About

I am a senior Lecturer in Journalism at the University of Derby. My research interests focus on news media and Latin American politics, particularly social media, nationalism, and neoliberal change in Chile and the Southern Cone. I have published articles that discuss the impact of media and memory and the neoliberal restructuring in Chile and the UK from a comparative perspective.

I have worked in UK higher education for over 8 years and as a journalist for Chilean and Latin American outlets covering politics and economics.

Teaching responsibilities

I have taught both undergraduate and postgraduate students in the areas of digital media, news writing, data journalism, political communication, public affairs, and research methods. I also supervise PhD projects.

Professional interests

My works and research look at the structure and agency of the news media in the Southern Cone as political institutions within a neoliberal framework. I am interested in developing an understanding of how news media agency shapes national and political identities and political cultures in a digital environment. At the same time, I am personally interested in the recent developments of social media as a political tool.

Research interests

My research interests are news media and journalism, neoliberalism, national identities and migration in Latin America.

I am happy to supervise PhD projects in the following areas:

• Journalism as political institutions
• News Media, national identities and migration
• News media and neoliberal change
• Journalism and Social Media

Membership of professional bodies

• Fellow of the Higher Education Academy (HEA)
• Media, Communication and Cultural Studies Association (MeCSSA)
• Society of Latin American Studies

Qualifications

• PhD in Politics, School of Politics and International Relations, The University of Nottingham (United Kingdom)
• MBA,  Pontifical Catholic University of Valparaiso (Chile)
• BA in Journalism and Media Studies, Pontifical Catholic University of Valparaiso (Chile)
• BA in History,  The University of Valparaiso (Chile)

Recent conferences

• Urbina Montana, M & Watkins, H (2024) 'Look back in anger: memories of social conflict in Chile and the UK - beyond melancholia and nostalgia" Symposium Memory Studies and Political Economy in Post-Socialist Perspective: Capital, Nostalgia and its Discontents-Workshop – Speaker. Ljubljana 3rd June
• Urbina Montana, M &Watkins, H (2023) ’The Forgotten Memory: Working Class Struggles versus Neoliberal Memories of Transformation’. 20^th annual Historical Materialism Conference – London 9^th-12^th November 2023
• Briceno, L &Urbina, M (2023) ‘Building hegemonies on Twitter. The Chilean New Right of Jose Antonio Kast and the Narrative of the Permanent Crisis during the 2022 Constitutional Referendum’. IPSA World Congress 2023. Buenos Aires (Argentina) 15^th -19^th July
• Suarez, Rebeca & Urbina, Maria (2022)” The TikTok Surviving Guide to the cost-of-living crisis. A Mix Method analysis of Titokers content and followers’ answers”. Mobile Studies Congress 2022 (MSC2022). Ningbo 9^th -11^th December
• Briceno, Lesley & Urbina, Maria (2022) “Jose Antonio Kast and the Chilean presidential elections of 2021. The New Right and the narrative of the existing national crisis. IPSA  Workshop ‘Latin America in crisis. Regional perspectives on political communication in the political and health emergency. Mexico City 21 – 23 September 2022
• Briceno, Lesley & Urbina, Maria ( 2021) ”National Exceptionalism and The Chilean New Right”. 26th World Congress of Political Science Association  IPSA. Lisbon 10 - 14 July

Experience in industry

Before moving into higher education, I worked as a journalist for more than ten years for Chilean news outlets such as El Mercurio de Valparaiso and other institutions. From 2011 to 2015, I covered political and economic affairs in Europe and the UK for the Latin American magazine America Economia, where my work was awarded the Prize for Economic Journalism for the Best Article in Economic News Magazines by the CAF-Development Bank of Latin America and Instituto de la Empresa in 2013.

Recent publications

Recent papers and book chapters

• Suárez-Álvarez, R., García-Jiménez, A. and Urbina Montana, M.L. (2023) “Sexualising characteristics of adolescents on TikTok. Comparative study Great Britain–Spain”. Convergence. 29(5), 1262-1282
• Watkins, H. and Urbina-Montana, M. (2022) Obstinate memory: Working-class politics and neoliberal forgetting in the United Kingdom and Chile. Memory Studies. 15(5), pp 1127-1141
• Mansell, Jon; Urbina, Maria & Watkins, Heather (2019) “National Renewal in the discourse of Neoliberal Transition in Britain and Chile'.  Journal Political Ideologies.  24(1), pp.74-92
• Urbina, Maria (2018) “Tales of Migration from the Global South. The Civilised and Uncivilised migrant in the narratives from La Tercera and El Mercurio”. In Balica Ed Migration and Crime. (pp. 109-138)  London: Palgrave

Recent book reviews

• Urbina, M.L. (2022), Jimenez-Martinez, Cesar (2020) Media and the Images of the Nation during Brazil's 2013 Protests' Bulletin of Latin American Research Vol 41, No 5, pp 846-847
• Urbina, Maria L (2022) ‘Beatriz Allende: A Revolutionary Life in Cold War Latin America’ Bulletin of Latin American Research Vol. 41, No. 2, pp331-33
• Urbina, Maria L (2015) " Dictatorships in South America". Bulletin of Latin American Research, 34(4), pp.541-542