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and are launching a new series called “Disruptions: Dialogues on Disability Art,” curated by Michael Orsini to explore contemporary art as a force for challenging ableism.

The event takes place from 7:00 – 9:00 p.m. on Tuesday, 27 February, in Room 372, Residence Commons Building, located on Campus Avenue at �Ӱ�ԭ�� University. Admission is free and everyone is welcome! Light refreshments will be provided.

In this presentation, Lindsay Eales and Danielle Peers dance a quartet with disability and madness. They draw together critical disability and Mad theory, spoken word, dance performance, and film. They weave these forms into critical reflections on representations of disability and madness in the arts, access to the arts, and the generative possibilities of cripping and maddening the arts. The presentation will be followed by a discussion with Lindsay and Danielle.

Lindsay Eales is a PhD candidate in the Faculty of Kinesiology, Sport and Recreation at the University of Alberta who studies disability, madness and dance. She is the Co-Artistic Director of CRIPSiE (the Collaborative Radically Integrated Performers Society) in Edmonton, which centres dance by and for people experiencing disability as well as their artistic and political allies. She has choreographed and performed integrated dance for 10 years. Her Masters research focused on practices and performances of social justice in integrated dance. Her PhD research is on Madness and performance art. For her research-creation work weaving together critical disability studies, Mad studies and dance, she has been awarded the Vanier Canada Graduate Scholarship (SSHRC), the Alberta Arts Graduate Scholarship, and the Alberta Award for the Study of Human Rights and Multiculturalism.

Danielle Peers is a community organizer, artist and Assistant Professor in the Faculty of Kinesiology, Sport and Recreation at the University of Alberta. Danielle uses critical disability and poststructuralist theories to study disability movement cultures: from the Paralympics, to inclusive recreation, to disability arts. Their research builds on their experiences as a Paralympian, filmmaker and dancer with CRIPSiE (Collaborative Radically Integrated Performers Society) in Edmonton. Danielle is the Director of the Media in Motion Lab, which supports creative methods for producing and sharing knowledges about human bodies in motion.

Michael Orsini is Professor in the School of Political Studies at the University of Ottawa. He is co-editor (with Christine Kelly) of Mobilizing Metaphor: Art, Culture and Disability Activism in Canada (UBC Press, 2016). He is currently part of a SSHRC-funded Partnership Grant, Bodies in Translation: Activist Art, Technology and Access to Life, which explores how activist art can be mobilized to promote social justice and an appreciation for diverse minds and bodies.

The full description of this event is on the CUAG site, here ().

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The Institute of Interdisciplinary Studies — Child Studies Presents

Reconfiguring Childhood at a Time of Climate Crisis by Guest Lecturer Dr. Veronica Pacini-Ketchabaw

The has emerged as a figure of uncertain and precarious futures, requiring new kinds of thought and action. Yet, childhood studies has not engaged deeply with the Anthropocene. Dr. Pacini-Ketchabaw will engage with responses to the Anthropocene within childhood studies and argue that we need to be attentive to place, to engage with educators and children, to adopt a critical response to address the social and environmental legacies of settler colonialism. “In this talk, I will introduce ‘common world pedagogies’ as an alternative perspective to neocolonial environmental stewardship approaches, and aspire to reconfigure colonial relations between childhood and nature,” explains Dr. Pacini-Ketchabaw.

is a professor in early childhood education at .  Her academic background in early childhood education and her current work as a pedagogista are combined with insights from feminist theory, environmental humanities, Indigenous studies, and cultural geography. Her interdisciplinary research with educators and young children explores the possibilities of common world pedagogies. These pedagogies support children to pay close attention to place, to other species, and to how we all got to be in the space we share. Dr. Pacini-Ketchabaw is interested in how we might learn with other species in the colonial spaces we co-inhabit. She can be contacted at: vpacinik@uwo.ca

Tuesday, January 30^th, 7:00 – 9:00 pm

Azrieli Theatre 102

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Professor Dan Irving researches trans people and communities as they navigate the Canadian labour force

This past year, the Liberal Government led by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau introduced federal legislation aimed to secure human rights and legal protection for transgendered people in Canada. states that the Canadian Human Rights Act be altered to “add gender identity and gender expression to the list of prohibited grounds of discrimination.” The Bill also amends the Criminal Code to increase protection against hate speech and propaganda targeting varied manifestations of gender identity.

It is important to note that this is the seventh time that a similarly worded bill has been introduced in Canada’s Parliament, the previous six attempts having been unsuccessful.

Although C-16 currently remains in the Senate, the speed in which it passed through the House of Commons should function as a symbolic step forward in Canada’s recognition of the profound issues faced by the Canadian community of lesbian, bisexual, gay, transgender, queer/ questioning (LBGTQ) people.

