Hello!
I am a Research Associate (Wissenschaftlicher Mitarbeiter, Walter Benjamin Postdoctoral Fellow) working with Prof. Dr. Thomas Hanitzsch in the Department of Media and Communication (IfKW) at LMU Munich, Germany.
My research primarily investigates the (de)politicization, platformization, and algorithmization of mediating global humanitarian crises. I am a PI of the German Research Foundation (Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, DFG) project “Global Disparities in Journalistic Practices in Mediating Migration Crises” (2024-2026). My work has been featured in peer-reviewed journals and books, including Int J Commun, Int Commun Gaz, Media Cult Soc, Journalism, Eur J Commun, and in the volume (De)constructing Societal Threats During Times of Deep Mediatization.
I have received computational methodology and data science training at the University of Cologne, UC Davis, and the NVIDIA Deep Learning Institute. Additionally, I serve as a reviewer for several academic journals (Int J Commun, Journal pract), international conferences (i.e. ECREA), and the Czech Science Foundation.
Feel free to reach me via email: zhe.xu@ifkw.lmu.de
Research Interests
Mediation of global crises
Computational communication
Immersive technology and AI in the newsroom