Maria Athina (Tina) Martimianakis MA, MEd, PhD

Scientist and Associate Director, Collaborations and Partnerships
Professor and Director of Medical Education Scholarship,
Department of Paediatrics, University of Toronto

Tina’s academic training in Political Science and the Sociology of Higher Education, combined with over two decades working in clinical contexts and university administration has led her to develop a unique interdisciplinary orientation to the study of health professions education. At the heart of her research program is the exploration of problematic socio-political relationships that impact the mission of health professional organizations to prepare and support clinicians to provide comprehensive and compassionate care to all patients.

 Theoretically, Tina’s works aims to elaborate on governmentality effects: the ways in which dominant discourses impact professional identity negotiations, particularly the articulation and application of expertise. She thus studies the material effects of discourse as a particular dimension of the hidden curriculum with the potential to support or hinder educational delivery and learning. Tina is also interested in ways in which organizations and educational programs may inadvertently create the conditions for knowledge stratification. Entry points for this work are discourses, such as collaboration, humanism, integration, caring, and globalization. These pervasive discourses and the associated activities, identities, tools, and cultural symbols they make possible, manifest formally and informally and influence the value systems that academic health care providers, learners and patients bring to their interactions.

 Her educational practice is closely aligned to her research program. As an educator, Tina employs critical and social cultural pedagogies to enable clinician educators to incorporate complex negotiations of the social world in their educational planning and implementation.

 Tina co-leads the Wilson Centre Globalization research group with Dr. Brian Hodges and Chairs the program committee of the Wilson Centre Globalization Symposium. The symposia bring together policy makers, scholars and educators from around the world to exchange views and disseminate research on topics related to the globalization of health professions. The Symposia are always co-organized with other organizations. Past partners have included, the University Health Network, St. Josephs’ Hospital and the Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto and internationally, Addis Ababa University, Ethiopia, the School of Health Professions Education, Maastricht University, Netherlands, the University of Aberdeen and ASME, UK and the Department of Social Medicine, National Taiwan University.

 Current Fellow(s) and HPER Doctoral Student(s): Justin Lam, Elisabeth-Abigail Ramdawar, Ruby Shanker, Leslie St Jacques, Erene Stergiopoulos