Eleonora Benecchi

Eleonora Benecchi, PhD, is a lecturer and researcher (MER) at Università della Svizzera italiana.

Her main research interests include Internet fandom, participatory culture with regard to the diffusion of pop culture contents through social media and the media consumption of young generations. 

She has published scholarly articles and contributions in the field of digital culture, online fandom, and participatory culture in top-tier journals such as Media Culture and Society and New Media and Society. His last book "Di chi è questa storia" explores the phenomenon of Internet fandom from a cultural and economic perspective.

Since 2012 she is responsible for the Italian part of Switzerland for the national researches MIKE and JAMES, which investigate the relationship between young people and media. Her last research project, conducted in collaboration with ZHAW and University of Lausanne, has analyzed with ethnographic tools the relationship between young people and news with particular attention to the online dimension.

She is currently collaborating to the project financed by the Swiss National Fund The origins and spread of the World Wide Web, directed by Gabriele Balbi.

In the audiovisual field she is responsible for IMeG for the organization of the Documentary Summer School at Locarno Film Festival.

At Università della Svizzera italiana she teaches Digital Cultures and Audiovisual Theory and Production (BA) and Social Media Management (MA).

Graduated cum laude in Communication Sciences (University of Bologna), she publishes her first research on the programming and reception of Japanese animation in Italy in 2004 with the title "Anime, cartoni con l´anima". From 2004 to 2007 she is assistant to the chair of Theories and Techniques of Radio-TV Communication and tutor of several laboratories dedicated to audiovisual production at bachelor and master level (University of Bologna). In these years she is involved in several research projects including: "Gender representation in Italian television" (University of Bologna and Ancorpari, 2003); "Analysis of Rai social programming" (Studio Vivaldi Comunicazione e Segretariato Sociale RAI, 2003-2005).

Her PhD, carried out at USI under the supervision of Prof. Giuseppe Richeri (Istituto Media e Giornalismo), investigated the relationships between producers and fans of TV series.

Internet Fandom, Radio and television contents production and reception with special regard to online extensions, radio and television programming