Ovetz, Robert

Robert Frank Ovetz was born in New York City on January 8, 1967, to Arye Ovetz and Maxine (Ratzkin) Ovetz. His father Arye survived the Romanian Holocaust. Ovetz received a BA (1989), MA (1992), and PhD (1996) in sociology from the University of Texas at Austin and currently teaches political science at the College of Marin in California. He has taught at New College of California and the Art Institute of California-San Francisco and has published articles in a variety of academic, mainstream, and alternative publications.

In 1994, Ovetz worked as a freelance journalist for CNN and became the first English-speaking journalist to break the news of the Zapatista uprising in Chiapas, Mexico. While there, he provided the first interview in English with the infamous Subcommandante Marcos. An ocean conservation advocate, Ovetz has served as the Director of International Campaigns for Humane Society International and as Executive Director of the marine conservation organization Seaflow and worked with the Sea Turtle Restoration Project. In 2007, the Northern California Society of Professional Journalists awarded him the Freedom of Information James Madison Award, due to his defense of his student’s Cultural Studies magazine, Mute/Off, which the Art Institute of San Francisco censored in 2006. The institute fired Ovetz because of the incident. Additionally, he has been involved with many art, music, and film projects, including releasing two CDs with his minimalist ambient band, Ultrasound .

Sources:

Canada College. “Humanities and Social Sciences Division: Robert Ovetz” Canada College. http://www.canadacollege.edu/socialsciences/ovetz.html (accessed August 19, 2010.)

UTWatch.org. “Robert Ovetz Dissertation: Vita.” University of Texas at Austin. http://www.utwatch.org/archives/ovetz/ovetz_vita.html (accessed August 19, 2010).

From the guide to the Ovetz, Robert, Papers 99-119., 1990-1996, (Dolph Briscoe Center for American History, The University of Texas at Austin)