Transforming Trauma into Beauty: Community Healing and Solidarity-Building Through Arts-Based Phenomenological Research

Ruthellen Josselson Chair in Qualitative Inquiry Speaker Series Presents: Transforming Trauma into Beauty: Community Healing and Solidarity-Building Through Arts-Based Phenomenological Research will feature Nisha Gupta, Ph.D., on April 7, 8:30 – 10:30 a.m. PT | 11:30 a.m. – 1:30 p.m. ET.

Nisha Gupta, Ph.D.

The goal of this learning experience is to introduce participants to arts-based phenomenological research as a vehicle for emancipatory praxis to serve the mission of liberation psychology, which is to raise critical consciousness about the psychological impact of sociopolitical oppression and to partner with marginalized communities to foster dialogue, community healing, and social change.  To meet these goals, the speaker will:

1. provide a theoretical overview of liberation psychology and the role of emancipatory arts;
2. provide a methodological overview of arts-based phenomenological research as a form of emancipatory art praxis for liberation psychologists;
3. share two case studies of using arts-based phenomenological research as a vehicle for consciousness-raising, community trauma healing, and solidarity regarding lived experiences of sexual/gender oppression; and
4. guide participants through an experiential activity of doing arts-based phenomenological research as a therapeutic intervention for community healing.

Guest Speaker: Nisha Gupta, Ph.D.  

Dr. Nisha is an associate professor of psychology at the University of West Georgia, where she works as a liberation psychologist, arts-based phenomenological researcher, and creativity scholar. She disseminates research about lived experiences of oppression and empowerment through art for social advocacy and community healing. Her work as a researcher, artist, and educator seeks to embrace the creative process as a vehicle for building solidarity across difference, evoking empathy and compassion, and fostering joy and empowerment. Nisha was also trained clinically as a psychotherapist for eight years, with a focus on trauma therapy as well as liberation psychotherapy with queer people of color. She received her education at New York University (M.A.) and Duquesne University (Ph.D.)

Event Host: Amy Taylor, Ph.D., Inaugural Ruthellen Josselson Chair in Qualitative Inquiry

Amy Taylor, Ph.D.

Amy Taylor, Ph.D., Director of the Alonso Center for Psychodynamic Studies, Clinical Psychology faculty member, the Inaugural Ruthellen Josselson Chair in Qualitative Inquiry. She received her Ph.D. in in existential-phenomenological psychology from Duquesne University and completed a postdoctoral fellowship and psychoanalytic training at the Austen Riggs Center in western Massachusetts. She has additional training in applying psychoanalytic ideas to groups, families, and couples.

Her clinical and research interests are broad, but she is especially interested in links between psychoanalysis and embodied experience, gender and sexuality, and technology. Recent foci include how pregnancy and parenthood shift clinician identity and how the analyst/ therapist’s office serves as a holding extension of the therapist’s body. Established in 2020, the Ruthellen Josselson Chair in Qualitative Inquiry fund supports Fielding faculty research, while honoring the legacy of Dr. Josselson and affirming the importance of qualitative research in psychology as acknowledged by the American Psychological Association Division 5, Quantitative and Qualitative Methods.