This recent federal movement towards legislative equality has much to do with the authentic change affecting knowledge cultivated by researchers, activists, and scholars including Professor Dan Irving of the Human Rights and Sexuality Studies programs in the Institute of Interdisciplinary Studies and the Pauline Jewett Institute, Women’s and Gender Studies.

Specifically, Professor Irving’s qualitative research focuses on transgender unemployment and underemployment in urban pockets across Canada. His current project, which will culminate in a forthcoming book, evaluates and decrypts the major issues, and the often dire realities that many trans people face while trying to obtain and maintain work.

Irving uses interviewing as a primary research tool to understand and reveal the ways that perceived conceptions of gender normativity influence those who are likely (and those who are not likely) to be recognized as employable in a service relation-based economy.

“For the book, I weave narratives of gender non-conformity and how these anecdotes relate to the modern-day workforce,” said Irving. “What I see again and again is the phenomenon of job ghettoization for trans people. That is to say, they are typically either struggling to obtain employment or being segregated and oppressed in the workforce.”

Irving goes on to explain that the “labour market depends so much on ideas of effective labour.”

“Workers are called upon to use their entire bodies and minds within a service relation-based economy— an economy geared to create positive feelings among clients and customers.”

“The ability to do this ‘effectively’ in the minds of employers, is based on notions of gender and sexuality normativity, whiteness and perceptions of ableness.”

“If you don’t meet these standards, you get classified as threatening, and thus ineffective, making, acquiring, and, or maintaining employment a particularly daunting task, regardless of your qualifications.”

Irving reminisced about one of his interviewees, an enthusiastic trans woman with a nursing degree who could not get a job. Although she possessed all the credentials and was passionate and ambitious, she was stuck in a loop of working entry-level positions. “It’s tragic. She crackled with energy and competency,” said Irving. “Like so many others, the fact that she couldn’t get work had a profound impact on her self-worth.”

Logging the underlying moral economy of this all, Irving further explainedthat employability is a lens through which many people deduce much of their personal sense of dignity. “Trans people lose jobs for reasons that have nothing to do with their skillsets.”

“Once this happens to a person a few times in their life, they no longer view themselves as employable and have no expectation of suitable employment. Their identity becomes ensnarled in this perception of not being good enough.” Of course, all of this leaves trans people with little choice but to acquire their money through criminalized activities—undertakings which tend to expedite disenfranchise – ment and marginalization.

When speaking with Irving, it is quickly evident that he realizes the moral component of his work. With this self-awareness, he explained that he operates as a research activist on two registers. “I always push for more work to get done and to make sure that it is sustainable. It is undeniably interdisciplinary research, and we have to understand that there are many factors in need of consideration. How do we mediate race, gender, class, and exploitation? What I’m studying can be tragic, and there are so many moving parts, so we need to generate reports that o ffer clear direction.”

“Second, we need to investigate the root of all marginalization. We need to force ourselves to confront the illusions fostered by capitalism.”

Professor Irving is a self-described Marxist, who became “politicized” in his late teens. As he transitioned in the early 2000s, Irving began to think a lot about questions surrounding the identity politics intrinsic to life as a trans person. Irving also nurtured his personal politicization by studying and deciphering how societal constructs shape our greater understanding of where we all fit. As might be expected, Irving had always yearned to be an agent of change. “I thought I’d be a lawyer, but after some university experience as an undergraduate (and total geek), I knew that academia was the profession I wanted to pursue.”

“At the time, I was witnessing this amazing galvanization in the trans community around identity, and I wanted to be an ally. So, I wrote my dissertation at York which focused on how organizations approach trans identity on three sites of political intervention—the union movement, feminist activism, specifically homeless and Violence Against Women shelters, and LGBT rights organizations.”

“Soon after I finished my Ph.D., I got a call from �Ӱ�ԭ��—my first professional interview—and I was offered a professorship.”

In fact, Irving was �Ӱ�ԭ�� University’s very first hire in the Sexuality Studies program. The irony of Irving’s rapid professional success is not lost on him. “You know, I feel like I have the best job in the world and recognize my personal privilege and influence, so I have to be cognizant and sensitive as I approach people who are less fortunate.”

As a trans person himself, Irving can share many of his own vulnerabilities with the community he studies, which he believes is essential. “I can relate to other’s fears, history, personal trials and issues through our shared identity. Typically, this gains me a degree of trust.”

“It also helps that I’ve been doing this for awhile, so I am something of a known entity in Ottawa and Toronto. I’ve always taken a very honest approach, and I think that my reputation often precedes me.”

Through his years of experience, Irving is still regularly surprised to learn of the resiliency of his interviewees. Although some trans people without work inevitably end up working in illicit (and often dangerous) trades, others establish alternative economies. Irving has met people who, in the absence of an employer, have created volunteer phone hotlines and embarked on careers as independent artists. Meanwhile, others embrace self-care through activities such as fitness, attending support meetings, and offering to counsel to others.

