Donata is a Lecturer in Psychotherapy within the Department of Psychological Medicine at the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience. Donata joined the IoPPN in October 2024 having previously worked at Birkbeck University as a Programme Director for the MSc. in Psychodynamic Counselling & Psychotherapy and for the MSc. in Psychodynamic of Human Development. Before that, Donata worked for 14 years at the Modern Language Centre, King's College, as a Senior Lecturer in Language & Intercultural Communication. Donata is a qualified Psychodynamic Psychotherapist and a member of the British Psychoanalytical Council (BPC) and of the Tavistock Society of Psychotherapists (TSP). Donata's background is multidisciplinary with a Degree in Modern Foreign Languages and Linguistics, an MA in Comparative Literature and Film Studies, an MA in Intercultural Psychodynamic Psychotherapy, a Clinical Training in Psychodynamic Psychotherapy at the Tavistock & Portman NHS Trust and at the Institute of Psychoanalysis and a Doctorate in Education. Donata is also a Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy (SFHEA) and is very passionate about supporting learning and teaching and collaborating with students throughout their transformative journeys in HE.

Research interests

Donata's main research interests are grounded on narrative inquiry and art-based methodologies to explore lived experiences and professional identity with a focus on collaborative writing and 'doing academia differently'. Donata is very passionate about the relationship between psychoanalysis, learning and education and is the co-convenor of a European Research Network on the subject. She is also dedicated to community-engaged learning supporting the collaboration between universities and the wider society with the purpose to use research to change society. She teaches on a Service-learning Module at King's and is passionate about the power of transformative education.

Research groups

Donata is a co-founder of King's Academy of Educators and a co-convenor of the Education & Psychoanalysis Network as part of the European Education Research Association (EERA); she is a member of the following associations: BERA (British Education Research Association); EERA (European Education Research Association) Association of Psychosocial Studies (APS), CANI Net (Collaborative Artful Narrative Inquiry), CCRI Edinburgh (Centre for Creative Relational Inquiry), funder of the Posthuman Collective @ the Open University, Adventures in Posthuman Network (University of Plymouth)UK & Europena Service-Learning Association, South-East Auto-ethnography Network, LHBN (Life History & Biography Network).

Teaching

Donata teaches at the MSc. in Clinical Psychotherapy and she is the Module Lead for the following modules: Foundations in Clinical Psychotherapy; Developmental & Individual Differences E Social Processes; she aslo teaches at the MSc. in Mental Health Studies where she is the Module Co-Lead for the the following Modules: Psychological Therapies and Self-Identity and Intergenerational Learning.

Expertise and public engagement

Donata contributed to public lectures, podcasts and sitting on panels at national and international conferences on educational studies, intercultural learning and the relationship between psychoanalysis and education.

• Puntil, D., Dennis, A., Chandler, K.M. (2024 in press). A rhizomatic analysis of the PGR relationality in doctoral training. In Lyons, D., Southcott, J., and Singh, K., Doing Doctorates Differently. Lexington Books Ed.
  
  • Cooke, C., Vackova, P., Puntil, D.; Dowdesdell, E., Caton, L. (2024, in press). Care in academia. What might that involve? Bio-digital collaborative writing towards response-able and care-full practices in Higher Education. Journal of Learning Development in Higher Education. Special Edition: Liberating Learning in HE, Autumn 2024.
  
  • Dowdesdell, E., Cooke, C., Vackova, P., Caton, L., Puntil, D. (2024 in press). How to care? Re-thinking national ethical guidance on care and response-ability in academia through collaborative writing experiment. In Fox, A., Baker, S., BERA Ethical Dilemmas Study Book, London: Bloomsbury.
  
  • Puntil D. (2023). People, object, places, stories. A nomadic inquiry into becoming language professional in HE. Posthuman Epistemologies of Practice in Organizational Studies. London, Palgrave.
  
  • Puntil, D., Cirillo, C. (2023). Be-ing and Be-coming a practitioner-researcher in Language Education: a diffractive dialogue. Alvarez, I., Fuertes Guttierez, M. The Politics of Language Teaching. London: John Murray Learning.
  
  • Riefeser, J., Puntil, D., Borelli, E., (2023). Un-Doing home. Exploring home-making and identity: An example of a project in a London higher education classroom. Petrić, B., Ros i Solé, C., Holmes Prue. Special Issue Belonging and home-making in the internationalised campus. London Review of Education. London: UCL Press.
  
  • Vackova, P., Puntil, D.; Dowdesdell, E., Cooke, C., Vackova, P, Caton, L. (2023). Quilted Poetry: a posthuman and bio-digital methodology towards more just ways of working in academia. Journal of Social Inclusion. Special Issue. Cogitatio Press.
  
  • Puntil, D.; Dias, G., Kraj, C., Deplessis, C., Rylance-Watson, E., Ma, C., Zunszain, P (2022). Connecting Postgraduate Students and Older Adults in the Community to Support Wellbeing: A Service- Learning Module During COVID-19 and Beyond. A Practice Report. Journal of Student Success, 13 (3).
  • Puntil, D.; Zunszain, P (2022). Intergenerational encounters. A Service-learning module for postgraduate university students. INSTED, Interdisciplinary Studies in Education and Society, 1: 2022.
  
  • Caton, L.; Cooke, C.; Puntil, D.; Vackova, P. Making spaces for posthumanist (un)doings. (2022). In: European Congress of Qualitative Inquiry.(Proceedings online)
  
  • Alvarez, I.; Cobo Palacios, I.; Fuertes Guttierz, M.; Puntil, D. (2022). Language teachers and researchers as worldmakers. In: Boyle, Catherine and Kelly, Debra eds. Language Acts and Worldmaking. London: John Murray Learning, pp. 1–40.
  • Puntil, D., Dennis, A., Chandler, K.M. (2022). Practice and the Professional Doctorate: a diffractive re-reading, Research in Post Compulsory Education, Special Issue, Spring 2021.
  
  • Puntil, D. (2019). Becoming a language professional in Higher Education: a psychosocial Case Study, in Negotiating Identity in Foreign Language Teaching, London: Palgrave, 2019.
  
  • Colaiacomo, S. Puntil. D., (2018). Learning to be Intercultural, Language Learning Higher Education, 8(1): 187-196.