Talia Fiester

Talia Fiester’s research interests include networked publics, affective truth claims, post‑#MeToo digital culture, and mediated feminisms. Her most recent project theorized gendered disbelief in TikTok discourse.

Before coming to Annenberg, she earned a research master’s degree in Media and Communications from the London School of Economics, focusing on the intersection of feminist theory, digital culture, and platform logics. Her master’s thesis explored the dynamics of public engagement with victimhood and believability in the post-#MeToo landscape. Focusing on suspicion towards women as mode of engagement and the moral immunity afforded to celebrity men, her research traced the way publics construct, contest, and circulate gendered truth claims through the platform’s participatory modes of engagement.

As an undergraduate at Penn, Talia conducted research on Asa Seresin’s concept of heterofatalism and how it manifests in mediated dating discourse, revealing that users simultaneously amplify despair around heterosexual relationships while fostering community and collectivism among young women.

Her work is grounded in feminist media studies and critical discourse analysis and is informed by her background in sexual violence prevention and education. Her future research will continue to theorize the entanglement of interpersonal violence, gender politics, and the digitally mediated production of justice.