Dr Elena Block

Lecturer in Strategic and Political Communication at The University of Queensland's School of Communication and Arts. PhD in Political Communication from The University of Queensland, and MSc from the London School of Economic and Political Science (LSE). Elena is currently involved in two strands of research focusing on populist communication and the the rise of disruptive, uncivil, and divisive discourses that appear to be undermining political dialogue and changing modern democracy from within. Elena is also interested in the impact of virtual and human influencers on audiences vis-à-vis traditional strategic communication, government PR, and propaganda.

Long trajectory as a journalist, media relations and public affairs executive. Main areas of interest: political communication; strategic communication; populist communication; civility/incivility in today's society; the mediatisation of politics and society; CGI/Virtual/teen influencers; pandemic communication and strategic silence.

Books

Block, E. (2015). Political Communication and Leadership Mimetisation, Hugo Chavez and the Construction of Power and Identity. New York: Routledge

Block, E. (2022). Discursive Disruption, Populist Communication and Democracy: The Cases of Hugo Chávez and Donald J. Trump (1st ed.). Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003118602

Selected articles

Block, E. and Negrine, R. (2017). The Populist Communication Style: Toward a Critical Framework. International Journal of Communication, 11(2017), 178-197

Block, E. (2013). A Culturalist Approach to the Concept of the Mediatization of Politics: The Age of ''Media Hegemony''", Communication Theory. 23(2013), 259-278

Block, E., & Lovegrove, R. (2021). Discordant storytelling, 'honest fakery', identity peddling: How uncanny CGI characters are jamming public relations and influencer practices. Public Relations Inquiry, 10(3), 265-293. https://doi.org/10.1177/2046147X211026936

Le, T. L., & Block, E. (2024). When communist propaganda meets western public relations: Examining Vietnam's government pandemic communication. Public Relations Inquiry, 13(1), 33-67. https://doi.org/10.1177/2046147X231218310

Book chapters

Block, Elena ( in press). Populist Communication Strategies in Intergroup Relations. The Sage Handbook of Intercultural Communication. Sage: 458-471

Block, Elena (2024). The Latin American political discourse. The Routledge Handbook of Political Communication in Ibero-America. London: Routledge.49-60

Block, E. (2023). "Social Responsibility" as a Weapon?. In: Weder, F., Rademacher, L., Schmidpeter, R. (eds) CSR Communication in the Media. CSR, Sustainability, Ethics & Governance. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-18976-0_13