J. Karen Serra Undurraga

J. Karen Serra Undurraga (PhD)

Lecturer in Counselling and Psychotherapy

Email: jkaren.serrau@ed.ac.uk

Street: Old Medical School Teviot Place
City
Post code: eh8 9ag

Research

Research summary

I am interested in rethinking concepts and practices that are crucial for how we can imagine our subjectivity and open up alternative ways of living.

Publications in English:

Serra Undurraga, J. K. A. (2026). Blinded by Neo-Colonial Lights: Exposing Hidden Histories of South-North Academic Migration. Cultural Studies ↔ Critical Methodologies, 0(0). https://doi.org/10.1177/15327086261484589

Serra Undurraga, J. K. A. & Barraclough, S. (2025). The Promise of Therapy: Soothing Personal Suffering Whilst Keeping the World As It Is? Psychotherapy and Politics International, 23(2), 1-24. https://doi.org/10.24135/ppi.v23i2.03

Serra Undurraga, J. K. A. (2025). Once you see it, you cannot unsee it: the contradictions of ‘decolonising’ in the UK university. International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education. OnlineFirst. https://doi.org/10.1080/09518398.2025.2539368

Serra Undurraga, J. K. A. & Wyatt, J. (2024). Not all that post, not all that new: The disruption of challenging coloniality. Cultural Studies <=> Critical Methodologies. OnlineFirst https://doi.org/10.1177/15327086231219706

Serra Undurraga, J.K.A. (2023). Using performative meta-reflexivity in psychotherapy research. In K. Tudor & J. Wyatt (Eds.), Qualitative Research Approaches for Psychotherapy (pp. 31-44). Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003280859-4

Serra Undurraga, J.K.A. (2023). What if reflexivity and diffraction intra-act? International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education, 36(6), 1109-1122. https://doi.org/10.1080/09518398.2021.1900622

Serra Undurraga, J.K.A. (2022). What are our psychotherapeutic theories and practices producing? European Journal of Psychotherapy and Counselling, 24(4), 386-401. https://doi.org/10.1080/13642537.2023.2175890

Serra Undurraga, J.K.A. (2022). Betraying our best intentions: on the need to interrogate how we relate and what it produces. International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education. Advance online publication.https://doi.org/10.1080/09518398.2022.2098409

Serra Undurraga, J. K. A. (2020). Reflexivities as Affective Ways of Relating That Produce. Qualitative Inquiry, 26(7), 920–930. https://doi.org/10.1177/1077800419885408

Publicaciones en español:

Serra Undurraga, J.K.A. (2016). El diagnóstico de narcisismo: una lectural relacional. Revista de la Asociación Española de Neuropsiquiatría, 36 (129), 171-187. https://scielo.isciii.es/pdf/neuropsiq/v36n129/articulo10.pdf

Serra Undurraga, J.K.A. (2016). Dinámicas vinculares en el narcisismo: una perspectiva relacional. Clínica contemporánea, 7 (1), 3-21. https://doi.org/10.5093/cc2016a1

Serra Undurraga, J.K.A. (2016). Cuerpo y vínculo: entramados en curso. Clínica e Investigación Relacional, 10 (1). https://www.psicoterapiarelacional.es/Portals/0/eJournalCeIR/V10N1_2016/13_Serra_Cuerpo%20y%20v%C2%A1nculo_CeIR_V10N1.pdf

Serra Undurraga, J.K.A. (2015). Justificar, fundamentar y pensar: una reflexión sobre el uso de las bases fenomenológico-existenciales en el enfoque humanista en Psicología. Revista Colombiana de Ciencias Sociales, 6 (1), 159-174 https://doi.org/10.21501/22161201.1306

Serra Undurraga, J.K.A. (2015). Tensiones teóricas en relación a Kohut: una revisión crítica. Clínica e Investigación Relacional, 9 (1), 206-30. https://www.psicoterapiarelacional.es/Portals/0/eJournalCeIR/V9N1_2015/10_Serra_Tensiones%20teoricas%20en%20relacion%20a%20Kohut_Una%20revision%20critica_CEIR%20V9N1.pdf

