Dr. Eurovision

Paul Jordan is a familiar face on TV around the time of Eurovision and has appeared on BBC Breakfast, Sky News, BBC World, Five News as well as several documentaries. He has also been the pundit for the BBC’s live coverage of the semi-finals for several years and has appeared on Radio 5 Live, BBC Radio 2 and various network stations in the UK and abroad.

Between 2015 and 2018 Paul worked behind the scenes of the Eurovision Song Contest as part of the communications team. He was part of the international jury for the French national selection for Eurovision, Destination Eurovision, in 2019 and in 2023 he appeared as a jury member on Eurosong, the Irish selection for the contest.

Paul is available for media and speaking engagements as well as consultancy work and can comment on virtually any aspect of the Eurovision Song Contest, providing unique insights from his time working behind the scenes.

Whilst the Eurovision Song Contest is an event which is often dismissed as musically and culturally inferior, Paul’s research shows that different countries attribute different meanings to the event. In 2011 Paul was awarded his PhD, The Eurovision Song Contest: Nation Building and Nation Branding in Estonia and Ukraine, from the University of Glasgow and in 2014 he published his book, The Modern Fairy Tale: Nation Branding, national identity and the Eurovision Song Contest in Estonia.

Paul has watched Eurovision since he was a child and has attended the event since 2000. His other research interests include nation and state building, post-Soviet identity politics and nationalism. He is a keen marathon runner and lives in London.