Giana Tomas
PHD STUDENT, RECREATION AND LEISURE STUDIES
Pursuing research that hits home
HEALTH
Giana Tomas
PHD STUDENT, RECREATION AND LEISURE STUDIES
Pursuing research that hits home
What does home mean to you? Whether it’s a place or a feeling, the concept is something Giana Tomas, a PhD student in Waterloo’s Faculty of Health, thinks we often take for granted.
“We tend to see home as something super stable,” she says. “But for people who relocate, trans-locate, emigrate — people undergoing massive change and transitions — what does home look like?”
The question is both personal and academic for Giana. Born and raised in the Philippines, her family immigrated to Halifax seven years ago. After completing her undergrad in Kinesiology and master’s in Recreation and Leisure Studies, both at Dalhousie University, she picked up and moved again — this time to pursue doctoral studies at Waterloo.
Health and well-being start at home
As Giana enters the second year of her PhD in Recreation and Leisure Studies, she’s channeling her lived experience of migration into her research. Her topic is an extension of master’s research exploring the connections between leisure and identity for Filipino immigrants experiencing unemployment or underemployment.
Through that project, she realized home is an important aspect of identity, health and well-being for newcomers. In her PhD research, she plans to investigate the ways in which migrants’ experiences shape “how they embody home” through cultural practices, cooking, family relationships and more.
Giana’s research questions are especially relevant as global conflict, political upheaval and natural disasters fuel the forced migration of millions of people around the world.
“Home is often apoliticized. But in terms of diasporic communities, home is so different for everybody. In this day and age, where there’s a war between Russia and Ukraine, and people have been de-homed or displaced, what does home even mean for them?”
Finding a research home in Rec and Leisure
While she’s always been interested in health and well-being, Giana says she found the biomedical model of health limiting. She wanted to explore diverse factors that impact health — things like family dynamics, language, cultural backgrounds and hobbies. Recreation and Leisure Studies was the perfect fit.
“Waterloo is the leading university for recreation and leisure studies in Canada. There was nowhere else I wanted to be. The people writing the books and articles I was reading — they were all from here.”
She says she feels “really blessed” to have found, not only a program she’s passionate about, but also a supportive community in her department, meaningful relationships with colleagues and professors, and a supervisor — Professor Kimberley Lopez — who “always has my back.”
“I think it's really this community of care in Recreation and Leisure. It’s pretty small maybe compared to other departments at Waterloo, but we’re all looking out for each other in both professional and personal ways.”
Putting research into practice
Like many Waterloo graduate students, Giana is eager to apply her learning and research to real-world challenges. As part of the Graduate Student Association (GSA) Affordable Housing Initiative Research and Action Group, she works as a liaison between graduate students and the municipality, conducting community research and presenting reports. She’s also the GSA Housing Coordinator, responsible for supporting students and advocating for affordable housing on and off campus.
With so many students being impacted by the housing crisis and the rising cost of living, she hopes her contributions will have a positive impact on campus and beyond.
While Giana plans to pursue a career in academia and is completing the Certificate in University Teaching offered by the Centre for Teaching Excellence in preparation, she says hands-on engagement with the community will always be an important part of her work.
“I look back to something one of my professors said. We don't just wake up one day picking a random research topic. It's a research topic that means something to us and, therefore, we pursue it. I always keep that in mind and look for meaningful ways to not only follow my passion, but also contribute.”
Health and well-being start at home
As Giana enters the second year of her PhD in Recreation and Leisure Studies, she’s channeling her lived experience of migration into her research. Her topic is an extension of master’s research exploring the connections between leisure and identity for Filipino immigrants experiencing unemployment or underemployment.
Through that project, she realized home is an important aspect of identity, health and well-being for newcomers. In her PhD research, she plans to investigate the ways in which migrants’ experiences shape “how they embody home” through cultural practices, cooking, family relationships and more.
Giana’s research questions are especially relevant as global conflict, political upheaval and natural disasters fuel the forced migration of millions of people around the world.
“Home is often apoliticized. But in terms of diasporic communities, home is so different for everybody. In this day and age, where there’s a war between Russia and Ukraine, and people have been de-homed or displaced, what does home even mean for them?”
Finding a research home in Rec and Leisure
While she’s always been interested in health and well-being, Giana says she found the biomedical model of health limiting. She wanted to explore diverse factors that impact health — things like family dynamics, language, cultural backgrounds and hobbies. Recreation and Leisure Studies was the perfect fit.
“Waterloo is the leading university for recreation and leisure studies in Canada. There was nowhere else I wanted to be. The people writing the books and articles I was reading — they were all from here.”
She says she feels “really blessed” to have found, not only a program she’s passionate about, but also a supportive community in her department, meaningful relationships with colleagues and professors, and a supervisor — Professor Kimberley Lopez — who “always has my back.”
“I think it's really this community of care in Recreation and Leisure. It’s pretty small maybe compared to other departments at Waterloo, but we’re all looking out for each other in both professional and personal ways.”
Putting research into practice
Like many Waterloo graduate students, Giana is eager to apply her learning and research to real-world challenges. As part of the Graduate Student Association (GSA) Affordable Housing Initiative Research and Action Group, she works as a liaison between graduate students and the municipality, conducting community research and presenting reports. She’s also the GSA Housing Coordinator, responsible for supporting students and advocating for affordable housing on and off campus.
With so many students being impacted by the housing crisis and the rising cost of living, she hopes her contributions will have a positive impact on campus and beyond.
While Giana plans to pursue a career in academia and is completing the Certificate in University Teaching offered by the Centre for Teaching Excellence in preparation, she says hands-on engagement with the community will always be an important part of her work.
“I look back to something one of my professors said. We don't just wake up one day picking a random research topic. It's a research topic that means something to us and, therefore, we pursue it. I always keep that in mind and look for meaningful ways to not only follow my passion, but also contribute.”