Institute Faculty

ABOUT US

Core Teaching & Supervising Faculty

(This page is currently being updated.)

Mary Olson, MA, PhD, LICSW

Founding Director, Trainer & Supervisor

Mary Olson, PhD is director of the Institute for Dialogic Practice and a clinical assistant professor of psychiatry at the Yale University School of Medicine. A psychotherapist, family therapist and educator with over 30 years of experience, she has specialized in developing new training formats for dialogic and reflecting practices as these have evolved from family therapy.

In 2001, she was a Fulbright Scholar in the Department of Psychology at the University of Jyväskylä, Finland and studied  “Open Dialogue” at Keropudas Hospital and closely related “Reflecting-Process Work” at the Acute Team, Tromso, Norway.  This was a turning point in her career.  From 2011-2017, she established and co-led the first US Open Dialogue research study at University of Massachusetts Medical School in Worcester, MA and Grady Hospital, Atlanta, GA. In 2011, she established the first training program in Dialogic Practice/Open Dialogue in the United States.

Mary lectures internationally: e.g., Harvard Medical School, Yale School of Medicine, University of Helsinki, Royal Society of Medicine (UK), University of Bergamo, University of Rome, Women’s College, Beijing, China, Tokyo University and Kyoto University, Japan. As a senior Open Dialogue trainer/supervisor, she has participated in training efforts in many countries, including the UK, Ireland, Portugal, Japan, Argentina and Mexico.  She has given many conference keynotes, plenaries, and workshops and been interviewed by The New York Times, and other media outlets.  She maintains an active private therapy and consulting practice in Connecticut and treats individuals, couples and families with variety of presenting  concerns. She is a member of the American Academy of Family Therapy.

From 1991-2017, she taught family therapy at Smith College School for Social Work and, from 1988-1995, she directed the clinical externship at the Family Center of the Berkshires, Pittsfield, MA (under the chairmanship of family-therapy pioneer Carlos Sluzki, MD).

After graduating from Wellesley College, Mary earned an MA in English and comparative literature, with high honors, from Columbia University, and an MSW from Smith College. She was trained in psychoanalytic/psychodynamic therapies at Smith and later obtained advanced training in systemic family therapy at the Family Institute of Cambridge and the Ackerman Institute, NYC. While working at the Family Center of the Berkshires, which, during the 1990s had a international orbit, she learned directly from Tom Andersen, Michael White, Lynn Hoffman, Peggy Penn, Marcelo Pakman and other leading innovators who taught in the Center’s summer intensives.   At the same time, she earned her PhD from the Department of Communication, with a concentration in interpersonal relations, at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst where she was a recipient of the prestigious University Fellowship.

See publications

Nazlim Hagmann, MD

Associate Director, Trainer & Supervisor

Nazlim Hagmann, MD is a leading psychiatrist and trauma specialist in New York City.  For many years, she worked in public, community settings before establishing a well-respected private practice in Manhattan in 2008. Throughout her career she has been interested in learning, understanding and working in alternative ways with people in extreme states.

Nazlim earned her medical degree at Albert Ludwigs University in Freiburg, Germany, did her residency training at SUNY Downstate and Albert Einstein University, and completed a fellowship in public psychiatry at Columbia University.  She has a master’s degree in Public Health from Heinrich Heine University in Duesseldorf, Germany and a Certificate in Trauma Studies from New York University.  In 2013, she completed the two-year training at the Institute and then a subsequent certification as a trainer in Dialogic Practice/Open Dialogue.

In her private practice in Manhattan, Nazlim sees individuals and families and provides psychiatric consultation.

Rebecca Hatton, PsyD

Trainer & Supervisor

Rebecca Hatton is a clinical psychologist in independent practice in Ann Arbor, MI specializing in psychotherapy with people experiencing psychosis.  She worked 17 years in public sector clinics in Detroit and Ann Arbor, leaving due to creative differences 10 years ago.  She began a life-changing immersion in Open Dialogue and related practices at that time.  She was among the first group of Americans to complete international certification in 2013, followed by training certification in 2020, at the Institute for Dialogic Practice.  During this time she also studied with Betram Karon, PhD, an inspiration for the creators of Open Dialogue.  She has been peer-trained in a variety of approaches to engaging with voices, including Maastricht Interviews, and started and facilitated the Ann Arbor chapter of Hearing Voices Network.  She is well-versed in CBT, psychodynamic, compassion-focused, and acceptance and commitment therapies modified for psychosis.  For the past decade, she has taught workshops across Michigan in relational ways of working with psychosis and currently hosts “inter-vision” groups among colleagues exploring dialogic ideas.  She is working on a text she hopes can serve as an adjunct to Open Dialogue training and contribute to the wider discourse around mad studies.

