Özden Ocak, PhD – About Me

My curiosity about the human psyche goes back to my childhood. As the daughter of a transcendental meditation teacher, becoming acquainted early on with concepts such as “awareness” and “self-reflection” opened for me, at a very young age, the doors to a rich world of meaning that I would both explore with curiosity and gradually build over time.

After elementary school, I attended İstanbul Erkek Lisesi for my secondary education. During this transition from childhood to adolescence, studying at this school opened many doors for me to make sense of myself and the world through literature, philosophy, and art, and to relate to the world with a joyful curiosity.

After graduating from high school, I began my studies in the Department of Psychology at Middle East Technical University (METU), which I had long aspired to. Following my undergraduate degree, I turned toward different fields within the social sciences and humanities. Cultural Studies drew my attention because it sought to understand the world through psychoanalytic theory, critical thought, and structuralist/post-structuralist approaches, moving beyond conventional academic boundaries. To pursue this path, I began doctoral studies at George Mason University in the United States.

During my doctoral work, I focused on themes of identity, belonging, migration, racism, and nationalism. As part of my research, I also spent time in France and the Netherlands, studying the dynamics of migration in those contexts. After completing my PhD, I held academic positions at several universities in the United States. Over nearly fifteen years in the U.S., my academic life was deeply intertwined with cultural and social questions. Writing, thinking, and analyzing were my main ways of making sense of the world.

Over time, I was drawn to explore how the themes I had studied intellectually-identity, loss, migration, belonging-were also reflected in people’s inner worlds. This orientation brought me back to psychology, and particularly to clinical work. I enrolled in the Clinical Psychology Master’s Program at İstanbul Bilgi University, whose psychoanalytic orientation resonated with my earlier readings and way of thinking. I completed this program by writing a thesis on the experiences of migrants living in Istanbul, bringing together my academic background with my clinical formation.

I now work as a psychotherapist with adults, while also teaching both in the United States and Turkey on migration and psychoanalytic theory.