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Dissertation Defended, Dr. Jozie Nummi

Jozie NummiPlease join us in congratulating Dr. Jozie Nummi on her successful defense of her dissertation titled “21st Century Protests in Ferguson, Missouri: Protest Policing Strategy and Framing.” Dr. Nummi defended her dissertation on May 31st. In her dissertation Dr. Nummi used qualitative methods and triangulated data of police reports, nonprofit reports, news media coverage, and 176,000 tweets between August 9 and August 31, 2014.

Dr. Nummi finds significant discrepancies in documentation of use of force, use of military equipment, and framing of protests between constituencies. Government report documents lack of crowd-control training, unfamiliarity with national policies, and inconsistencies between incident command and police officer’s accounts of the protests. Furthermore, police officers and leadership’s framing on the use of military equipment and protests illustrate a commitment to protect residents and protesters. News media coverage and tweets document injuries and threat of or use of force that differ from police accounts. The framing in government documents and in news media coverage justifies use of force against protesters and delegitimizes protesters. These findings expand upon combinatorial models of police tactics documenting the growth of the militarization of policing by elite whites. Dr. Nummi’s findings raise fundamental questions on the transparency of law enforcement agencies and thus the ability of protesters and reporters to exercise their First-Amendment rights.

Dr. Nummi was mentored by Dr. Joe Feagin. Committee members included Dr. Sarah Gatson, Dr. Nancy Plankey-Videla and Dr. Amy Earhart (Department of English).

Congratulations, Dr. Nummi!