Professor Martin Lang ’95 of the Department of Communication Studies at Gustavus, on his background, paths to Gustavus both as student and faculty member, a not-so-wonderful year as an M.A. student in English at Michigan State University, how media shapes our understanding of ourselves and one another, his award-winning incorporation of civic engagement into his teaching, two documentaries he has coproduced titled (Mid)West of Somalia and Farming Forward, a project linked to one of his courses on U.S. print media coverage of systemic racism in policing, the transformative impact                                                                                                                                             of a semester-abroad program in India he directed, and why studying communication matters.