Natascha Chtena is a Research Associate in the Publishing Program at Simon Fraser University and a Research Affiliate with the Public Knowledge Project. She also serves as Publishing Project Manager for mediastudies.press, an open-access publisher for the media and communication studies fields. 

Rooted in a long-standing commitment to open knowledge, her work draws on two decades of experience across scholarly publishing, libraries, museums, and independent media. This diverse background shapes her research into how knowledge is produced, legitimized, and shared—particularly in relation to questions of access, equity, and power.

From 2022 to 2024, she coordinated the VOICES project (Value of Openness, Inclusion, Communication, and Engagement for Science in a Post-Pandemic World) at the ScholCommLab. Prior to that, Natascha was a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics, and Public Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School (HKS), as well as Editor-in-Chief of the open-access journal HKS Misinformation Review. 

She holds a PhD in Information Studies and an MA in Comparative Education from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), as well as an MA in Media Anthropology from the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London.