Gitlin is a professor in the departments of culture and communication, journalism, and sociology at New York University. He has published seven books, including The Sixties: Years of Hope, Days of Rage, Inside Prime Time, and a novel, The Murder of Albert Einstein. Gitlin is a columnist for the New York Observer and has also published his writing in publications such as The New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Washington Post, and Boston Globe. He is on the editorial board of Dissent and a contributing editor of the academic journals Theory and Society and Critical Studies in Mass Communication. Gitlin's most recent book The Twilight of Common Dreams: Why America is Wracked by the Culture Wars is an examination of how the fundamental problems of inequality and racial discrimination are often overlooked by activists of identity politics who would rather fight against perceived symbols of insult. The book was a selection of the Book of the Month and History Book Clubs.
Gitlin holds degrees from Harvard University, the University of Michigan, and the University of California at Berkeley. He was the third president of Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) in 1963-64, and in 1964-65, the coordinator of the SDS Peace Research and Education Project, during which time he helped organize the first national demonstration against the Vietnam War. In 1968-69, Gitlin was an editor and writer for the San Francisco Express Times. Gitlin served as a professor of sociology and director of the mass communications program at the University of California at Berkeley for sixteen years, after which he accepted his current post as a professor at New York University.
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