Last month, we presented our paper at the Migration and Societal Change Conference in Utrecht 🤩

It was an incredibly gratifying experience to share our findings and engage in such stimulating discussions with fellow researchers.

Read our published paper here: advances.in/psychology/1...

Late reflection on the #HEPP5 conference at @helsinki.fi - I presented on "Contested Classrooms" examining Hungary's educational system as a battleground for competing knowledge claims. Chaired fascinating panels on political charisma & humor in populism. (1/2)

Thanks everyone who supported us during this work, especially @HEPP and @decaproject.bsky.social, big thanks to the reviewers for the great comments and everyone who came into contact with this work in the past and made it better with their feedback<3 (7/7)

journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10....

Our framework introduces "banana populism" as a new way to analyze these whimsical elements of political communication - & calls for more research into how the ordinary becomes extraordinary in populist politics (6/7)

What's fascinating is how these "silly" moments do serious political work: they make leaders seem authentic, create warm fuzzy feelings among supporters, mainstream extreme ideologies & define political boundaries - all while being perfect for social media (5/7)

Sometimes it's food (Babis’ petrol station hotdogs), sometimes it's pets (Le Pen's cats), sometimes it's fashion (Bolsonaro's football jerseys). But it's always about making complex political messages more accessible & memeable (4/7)

From Trump's MAGA hats to Viktor Orbán’s pickles - seemingly ordinary objects become extraordinary political tools. These aren't just random props - they're carefully crafted performances that create emotional connections (3/7)

Why a banana? Like #populist articulations themselves, the banana combines ubiquity & ordinariness with potential for absurdity when transported into political contexts. Its inherent capacity for lowbrow humor mirrors these often unintentionally amusing political performances (2/7)

Thrilled to share our new article "Banana Populism" published in Social Meedia + Society with @lanihart.bsky.social, @soschma.bsky.social and Mike Cole! We explore how populist leaders use mundane objects & whimsical imagery in political communication (1/7)

journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10....

From Thursday's Strategic Research Council SHIELD consortium meeting - shared thoughts on the relationship between trust and epistemic rights in online environments @decaproject.bsky.social

My Christmas gift 🎄 came early this year, successfully defended my PhD thesis on disinformation at Uni Helsinki. Big thanks to the opponent, @olivierklein.bsky.social for the friendly discussion and to Jan-Erik Lönnqvist and Inga Jasinskaja-Lahti for being the best supervisors