Dawn Wink, Phd

Dawn Wink, PhD, is an educator and writer whose work explores the tensions and beauty of language, culture, and place. Wink’s transdisciplinary professional journey includes 25+ years in multilingual and international education, along with a dedication to creative writing. She brings these passions together through teaching, presenting, and publishing, working with educators around the world.

Dr. Wink’s educational journey includes a Bachelor of Arts in International Relations, Spanish, and German at the University of California/Davis; Master of Arts in Crosscultural and Bilingual Leadership from California State University/Sacramento; and Ph.D. in Transformative Studies from the California Institute of Integral Studies. Her doctoral studies focused on ecolinguistics and linguistic human rights and the transdisciplinary exploration of stories at the intersection of language and landscape through the lenses of wildness, beauty, and imagination. Wink received the TESOL Trainer-of-Trainer certification from the School for International Training in Battleboro, VT, and is an English Language Specialist of the U.S Department of State, Washington, DC. 

Wink’s publications include: Teaching Passionately: What’s Love Got To Do With It, co-written with Joan Wink (Pearson, 2005); Meadowlark (Pronghorn Press, 2013), awarded the Women Writing the West WILLA Award for Historical Fiction/Finalist, High Plains Book Award for Woman Writer/Finalist, and NM/AZ Book Awards for Historical Fiction/Finalist; “Beyond the Brick Wall: Transdisciplinary and Creative Research through Scholarly Personal Narrative and Lilyology” in Creative Research Methods (Bristol Press, 2024); “Raven’s Time: Critical Literacy in the American Southwest” (Critical Literacy: Theories and Practices, 2009); Wild Waters: Landscapes of Language,”(Langscape, 2015), and “Language, Culture, and Land: Lenses of Lilies” (Langscape, 2022). 

Dr. Wink is Academic Director of the Department of Teacher Education at Santa Fe Community College in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Wink serves as a Faculty Mentor with the Regenerative Practices and Visionary Leadership PhD Program at Southwestern College. She presents regularly on pedagogy, education, creative writing, ecolinguistics, linguistic human rights, and research methods. She loves flowers, sunrises, and sunsets and lives with her family in Santa Fe.