Meet our scholars

The PSI Network consists of almost 400 doctoral students and PhDs from across the full range of disciplines at UBC.

Below you can navigate their profiles based on year of scholarship, faculty, theme; read about their research; and watch brief videos of their talks. 

Trinh Nguyen

Vietnam
Doctor of Philosophy in Library, Archival and Information Studies (PhD)
Exploring information governance in sustainable decentralized projects

Karen Lok Yi Wong

Canada
Doctor of Philosophy in Social Work (PhD)
Understand the processes of the complex healthcare systems from the experiences of Chinese people living with dementia in Vancouver: The use of a process map

Judith Valerie Engel

Austria
Doctor of Musical Arts in Piano (DMA)
Who is heard? Canadian Women Composers and the legacy of ‘genius’ Music

Rachel N. Stern

United States of America
Doctor of Philosophy in Geography (PhD)
Interdisciplinary and Mixed-Methods Approaches to Extreme Heat: A Community Participatory Study of Older Adults' Heat Experiences in Metro Vancouver

Allison Campbell

Canada
Doctor of Philosophy in Gender, Race, Sexuality and Social Justice (PhD)
Parenting behind bars: maternal-child (connection and) separation in BC's prisons designated for women

Starr Sandoval

Canada
Doctor of Philosophy in Linguistics (PhD)
Expressive meaning in Ktunaxa

Michelle Kamigaki-Baron

Doctor of Philosophy in Linguistics (PhD)
Investigating the psycholinguistic connections between Pidgin and ʻŌlelo Hawaiʻi

Titilope Onolaja

Nigeria
Doctor of Philosophy in Art History (PhD)
Power and policy in West African museums: a comparative analysis of Nigeria and Senegal

Stephen Oppong

Ghana
Doctor of Philosophy in Theatre (PhD)
21st century receptions of classical greek theatre in Africa.

Mahashewta Bhattacharya

India
Doctor of Philosophy in Anthropology (PhD)
Home-ing as (auto)biography: Tracing the materialities and sensorialities of multi-sited homes among rural to urban women migrants of Eastern India

Andrea Kampen

Canada
Doctor of Philosophy in Library, Archival and Information Studies (PhD)
Information sharing practice of artist-researchers

Risa Tonita

Canada
Doctor of Musical Arts in Piano (DMA)
The pianist's self: Political action in piano performance as a relational practice

Younus Mushtaq Ahmed

India
Doctor of Philosophy in Anthropology (PhD)
Sanitizing ‘sanitation’: Caste, infrastructure, and the politics of development in Chennai’s slums

Tanzoom Ahmed

India
Doctor of Philosophy in Asian Studies (PhD)
Understanding Muslim Women in urban marginalized spaces of South Asia

Cheyanne Connell

Canada
Doctor of Philosophy in Anthropology (PhD)
Naachin of Past and Present

Sydney Lines

Canada
Doctor of Philosophy in English (PhD)
Romancing the empire: Race, ethnicity, and nationalism in the writings of Winnifred Eaton and Laura Goodman Salverson

Fabiola Bazo

Peru
Doctor of Philosophy in Gender, Race, Sexuality and Social Justice (PhD)
Exhibition: Feminist and queer interventions in contemporary urban popular music in Peru
Olivia's research photo

Olivia Dreisinger

Canada
Doctor of Philosophy in English (PhD)
Diagnosis grad school: A podcast series

Romina Tantalean-Castaneda

Peru
Doctor of Philosophy in Gender, Race, Sexuality and Social Justice (PhD)
Working collaboratively with an Indigenous women's grassroots federation of the Peruvian Amazon, my research focuses on the Rights of Mother Nature from a strongly pluralist paradigm, while centering Indigenous women's leadership, knowledge, and voices

Parboti Roy

Bangladesh
Doctor of Philosophy in Asian Studies (PhD)
Violence against Indigenous women in the Chittagong Hill Tracts, Bangladesh: the lived experiences of Adibashi women and their navigational mechanisms to address violence

Aram Bajakian

Canada
Doctor of Philosophy in Music, Emphasis Ethnomusicology (PhD)
Navigating nostalgias: Musical identities in the Armenian diaspora

Leilani Forby

Canada
Doctor of Philosophy in Psychology (PhD)
Getting to know you: The frequency, intentionality, and content of mind wandering in autistic individuals