As he reflected on the hundreds of hours he’s spent interviewing members of trans communities, Professor Irving stated with conviction that “trans people are the storytellers of our society.”

“You meet these marginalized individuals who are often impoverished, dealing with mental health issues, and face obstacles most will never confront in their lifetime, and still, their spirit shines through.”

While the Canadian Government continues to debate Bill C-16, through his research, Irving and his interviewees give voice for the often unspoken and unspeakable feelings that particular bodies are worthless or worth less than others in the labour market—an exclusion that has a debilitating emotional impact on trans people and communities. To secure real societal change, Irving believes this effort needs to be collaborative.

“In my role as a trans scholar, I’m privileged in that I’ve been given access to spaces of privilege that many do not have. Although I’ve been granted access, I’m simply a bridge to trans community activists who lead the way forward despite the fact that they’re cast into social locations that are severely marginalized and compromised. They are the central figures in action on Bill C-16. These types of progressive movements forward are propelled by the tenacity and relentless pursuit of social justice taken on by trans community members.”

Professor Dan Irving’s forthcoming book, (Title TBA) will be released through Canadian Scholar’s Press. It is part of a three book series which Irving edits entitled “Studies in Trans* and Two Spirit Community Engagement”.

• A survey lead by Trans Pulse Project in 2010 disclosed that out of the almost 500 transgender respondents in Ontario, 20% reported having been physically or sexually assaulted, though not all of them reported the assaults to police.
• The respondent-driven sampling survey found 13% reported being fired and 18% refused a job because they were transgender.
• In 2016, about 299 trans deaths were recorded worldwide, including 23 in the United States. This is the second highest number since such records began in 2008.

Professor Dan Irving was a fall 2016 lecturer for FASS’ ongoing CU in the City series. His talk was titled Depressed Economies: Transgender Un/deremployment. Learn more about CU in the City.

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by Nick Ward

The term “pura vida” is a colloquialism unique to Costa Rica.

The direct translation of pura vida is “pure life,” and it is meant to express a national ethos of eternal optimism. Costa Ricans use pura vida as a means to say hello, goodbye, thank you and you’re welcome – really, it is a sort of phrasing catch-all used for almost any situation. Pura vida is a persistent reminder that no matter the circumstances, life is beautiful and we’re all fortunate to be enjoying the ride. In fact, uttering pura vida is such a prevalent Costa Rican trait, that most would affirm that the adage is less of a slogan and more of a lifestyle.

This perception of Costa Rica as a laissez-faire, friendly, and optimistic nation certainly bolsters its conventional reputation as a picture-perfect tourist destination. Combine this dispositional repute with the country’s flush but traversable rain forest, its beautiful beaches on both the Pacific and Caribbean coastline, and its proximity to North America, and it is easy to understand Costa Rica’s magnetism. Unsurprisingly, the promise of the pure life and beautiful landscape attracts nearly three million cautiously-intrepid pasty-skinned, cargo short wearing tourists annually. Most of whom are quick (again unsurprisingly) to adopt and make liberal use of the aforementioned phrase “pura vida.”

With all that stated, it is important to remember that pura vida is a contextually pliable term.

In fact, for a significant portion of the many pasty-skinned tourists visiting Costa Rica each year, they are more likely to use the maxim to describe the country’s vibrant sex industry than to refer to the country’s beach culture.

[wide-image image=”21208″]

Photo Caption: Hotel Del Rey – The most popular sex tourism hotel in the Gringo Gulch neighbourhood.

In her newly released book, , Women’s and Gender Studies professor, Dr. Megan Rivers-Moore presents her extensive ethnographic research on the vast and complex sex industry that exists within the neighbourhood known as Gringo Gulch in Costa Rica’s capital city, San Jose.

“There are a lot of places in the world viewed as sex tourism hubs, but Costa Rica is unique for many reasons. For example, it’s proximity to the U.S. and the way the country has been marketed as safe, familiar, and affordable for travelers but also as “exotic” and different has made it especially appealing to many middle class and working class men from North America interested in participating in the sex industry,” said Rivers-Moore.

Professor Rivers-Moore attributes a number of factors to the booming market of sex tourism in Costa Rica. For one, the state does not regulate the exchange of money between sex worker and purchaser (though third party involvement such as managers or brothel administrators is illegal). While this lack of state intervention on the industry undeniably plays a massive role as to why sex tourists come to Costa Rica, Rivers-Moore’s research ascertains that, paramount to attracting sex migrants and tourists is the broad-minded social disposition towards the scene.

