- Communication and Media Research Institute
About me
I am currently a Senior Lecturer at the School of Media and Communication, teaching media theory and practice modules for undergraduate and postgraduate students. I am also the Course Leader for the BA Digital Media and the Leader for the Cultural Identities and Social Change theme at the Communication and Media Research Institute (CAMRI).
Prior to joining Westminster, I worked as a Tenured Assistant Professor at the Department of Social Communication and at the Postgraduate Programme in Media and Everyday Life of Federal Fluminense University (UFF) in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
I hold a Ph.D. in Media Studies from the University of Westminster. My doctoral research focused on ethnographic approaches to community media uses in Brazilian favelas. I earned a MA in Communication and Society from the University of Oregon, in the US, as a Fulbright scholar. I also completed a postdoc at Royal Holloway University of London, working on a project on multiplatforming public service broadcasting in the UK, funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC). Between 2018 and 2019, I acted as a Co-Investigator for the e-Voices Redressing Marginality project, an AHRC-funded networking grant that analysed different uses of digital media to fight marginalisation in countries of the Global South.
In July 2020, I was elected Vice President of the International Association for Media and Communication Research (IAMCR) and, prior to that, I was the Co-Chair for the association’s Community Communication and Alternative Media Section for four years (2016-2020). In addition to my academic career, I have extensive experience as an advertising copywriter, working for advertising agencies and political campaigns in various parts of Brazil.
I supervise doctoral students on topics such as everyday feminist digital activism in China; news making, social security and media ownership in Chile; animation as tool to analyse South-to-South diasporic connections between Brazil and Nigeria and evolutions in human rights witnessing, advocacy and activism using video and social media. My methodological expertise lies in qualitative methods, ethnographic research (online and offline), creative methods, and participatory action research.
Teaching
I am currently the Module Leader for Creative Industries and Professional Life; Transforming Audiences (Undergraduate - BA Digital Media) and Major Project (MA Data Culture and Society). I also teach on several other undergraduate modules, such as Digital Media and Society, Diversity and the Media, and postgraduate modules, such as Strategic Campaign Communication (for the MA in Media, Campaigning and Social Change) and Data and Society Research and Methods (for the MA in Data, Culture and Society).
Prior to joining Westminster, I taught several undergraduate and postgraduate modules on digital media, creative advertising, political communication, research methodologies, and digital activism and human rights. I have extensive experience working in the Higjer Education Sector in the UK (Westminster, Bournemouth, Royal Holloway, among other universities), the US (UC Berkeley and University of Oregon) and Brazil (Federal Fluminense University).
Research
My current research focuses on digital media activism and artivism (art + activism) as tools for social change in the Global South and on creative and participatory approaches to analysing marginalised communities’ information security needs and everyday engagements with artificial intelligence (AI). My book Media Activism, Artivism and the Fight Against Marginalisation in the Global South was published by Routledge in 2023. I have also published in leading academic journals and contributed to several edited book collections.
Publications
For details of all my research outputs, visit my WestminsterResearch profile.