Professor Natalia Chaban is a twice awarded Jean Monnet Chair and Professor at the Department of Media and Communication, University of Canterbury (UC), New Zealand. Vice-Leader of the Work Group “Perceptions and Communication”, COST Action EU Foreign Policy Facing New Directions (ENTER) and Director of Public Diplomacy and Political Communication Forum at UC, she leads multiple transnational research projects supported by the European Commission, EEAS and NATO. In her regional engagement, she is the President of Ukrainian Studies Association of Australia and NZ and co-editor of the Australian and New Zealand Journal of European Studies (since its inception in 2009).
Natalia focuses her interdisciplinary research on cognitive and semiotic aspects of political and media discourses, and image and perceptions studies within the EU and IR contexts. Natalia’s contribution to the field of EU external perceptions has been internationally recognized by scholars and stakeholders, and research design and methods have been replicated around the world. Natalia widely publishes on the topic of EU external perceptions including articles in high impact journals such as the Journal of Common Market Studies, Journal of European Integration, European Foreign Affairs Review, Cooperation and Conflict, Foreign Policy Analysis, Mobilities, Comparative European Politics.
Her latest publications include co-edited with Arne Niemann and Johanna Speyer Changing Perceptions of the EU at Times of Brexit: Global Perspectives (Routledge 2020) and co-authored with Ole Elgström The Ukraine crisis and EU Foreign Policy Roles: Images of the EU in the Context of EU-Ukraine Relations (Edward Elgar, 2021).