is called Black Expat Stories, and it's an ethnographic series chronicling what folks are calling the third great migration of people of color leaving Western civilizations for other places. And so our goal is to, you know, bear witness to document this moment in history that we're experiencing in real time and make sure those voices are heard and reflected. So I'm really excited about that project.
- [49:40]
B
Okay. That is amazing. I can't wait to see both of these projects and everything, what comes of this work. So that's really great. So thank you so much for telling us about your book. I'm Regan Gillum. I've been speaking with Dr. Jameela Cupid and Maisha Joel, who are authors of the book book who's in the Room? A Guide to Public Relations from the Black Professional Perspective, published by Kendall Hunt Publishing Company. I want to thank you both for writing this book and for sharing it with us on the podcast.
- [50:13]
D
Thank you so much, Regan, for having us. This was delightful. We appreciate you.
- [50:19]
C
Thank you. Yes, it's truly, truly a pleasure. We appreciate it.
- [50:39]
A
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C
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A
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- [50:58]
C
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B
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- [51:06]
D
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