Sebastian Svegaard

Sebastian Svegaard is a Research Fellow at the School of Communication, part of the Faculty of Creative Industries, Education & Social Justice at Queensland University of Technology. He works under the Digital Media Research Centre (DMRC) within Professor Axel Bruns's Australian Laureate Fellowship project Determining the Drivers and Dynamics of Partisanship and Polarisation in Online Public Debate.

• Education: PhD in Media Studies (2019) from Birmingham City University (UK), with prior MA (Research) and BA in Musicology from the University of Copenhagen (Denmark), including minors in History and Gender Studies.

Sebastian's research focuses on applying fan studies to analyse partisanship and polarisation in digital communication. His work explores the interplay between identity, affect, fandom, belonging, and their influence on publics, politics, and digital discourse. He has contributed to debates on destructive polarisation, populism, and LLM applications in communication research.

Recent publications examine political discourse on TikTok, ideological intersections with fandom (e.g., Taylor Swift as a political canvas), and frameworks for analysing digital polarisation. His work also connects to UN Sustainable Development Goals through digital media's role in social justice and public engagement.

Sebastian previously taught modules in Subcultural Studies, Celebrity Studies, Fan Studies, and Media/Critical Theory. He serves on the editorial board of Riffs, a journal linking music to cultural studies.