Former Prof. Ann Burlin Passes Away

March 4, 2013

Ann E. Burlin, who taught communication at DePauw University in the spring of 1981, died February 23 in Silver Spring, Maryland. She was 59 years old.

Born February 4, 1954 in Frankfurt, Germany, Burlin did her undergraduate studies in speech communication and economics at the University of Virginia and served as the first female editor-in-chief of Corks & Curls, the school's yearbook. She was awarded a graduate fellowship to Indiana University in Bloomington in 1975, where she completed her M.A. degree in communication and served as a graduate teaching assistant.

She came to DePauw in 1981 to take over the communication classes of Ralph Knupp, who resigned in February of that year. Larry Sutton, who chaired the communication department at the time, remembers Burlin as "a very good teacher." She also taught in the communication departments at Stetson University, Stonehill College, The College of Wooster and Berea College. Her scholarship focused on American public address and the rhetoric of economic policy.

After nearly two decades of teaching, Burlin joined Discovery Communications in Washington, D.C., as a photo editor and librarian. She also enrolled part-time at the University of Maryland, earning her Masters of Library Science Degree in 2008.

An online obituary may be accessed here.

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