Dr. Erika Ono, RSW, is an Adjunct Professor in the School of Social Work (Faculty of Arts) and a Clinical Instructor in the Child and Adolescent Psychiatry Subspeciality Residency Training Program (Department of Psychiatry, Faculty of Medicine) at the University of British Columbia. Erika is a clinician-researcher, with clinical expertise in gender-based violence, trauma therapy, perinatal substance use, adult mental health, and neurodiverse child and youth mental health. Erika specializes in institutional ethnography, critical ethnography, and community-based participatory action research methods, as well as evaluative frameworks such as developmental and principles-focused evaluation. Her research explores social work with families in the contexts of interpersonal and systemic violence, and how it is shaped by the “best interests of the child” legal principle and social construct in child protection, family law, and healthcare. Erika’s practice, research, and pedagogy are firmly rooted in decolonial, intersectional, feminist, critical race, and critical disability theories.

PhD University of British Columbia
Faculty of Arts, School of Social Work

MSW University of British Columbia
Faculty of Arts, School of Social Work

BA University of Victoria
Faculty of Human and Social Development, School of Child and Youth Care
Faculty of Humanities, Department of Gender Studies

• Cluster Member, 2024 (ongoing)
  • Research Excellence Clusters, Office of VP Research and Innovation, University of British Columbia
  • Cluster name: Thriving in community: Re-imagining supports for children with medical complexity and their families.

• Co-Investigator (PI: Anamaria Richardson), 2022-2023
  • Health After 2020: Health in Unexpected Places, University of British Columbia
  • Title: Reframing dialogue through embodied approaches: Surpassing barriers to health in a verbal world.

• Co-Investigator (PI: Anamaria Richardson), 2021-2022
  • Community-University Engagement Support, University of British Columbia
  • In partnership with the Family Support Institute of BC
  • Title: A community-university partnership to improve health outcomes of families and caregivers of children and youth impacted by self-injurious behaviours (SIB)

• Co-Investigator (PI: Deborah O’Connor), 2018-2023
  • Title: The violence of “best interests of the child”: Social work in the ruling relations

Peer-Reviewed Journals

Iyamu, I., Berger, M., Ono, E., & Salmon, A. (2021). Creating effectiveness principles for principles-focused developmental evaluations in health-care initiatives: Lessons learned from three cases in British Colombia. Canadian Journal of Program Evaluation, 36(1). https://doi.org/10.3138/cjpe.70804

Ono, E., Friedlander, R., & Salih, T. (2019). Falling through the cracks: How service gaps leave children with neurodevelopmental disorders and mental health difficulties without the care they need. British Columbia Medical Journal, 61(3), 114-124. https://bcmj.org/sites/default/files/BCMJ_Vol61_No3-service-gaps.pdf

Ono, E. (2017). Reformulating the use of battered woman syndrome testimonies in Canadian law: Implications for social work practice. Affilia: Journal of Women and Social Work, 32(1), 24-36. https://doi.org/10.1177/0886109916679862

Ono, E. (2013). Violence against racially minoritized women: Implications for social work. Affilia: Journal of Women and Social Work, 28(4), 458-467. https://doi.org/10.1177/0886109913505044

Book Chapters

Riaño-Alcalá, P., & Ono, E. (2021). Trajectories of life and belonging in the Neighbourhood houses of Metro Vancouver. In M. Chung Yan & S. Lauer (Eds.), Place-based solution to urban disconnection: Neighbourhood houses in Metro Vancouver. Vancouver, BC: UBC Press.

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