Serra Undurraga, J.K.A. (2015). Descartes y el cuerpo en el narcisismo. Gaceta de Psiquiatria Universitaria, 11 (4), 368-378 https://sodepsi.cl/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/GPU-2015-4.pdf

Bosco, C., Cano, T., Ojeda, T. & Serra Undurraga, J.K.A. (2014). Personas transexuales y discursos acerca de lo trans: desafíos a la clínica psicológica. Gaceta de Psiquiatria Universitaria, 10 (4), 458-467. https://sodepsi.cl/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/GPU-2014-4.pdf

Current research interests

I am interested in how the insidious presence of (neo)colonialism and neoliberalism makes itself present in how we make sense of, and orientate, ourselves and our lives. I am working on a research and education project piloting Freire´s methodology of culture circles to facilitate meaningful dialogue about race between undergraduate students. I am working with autohistoria-teoria, a methodology developed by Anzaldua that blends theory, personal experience, history and politics to develop transformative ways of understanding the self and society. I have researched the entanglement between psychotherapy and oppressive structures I have worked on analysing the contradictions of attempts at ´decolonising´ in the context of UK higher education.

Past research interests

I have worked on reconceptualising reflexivity as ways of relating to oneself that generate subjectivities and worlds, offering ´performative meta-reflexivity´ as a tool. I have proposed to question how psychotherapeutic theories and practices can contribute to generating hegemonic versions of subjectivity that limit the scope of alternative ways of living and feed into individualism. I have worked on reconceptualising narcissism in an embodied and relational manner, troubling how this diagnosis can be used in clinical practice.

Affiliated research centres

CCRI

Projects

Past project grants

Fostering Dialogue Across Racial Differences in Undergraduate Students: A Pilot Study

Funded by PTAS (Principal's Teaching Award Scheme) regular grant

Conversations about race at the university can sometimes feel performative, one-sided, surface-level, or even invalidating. To address this problem, we have piloted what we named interracial culture circles with a group of undergraduate students. This is a participatory method inspired by Freire to enable conversations on how racialisation and other unjust social structures and dynamics affect students´ experiences at the UoE. The students became co-investigators of their own experiences, and by the end of our 8 sessions, they engaged in a photovoice activity, capturing their experiences as students.

J. Karen Serra Undurraga (principal investigator)

Mridula Sridhar (Co-I and Research Assistant)

Candela Sanchez-Rodilla Espeso (Co-I)

Visit our blog for more information:

https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/fostering-dialogue-across-racial-differences/

Conferences

Invited speaker

Keynote speaker

Challenging counselling´s aspirations to neutrality and universality

The 3rd International Conference on Guidance and Counseling: “Inventing Guidance and Counselling's Adaptability Toward New Force in Counseling and Psychotherapy”, State University of Surabaya, Indonesia

Media

Publications

Publications in English:

Serra Undurraga, J. K. A. (2020). Reflexivities as Affective Ways of Relating That Produce. Qualitative Inquiry, 26(7), 920–930. https://doi.org/10.1177/1077800419885408

Publicaciones en español:

Serra Undurraga, J.K.A. (2016). Dinámicas vinculares en el narcisismo: una perspectiva relacional. Clínica contemporánea, 7 (1), 3-21. https://doi.org/10.5093/cc2016a1

Serra Undurraga, J.K.A. (2015). Descartes y el cuerpo en el narcisismo. Gaceta de Psiquiatria Universitaria, 11 (4), 368-378 https://sodepsi.cl/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/GPU-2015-4.pdf

Publishing roles

Reviewer for the following academic journals:

International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education

European Journal of Psychotherapy & Counselling

Person-Centered & Experiential Psychotherapies

Cultural Studies ↔ Critical Methodologies

International Journal for the Advancement of Counselling

British Journal of Guidance and Counselling

Book reviewer for Routledge

This article was published on 10 Sep, 2026