Jorma Ahonen, MSc

Trainer & Supervisor

Jorma Ahonen is a is a social psychologist and advanced-level psychotherapist in Helsinki, Finland.

Adjunct Faculty

Russell Razzaque, MD

Russell Razzaque is an internationally-recognized psychiatrist and researcher in the UK.   He is currently leading a national initiative in the UK, “Peer-Supported Open Dialogue to the National Health Service,” coordinating a multi-centre, randomized-design, controlled trial. He trained at the Royal London Hospital and has worked for the UK Ministry of Justice, the University of Cambridge, and the National Health Service. He currently works as a Consultant Psychiatrist in northeast London, where he is also Director of Research. Additionally, he currently serves as an elected member of the national governing Council of the Royal College of Psychiatrists, and he is a Visiting Professor at London South Bank University. Russell has published numerous academic papers  as well as books on spirituality.  He is a regular contributor to several national and international media outlets  including Psychology Today, The Guardian, The Telegraph and The Independent.

Peter Rober, PhD

Peter Rober, PhD is  a professor of family therapy at the Institute for Family and Sexuality Studies at the University of Leuven, Belgium and an internationally-recognized clinical psychologist, family therapist and family therapy trainer at Context: The Center for Marital and Family Therapy (UPC KU Leuven, Belgium. Peter has made key contributions to the development of dialogical therapy and published widely on various topics, including the inner dialogue of the therapist, anti-colonizing practices, working with refugees, and loss.  He is the author of several books, including “In Therapy Together: Family Therapy as a Dialogue (2017). His research interest areas focus on the practice of family therapy and on the therapy process, including especially the self of the therapist and the therapist’s inner conversation.

Jaakko Seikkula, PhD

Jaakko is an emeritus professor of psychotherapy at the University of Jyväskylä, Finland, with over 40 years of experience in clinical, research and teaching. From 1981 to 1998 he was chief psychologist at Keropudas Hospital in Finland and is a founding member of the Open Dialogue approach. He has been a lecturer and trainer in Europe, Asia and America, and has more than 190 published articles and books on the principles, practice and evidence of the Open Dialogue approach and dialogical practices in mental health. He has also won awards for his research career at the European Family Association (EFTA) and the American Family Therapy Academic (AFTA).

Visiting Lecturers

M.T.F. María del Rocío Chaveste Gutiérrez, Ph.D

Founder, general director, professor and clinical supervisor at Kanankil Institute in Merida, Yucatan, Mexico. Dr. Chaveste is an Adjunct Professor at the Houston Galveston Institute, an Associate member of the Taos Institute and a member of the Relational Research Network of the same Institute.  She has a Ph.D. in Social Psychology, and three Master Degrees: Family and Couples Therapy, Organizational Management, and Political Communication and Electoral Marketing. She was the Director of Social Development for the Municipality of Merida during 2001-2004. She is the co-author of the book Prácticas socioconstruccionistas y colaborativas: psicoterapia, educación y comunidad, 2010; and editor of Identidades, y Relaciones: una mirada desde el Socioconstruccionismo y las prácticas colaborativas y dialógicas, 2014. She has also published several articles on Collaborative and Dialogic Practices. Most recently, with ML Papusa Molina was the compilator of Harlene, conversaciones interrumpidas… (2019), a collection of translated essays written by Harlene Anderson and published by the Taos Institute World Share Book series.

Maria Luisa (Papusa) Molina, PhD

Dr. Molina received a Ph.D. in Educational Leadership with emphasis in Women’s Studies, Public Administration and Chicano Studies from the University of Iowa; she also holds a MA in Education and Development from the same university.   Previous to her work at Instituto Kanankil as the Executive Director, she was the Coordinator for Academic Development at Universidad de Oriente (2006-2009) and served as the General Director of the National Institute for Women from 2002-2006 in Mexico.  She has also held different positions as professor, among them: James Watson Irwin Distinguished Chair in Women’s Studies at Hamilton College, New York (1994-1996); professor at the San Francisco Institute for Integral Studies (1996-1999), teaching in the Feminism and Spirituality Master´s Degree Program. She is a guest Professor at the Houston Galveston Institute; an Associate member of the Taos Institute, and a member of the Relational Research Network of the same Institute. Dr. Molina was a co-founder of Women Against Racism and recipient of the Phillip Hubbard Human Rights Award. Her early publications and research focused on the intersections of gender, race, class, and sexuality; most recently she has been engaged with issues of research methodology from a collaborative and dialogical perspective. Most recently, with Rocio Chaveste, was the compilator of Harlene, conversaciones interrumpidas… (2019), a collection of translated essays written by Harlene Anderson and published by the Taos Institute World Share Book series. .