6:00pm Wednesday, March 25, 2009 @ The Boston Athenæum, 10 1/2 Beacon Street

For more than two centuries, America’s newspapers have been the public’s primary source of information about our government.  As circulation and staffs shrink, there are significant implications for democracy, which is dependent upon an informed public.

Bruce D. Butterfield is an assistant professor and professional journalist in residence in the Department of Communication and Journalism at Suffolk University.  Butterfield spent 16 years as a staff writer for the Boston Globe, where he covered national labor issues and was an investigative reporter on the newspaper’s Spotlight Team.  A two-time Pulitzer Prize finalist, he has won numerous major awards for his reporting.

Cullen Murphy is the editor-at-large of Vanity Fair magazine and was, for two decades, the managing editor of the Atlantic Monthly.  Murphy’s articles and essays have appeared in many publications, including the Atlantic Monthly, Harper’s, the New Republic, Slate, the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, the Boston Globe, American Heritage, and Smithsonian. His most recent book is Are We Rome?, which he wrote, in part, at the Boston Athenæum.

Robert E. Rosenthal is chair of the Department of Communication and Journalism at Suffolk University.  He is an international consultant specializing in strategic communication, with a core emphasis on institutions subject to government regulation.  A specialist in the field of political communication, Rosenthal is a frequent guest on radio talk shows and television newscasts.

Joan Vennochi writes regularly about national and local politics for the Boston Globe, and also covers issues relating to business, law, and culture.  She began her career at the paper as a researcher on the Spotlight Team, the newspaper’s investigative unit, and shared in a Pulitzer Prize awarded to the team for local investigative reporting.

Reservations will be accepted starting March 12 at 617-720-7600.