Ivana Guarrasi, Ph.D.

Education

• Ph.D. in Communication from University of California San Diego
• M.A. in Linguistics from California State University Long Beach
• M.A. in British and American Studies from University of Presov, Slovakia
• M.A. in Aesthetics from University of Presov, Slovakia

Biography

Teaching and learning are central to my practice, research agenda, and scholarly identity. My work is situated at the intersection of interdisciplinary communication studies, science and technology studies (STS), and critical health communication, where I examine how complex, embodied, and affective human experiences are translated into standardized, institutionally legible forms. Using ethnographic methods, my scholarship centers on clinical simulations in medical and nursing education, highlighting the transformative potential of simulation training for more equitable health care. Adopting a cultural studies lens, I analyze collaborative practices in healthcare to cultivate a productive dialogue between social science and health professions training. More recently, my research has turned to nursing work and sustainability, bringing together health communication and sustainability studies to explore how nurses’ informal communicative practices and affective, relational forms of collective care both sustain and expose the limits of resilience in chronically precarious, financialized healthcare systems.

I earned my Ph.D. In Communication from the University of California San Diego. At Minnesota State University, Mankato, I teach a range of undergraduate and graduate courses, including health communication, intercultural communication, conflict management, race, gender and media, interpersonal communication, and cultural studies of mind. I am currently an editor of the international journal Mind, Culture, and Activity."

Recent Publications

• Guarrasi, I. & Jornet, A. (2025). Affective Contextures of Collective Care: Sustainability in Nursing Work. In Rajala, A., Cortez, A., Hofmann, R., Jornet, A., Lotz-Sisitka, H., & Markauskaite, L. (Eds.), Proceedings of the 19th International Conference of the Learning Sciences - ICLS 2025 (pp. 1928-1932). International Society of the Learning Sciences.

• Guarrasi, I., Hopwood, N., Blunden, A., Wright, D. F. B., Anakin, M. (2025). Foundational concepts in cultural-historical activity theory: A missing opportunity to address challenges in pharmacy practice. Research in Social and Administrative Pharmacy, 21(6), 487–493.

• Kerber, A., Guarrasi, I., Chiou, H. S., Ehmke, S., Oeding, K., & Sekimoto, S. (2024). Garden EngAGEment: Cultivating cultures of care through artful place-making. Health Communication, 1–11.

• Guarrasi, I., Cornell, R., & Clemenson, S. (2024). Interprofessional collaboration as a feminist pedagogy: A call for the unsettling of care in health professions education. Feminist Pedagogy, 5(1), Article 6.

• Guarrasi, I. (2022). “The Heart of the Simulated Matter: Interprofessional Training Practices of Clinical Care." In Making Sense of Medicine: Material Culture and the Reproduction of Medical Knowledge, John Nott and Anna Harris (Eds.). Bristol, UK & Chicago, USA: Intellect, 205-217.
• Jornet-Gil, A., Guarrasi, I., Rajala, A. (2020). “LCHC's Expanding Bio-geographies: A glimpse to the future(s) through the case of the Re-generating CHAT project." Mind, Culture & Activity, 27(2).
• Guarrasi, I. (2019). Semiotic Body of a Standardized Patient as a Map of Clinical Practice. Versus - Quaderni di studi semiotici 129(2), 333-362.
• Guarrasi, I. (2015). Residual Categories in Medical Simulation: The Role of Affect in the Performance of Disease. Mind, Culture, and Activity 22(2), 112-128.