Stefania Manca, PhD, is a senior researcher at the Institute of Educational Technology of the Italian National Research Council (CNR-ITD), Italy. Her research investigates the socio-political dynamics of digital cultures at the intersection of education, media, and public discourse, with a particular focus on online hate, antisemitism, and the mediation of Holocaust memory in digital environments.
Her work examines how media literacy, memory education, counter-narrative strategies, and pedagogical interventions can counter harmful narratives, foster critical digital engagement, and support civic resilience and peacebuilding processes. Combining qualitative and digital methods, she analyses how online environments shape public debate, identity formation, and conflict transformation in contemporary societies.
She has published extensively on social media in education, digital scholarship, and participatory cultures, and has led and contributed to research projects on digital Holocaust memory and Holocaust distortion, producing both scholarly outputs and policy-oriented guidelines for educators, museums, and memorial institutions. Her recent work focuses on how platforms such as TikTok and Instagram are used to challenge antisemitism, address Holocaust distortion, and promote dialogue, empathy, and civic responsibility among diverse publics.
As an ISGAP Research Fellow, she is interested in advancing interdisciplinary research on contemporary antisemitism, Holocaust memory, digital media, and public education. Her current research explores how antisemitic narratives, Holocaust distortion, and anti-Jewish prejudice are produced, circulated, normalized, resisted, or reconfigured across digital, institutional, and educational settings, with particular attention to the tensions between political normalization, public discourse, and educational responses to hatred and misinformation.