Nick Pernisco

Nick Pernisco is an author, educator, filmmaker, entrepreneur, and disability advocate whose work sits at the intersection of storytelling, technology, education, and personal resilience. Over a career spanning more than two decades, he has worked across media production, higher education, publishing, and technology, using each of those fields to explore how information and storytelling can help people better understand both the world around them and the challenges they face.

A longtime media professor, Pernisco has taught subjects ranging from media literacy and media studies to film, television, and digital communication. He is the author of Media Literacy: An Essential Guide to Critical Thinking Skills for Our Complex Digital World, now in its third edition, a comprehensive textbook examining how people can critically understand and navigate an increasingly complex media environment. His writing has also expanded into personal development with Awaken Your Inner Warrior: Developing the Mindset for Overcoming Life’s Great Challenges, which applies lessons about perseverance, strategy, and purpose to challenges extending far beyond illness.

Pernisco’s life and work took an unexpected direction when he was diagnosed with young-onset Parkinson’s disease in 2011 at the age of 33. Rather than allowing the diagnosis to define the boundaries of his life, he eventually made his experience the foundation for a new body of work devoted to education, advocacy, and empowerment. His Parkinson’s Warrior series includes Fighting Back and Taking Control, Deep Brain Stimulation: A Journey to Relief, Guide to Supplements, Natural Therapies, and Medical Marijuana, and Mental Health. Drawing on both research and firsthand experience, the books seek to give people living with Parkinson’s practical information while encouraging them to remain active participants in their own lives and care.

That mission has grown well beyond publishing. Pernisco created Parkinson’s Warrior, an advocacy and wellness community encompassing educational resources, online content, social media, and a large community of people affected by Parkinson’s. He also helped establish Connected Neurosciences, a technology company focused on software for people living with neurological conditions. Its work includes Parkinson’s LifeKit, a personal tracking platform designed to help people monitor their symptoms, medications, activities, and changes over time. He has also served within the Parkinson’s advocacy community, including service associated with the American Parkinson Disease Association.

Pernisco is also a filmmaker and screenwriter. Raised in Santa Monica, California, surrounded by the film industry, he studied film and later earned a master’s degree in screenwriting. After producing documentaries, television programs, and educational media earlier in his career, he returned to narrative filmmaking years after his Parkinson’s diagnosis. His recent films include Love Letter, Recycled Love, and A Room with a View, a drama inspired in part by his experiences with young-onset Parkinson’s.

Across his books, films, teaching, technology projects, and advocacy, Pernisco’s work is connected by a recurring idea: difficult circumstances may change the course of a life without determining its possibilities. Whether he is writing about media literacy, living with Parkinson’s, developing technology, teaching students, or telling fictional stories on film, his work encourages people to approach the world with curiosity, critical thinking, resilience, and a determination to remain engaged in their own lives.