Beatriz Nieto-Fernandez

Email: bnietofernandez@bjtvalve.com

Pronouns: She/Her/Hers

Areas of Expertise
Organizational Communication, Postcolonial Studies, Power and Control in Organizations, Race and Ethnicity Studies, Medical Humanities, Science and Technology Studies

About 
Dr. Beatriz Nieto-Fernandez (Ph.D., University of South Florida) is a qualitative scholar, researcher, and assistant professor specializing in organizational communication. Her research centers on the intersection between media and organizations, corporate media use, and the relationship between organizational identity and an organization’s customers in the context of bio-capitalism. 

Her current research investigates the ways in which direct-to-consumer genetic testing organizations use different types of media and rhetorical devices to sell ideas of ancestry, race, and health advocacy to their customers, exploring the ways in which the phenomenon of genetic testing frames the ideas of racial identification, ethnicity, and belonging to the nation as ethno-commodities for profit. 

Her research has been presented at the National Communication Association conference, the International Communication Association, and the World Congress of Semiotics. Her work can be found in Management and Communication Quarterly, The Encyclopedia of Health Humanities: Future Trends in Health Advocacy and The Routledge International Handbook of Organizational Autoethnography.

As an instructor, "Dr. B" has taught diverse courses such as "Small Group Processes,” "Public Speaking," "Persuasion and Media," "Organizational Communication," and "Women and Communication." 

In her personal time, Dr. B enjoys hanging out with her friends' cats, reading novels, going to the beach, and binging on TV shows occasionally. 

Background
PhD – University of South Florida (2022)
Dissertation: “Re-centering and De-centering ‘race’: an Analysis of Direct-to-Consumer Genetic Testing Organizational Websites”

Awards and Achievements
Arthur P. Bochner Award for Outstanding Achievement in Doctoral Studies, University of South Florida (2022)

Doctoral Honors Seminar, National Communication Association (2021)

Invited lecturer at “Strands of Meaning: A Public Debate and Discussion about Genetic Testing,”  The John R. Park Debate Society, Department of Communication – University of Utah (2021)

Invited lecturer at “Organizational Ethics and Technology: Direct-to-Consumer genetic testing organizations as a case study,” Research Colloquium at Center for Internet Studies and Digital Life – University of Navarra Spain (2020)

Nieto-Fernandez, B. (2020) “An Organizational Communication Ethics Approach to Direct-to-Consumer Genetic Testing” – Organizational Communication Division – National Communication Association, Indianapolis, IN. – Top Student Paper

Publications
Pal, M., Nieto-Fernandez, B., & Satheesh, S. Postcolonial Approaches to Qualitative Organizational Research. In Taylor,B., Brummans, B., & Sivunen, A. (Eds),  SAGE Handbook of Qualitative Research in Organizational Communication. (Forthcoming)

Nieto-Fernandez, B., & Elhendi, R. Organizations and diasporas: Diasporic belonging, and organizational epistemologies in M. Pal., J. Cruz, & D. Munshi (Eds.), Organizing at the Margins: Local Knowledges, New Futures. New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan. (Forthcoming)

Nieto-Fernandez, B., & Pal, M. Genomic Health Advocacy: Global Trends in Direct-to-Consumer Genetic Testing, Medical Racism, and Biocapitalism. Palgrave Encyclopedia of the Health Humanities: Future Trends in Health Advocacy.  (Forthcoming)

Pal, M., & Nieto-Fernandez, B. (2022). Pandemic Reflections: Precarity, Solidarity, and Global Inequities in Organizational Communication Research. In Communication in the 2020s (pp. 184-191). Routledge.

Pal, M., Kim, H., Harris, K. L., Long, Z., Linabary, J., Wilhoit Larson, E., Jensen, P. R., Gist-Mackey, A. N., McDonald, J., Nieto-Fernandez, B., Jiang, J., Misra, S., & Dempsey, S. E. (2022). Decolonizing Organizational Communication. Management Communication Quarterly, 36(3), 547–577. http://doi.org/10.1177/08933189221090255

Pal, M., Nieto-Fernandez, B., Ketheeswaran, N., (2020). “Postcolonial Organizational Autoethnography: Journey into Reflexivity, Erasures, and Margins” in A. Hermann (Ed.), The Routledge International Handbook of Organizational Autoethnography (pp. 84-98). Third Avenue, NY: Routledge.

Courses

Organizational Communication, Small Group Processes

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