Erik Post

Netherlands
Doctor of Philosophy in Geography (PhD)
Projects of life and death: Extractivism, climate justice, and decolonial futures in the Sierra Norte de Puebla, Mexico

Emily Tilton

Canada
Doctor of Philosophy in Philosophy (PhD)
Knowing across difference

Julia Nakamura

Canada
Doctor of Philosophy in Psychology (PhD)
Volunteering with the Canadian Red Cross: recruiting, training, engaging, and promoting health and well-being of Canadian volunteers

Ife Adebara

Nigeria
Doctor of Philosophy in Linguistics (PhD)
Inclusive by Design: Natural Language Technology for Africa

Bri Watson

United States of America
Doctor of Philosophy in Library, Archival and Information Studies (PhD)
Expanding the catalog: renaming and redescribing indigenous, Black, Queer, Disabled and communities of color in Galleries, Libraries, Achieves, Museums, and Special Collections (GLAMS)

Ryan Stillwagon

United States of America
Doctor of Philosophy in Sociology (PhD)
Queer Rights to the City: Exploring Mechanisms of Urban Food Security in Vancouver and the Underlying Processes that Imperil LGBTQIA2S+ Survival

Alison Ariss

Canada
Doctor of Philosophy in Art History (PhD)
Salish Weaving in Relation with the Land: The Work of Wrapping Territory and Critiquing Institutions

Max Cohen

United Kingdom
Doctor of Philosophy in Geography (PhD)
Placing the Just Transition in Scotland and New Zealand

Michelle Kaczmarek

United Kingdom
Doctor of Philosophy in Library, Archival and Information Studies (PhD)
Fixing for Change: Stories of Information and Aspiration in Community Repair Initiatives

Addye Susnick

United States of America
Doctor of Philosophy in Political Science (PhD)
Trans Joy and Trans-Formative Justice: Imagining and Enacting Radical Futures

Anudeep Dewan

Nepal
Doctor of Philosophy in Anthropology (PhD)
Landing on Histories: Indigenous Experiences of Belonging in Nepal and India

Alejandra Botia

Colombia
Doctor of Philosophy in Counselling Psychology (PhD)
The role of peer support in eating disorders recovery

Caitlyn Yates

United States of America
Doctor of Philosophy in Anthropology (PhD)
Degrees of Visibility: the Journeys of Extra-continental Migrants through the Americas

Nick Middeldorp

Netherlands
Doctor of Philosophy in Geography (PhD)
Territories in dispute: repression and protection in Indigenous struggles in Northern Cauca, Colombia

Henry John

United Kingdom
Doctor of Philosophy in History (PhD)
Mapping the war in the woods

Bonnie Tulloch

Canada
Doctor of Philosophy in Library, Archival and Information Studies (PhD)
Do the ends justify the memes? Exploring the relationship between youth, internet memes, and digital citizenship

Jeffrey Hicks

Canada
Doctor of Philosophy in Economics (PhD)
Using large-scale administrative data to study the long-term causes and consequences of social assistance use

Jason Winikoff

United States of America
Doctor of Philosophy in Music, Emphasis Ethnomusicology (PhD)
The Music of the Masks: Zambian Luvale Percussion, Makishi, and Timbral Aesthetics

Jelena Todorovic

Serbia
Doctor of Philosophy in Classics (PhD)
Disability Theatre and Roman Comedy

Lara Sarlak

Turkey
Doctor of Philosophy in Anthropology (PhD)
Infrastructures of the Displaced: a case study of Istanbul

Michelle Hak Hepburn

Canada
Doctor of Philosophy in Anthropology (PhD)
Thinking with trees to see the forest: Huayruro trees and deforestation in San Martin, Peru

Sara Press

Canada
Doctor of Philosophy in English (PhD)
Diagnosing Disparities: Unsettling the Anglo-Colonial Standards of Health and Normality in Canada and the United States

Roger Yu-Hsiang Lo

Taiwan
Doctor of Philosophy in Linguistics (PhD)
From annotation to assessment: Tools for sign language phonetic and phonological research

Saguna Shankar

Canada
Doctor of Philosophy in Library, Archival and Information Studies (PhD)
Caring for Information Practices: An Inquiry into Visions of Data, Digital Technologies, and Migration

Kate Kysow

Canada
Doctor of Philosophy in Psychology (PhD)
Clean-outs as a strategy for community agencies to address hoarding

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