Reader in Media and Communication

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Tel: 0131 474 0000

Dr Ana Tominc (PhD) is a Reader in the Media, Communication and Performing Arts division at Queen Margaret University, Edinburgh.

My background is in social anthropology, cultural studies and linguistics. My PhD (Lancaster, 2012, supervisor: Prof. Dr Ruth Wodak) was an interdisciplinary study combining critical discourse analysis, cultural and food studies. It focused on the globalization of celebrity chefs’ discourse, such as Jamie Oliver’s, and the discourse change their intervention caused in countries, such as Slovenia, where my case study was situated. Using a critical discourse studies approach, it demonstrates how the representation of culinary advice in standard and celebrity cookbooks has changed in recent decades as a result of general social transformations such as postmodernity and globalization. I argued that compared to the standard cookbooks, where nutritionist ideology is at the forefront, the celebrity cookbooks reflect the conversational, hybrid nature of the genre, through which the chefs promote global foodie discourse, while at the same time localizing the global trends to the Slovene context. This was also the topic of my first monograph, The Discursive Construction of Class and Lifestyle. Celebrity Chef Cookbooks in post-Socialist Slovenia (John Benjamins, 2017).

I joined QMU in 2014 to work on development and delivery of the new MSc Gastronomy degree, where I was also the programme leader. I have since taught topics related to food, culture, politics, media, communication and qualitative research methods as part of various degrees across QMU, and have developed food-related modules for QMU partners in India. Since 2019, I am also a Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy (SF HEA).

My research interests are focused on food and communication broadly. I have published in the areas of food media, lifestyle and class; food media, anti-Semitism, national identity, and populism; early food television in Europe; and especially focusing on food media in socialist Yugoslavia. My recent edited collection (Routledge, 2022) explores food and cooking on early TV in Europe, presenting nine European contexts of the 1950s and 1960 through genres such as travelog, cooking show and TV food competition, and, for the first time, demonstrating the role of early television in development of the European postwar foodways.

I am the founder and chair of the Biennial Conference on Food and Communication, which was first organized in Edinburgh in 2018, and, since 2020, a member of the Association for the Study of Food and Society (ASFS).

Affiliations/Memberships to Other Organisations:

Professional Social Media:

Research/Knowledge Exchange Centre membership:

My research interest lies at the intersection between discourse analysis, and media, cultural and food studies. I am interested in contemporary discourse on food media, and how they related to identity, such as class and nation, as well as how food relates to politics and popular culture. I am also keen on historical topics that address representation of food diachronically, especially on television, and in the context of socialist Yugoslavia. The recent edited collection (Routledge, 2022) explores food and cooking on early TV in Europe, presenting nine European contexts of the 1950s and 1960 through genres such as travelog, cooking show and TV cooking competition, and, for the first time, demonstrating the role of early television in development of the European postwar foodways.

My interest lies at the intersection between discourse analysis, media and cultural studies and food studies. I am interested in contemporary discourse on food in various media, and how it relates to identity, such as class and nation. I am also keen on historical topics that address representation of food diachronically, especially on television (although not exclusively).

Active research interests:

  • Food media, language, and discourse
  • Food media and racism/stereotypes/anti-Semitism
  • Food, the media, populism and Brexit
  • Food and early television in Europe
  • Food media in Socialist Central and South-eastern Europe

Research Methods:

  • (Critical) Discourse analysis
  • Corpus-assisted discourse analysis
  • Narrative analysis
  • Diaries
  • Interviews
  • 2022 Scottish Graduate School of Humanities/Social Sciences - funding for Spring into Methods workshop (2,000 GBP) (co-I)  
  • 2020 – Carnegie Trust Research Incentive Grant (GBP 14,270.00) - Representing food in UK media during the Brexit campaign: Policy, regulation and national food myths
  • 2020 – QMU School Award for Research Support (GBP 1,992.00) – Early Food Television in Europe
  • 2020 – QMU BeaM ERC Researcher Development Fund (GBP 992.00) – COVID19 Diaries Project
  • 2018 – Association for the Study of Food and Society – 1 st Biennial Food and Communication Conference grant ($2,000 – maximum available)
  • 2016 Santander Universities – Research Grant

I have been teaching in UK higher education for more than a decade. I started as a seminar tutor while I was a PhD student at Lancaster University, where I taught courses on language and the media, discourse analysis, and critical discourse analysis. I later taught English for Academic Purposes and Study Skills to various age groups and nationalities, at the Universities of Lancaster, Heriot-Watt and Edinburgh.

At Queen Margaret University Edinburgh I have taught and developed postgraduate and undergraduate modules on a range of modules to do with food, culture, politics, communication and the media, as well as research methods. I have also supervised students of all levels. During 2014-17, I was a programme co-leader for MSc Gastronomy.

Since 2019, I am a Senior Fellow of Higher Education Academy (SF HEA).

I currently teach undergraduate and postgraduate modules to do with introduction to media and communication, media and politics, food, media and communication, and media and policy.

2020 - June “Researcher of the Month” - QMU School of Social Sciences, Arts and Management

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