Joao Feres Jr. is a political science professor at Instituto de Estudos Sociais e Políticos (IESP), of the State University of Rio de Janeiro (UERJ). Since 2005, Feres Jr. has been the coordinator of Grupo de Estudos Multidisciplinares da Acao Afirmativa (GEMAA), a research group that focuses on the study of affirmative action policies in higher education in Brazil and elsewhere, from a variety of disciplinary viewpoints. He also heads Laboratorio de Estudos da Midia e Esfera Publica (LEMEP), a research group dedicated to the analysis of the news media coverage in the fields of culture and politics. He has published extensively on affirmative action and race relations in Brazil and in the US, media and politics, and is now conducting a comprehensive study about the impact of affirmative action policies in Brazil's higher education public system on social inequalities.