Dr Sanja Vico

I am a Lecturer in Communications and Digital Media (E&R) and the Director of PhD programme in Media and Communications in the Department of Communications, Drama and Film. My research has been focused on digital media in contexts of identity, migration, nationalism, cosmopolitanism, and post-conflict justice and reconciliation. I have expertise in a range of qualitative methods, primarily (digital) ethnography, interviews, focus groups, and discourse analysis, and experience in collaborating on quantitative projects, including survey, experiments, and quantitative text analysis. I hold a PhD in Media and Communications from Goldsmiths (2019), an MSc from the London School of Economics and Political Science (2013) and a BSc from the Faculty of Political Science, University of Belgrade (2012). I am a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy.

My awarded past research project explored how Serbian Londoners navigated social media environments to negotiate their identities, with a focus on their banal expressions of nationalism and cosmopolitanism. In my current project, I study intra-ethnic interactions on social media and offline regarding the legacy of war to consider the role of social media in promoting discourse shifts in this context. I have given interviews about my research and have commented on current affairs in the Western Balkans for several media outlets, including Al Jazeera Balkans.

Prior to joining the University of Exeter, I held a prestigious fellowship at the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE), where I worked as a Postdoctoral Research Officer on the ERC-funded project Justice Interactions and Peacebuilding. Previously, I taught at Goldsmiths, LSE, and the University of Belgrade. I have also worked as a Research Consultant and Analyst on projects related to the media and politics in the Western Balkans for several companies and organisations, including BBC Media Action, and provided expert advice to various government officials and commercial stakeholders, including the House of Lord and the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO). My collaboration with the BBC led to the launch of BBC News service in Belgrade in 2018.

I have been recognised as a Global Talent by the British Academy, and received the Best Paper Award, honorable mention, for my article on identity politics on social media by the European Communication and Education Association (ECREA) in 2019. My book about nationalism on digital media is coming out with Routledge in January 2025.

I have held affiliations with the LSE Research Unit on Southeastern Europe (LSEE) and the Centre for the Studies of the Balkans at Goldsmiths.

I am a Lead Supervisor to Ziyi Song, a PhD student who explores national identities of young Chinese in London on social media, and a Co-Supervisor to Qiaosong Xi, a PhD student who studies everyday feminist activism on Chinese social media. 

Twitter: @sanja_vico

LinkedIn: @sanja_vico

Research supervision:

I welcome research proposals from prospective PhD students in the areas of my expertise:

• Social and Mobile Media
• Identity
• Migration
• Nationalism
• Cosmopolitanism
• Post-Conflict Justice and Reconciliation
• Digital Diplomacy
• Nation Branding
• Activism
• Mediated Interpersonal Communication
• Memory Studies

Please have a look at the University's guidance on how to write a research proposal here https://www.exeter.ac.uk/study/pg-research/apply/researchproposal/#:~:text=You%20should%20discuss%20the%20intellectual,questions%20that%20guide%20your%20research