“From the perspective of the tourists, the state, and the sex-workers themselves, there exists an understanding as to why everybody is there and playing the role they are playing. Each of these players is profiting from the industry in one way or another, they are all using their participation to get ahead. And the stigma that surrounds sex-work in North America, particularly the turn toward criminalizing the sale of sex in many places, including in Canada most recently, is a major motivator for sex tourists who travel to Costa Rica. They are able to participate in the industry without risk of arrest and public shaming. Stigma for them isn’t a serious issue in Costa Rica, although it certainly is an issue for Costa Rican sex workers, who struggle to hide the source of their income from their families and communities.”

Rivers-Moore’s book actively challenges the narrative that most of us reflexively construct in our minds when presented with such a scenario – that the local sex workers of a Third World, Latin American country are being exploited and taken advantage of by privileged white, North American men.

Instead, Rivers Moore tells a more composite story of the Costa Rican sex tourism scene. “You quickly learn that we can’t presume to know what exactly is being bought and what is being sold. Often the exchanges have a lot more depth than the transaction of sex for money.”

“Many of the sex workers I interviewed articulated the idea that they viewed themselves also as care workers; believing they were providing a service to humbled white men who had run out of relationship options in their homeland. They took great pride in making these men feel good about themselves, and considered the caring aspects of their work (listening to men talk about their problems, making them feel attractive) was as important, if not more important, than the sex. Similarly, many of the men I met articulated that they view themselves as progressive and take a great deal of pride in treating the women they meet with respect in a culture they view as inherently misogynistic. This is a massive generalization about Costa Rican culture, of course, and one that is based on problematic assumptions and generalizations that are often pretty racist. But it’s significant that sex tourists want to think about themselves as enlightened and progressive, and some of them are well versed in feminism. Barry, a tourist from Virginia who took on a second job in order to fund periodic trips to Costa Rica, found it important to emphasize ‘I really appreciate them. I’m really glad they’re here, for me they’re a godsend. I’m sure lots of men treat them badly, but I make sure to be kind, to be respectful.’”

“Given the nature of sex tourism, there was a lot of talk from both sex workers and their clients about getting the ‘girlfriend experience,’ an experience that involves longer periods of time together, talking, listening, and sharing interests. This work involves quite a lot of skill, requiring patience, compassion, and empathy. For example, Virginia, a mother of two who attends secondary school at night, told me ‘some of them just look for company, they pay for company. I’m very happy to listen, as long as they pay. I’ll listen to it all. Cry, whatever, as long as you pay.’ It is so much more complicated than just sex.”

Rivers-Moore has a long standing academic relationship with Costa Rica. Prof. Rivers-Moore became interested in the country when she moved there after completing high school to spend a year learning Spanish and she was quickly enchanted with the nation’s considerable charm.

It was during this time in Costa Rica that she first noticed the prevalence of male tourists, but due to the subtle nature of the sex industry, it took her some time to recognize the dynamic at play. Once she understood what was occurring, she became fascinated, and focused much of her post-secondary education and early academic career on this phenomenon. Rivers-Moore completed her PhD at the and upon completion of her degree, she went on to work at the , where she continued her research on a more long term basis before accepting a job at .

This thorough Costa Rican research journey has ultimately led to the release of Gringo Gulch: Sex, Tourism, and Social Mobility in Costa Rica, an ethnographic work that analyzes and decodes the mosaic of race, gender, class, government, and human need and desire in our increasingly borderless world. For Gringo Gulch, Rivers-Moore spent over a year in San José’s sex tourism neighbourhood, interviewing tourists, actors of the state, and sex workers to achieve a vivid depiction of what being a player in this game is comprised of. The reader is introduced to a variety of characters from all sides who give their honest account as to why and/or how they participate in the Gringo Gulch scene, and what is taken away from it. “People sometimes assume that sex work is about villains and victims, and I think my work demonstrates that nothing could be further from the truth. It is so important to actually do empirical research and talk to people about their lives, because when we do, we find out that the sex industry is so many things simultaneously: it can be fun, it can be boring. Some people have harrowing experiences, and some find it utterly mundane. I really can’t emphasize enough how important it is to listen to people’s own interpretations of their lives and their experiences, without judgment.”

What Rivers-Moore is able to conclude from these characters is that most involved – the sex workers, the sex tourists and workers of the state – embrace the industry for their own sake, and use it to climb a social and/or monetary ladder that likely wouldn’t have been accessible to them without the existence of sex tourism.

By setting the scene in the culture of pura vida and telling us these distinctive stories of individuals (which are sometimes tragic, sometimes empowering and sometimes both), Gringo Gulch: Sex, Tourism, and Social Mobility in Costa Rica is an account of a nuanced social manifestation that helps us to understand the transnational ramifications of sex tourism. On an even broader scale, Gringo Gulch is the analysis of human beings making the most of their own disparate realities in a neoliberal state.

Professor Megan Rivers-Moore recently hosted an event at SAW Gallery to celebrate the publication of Gringo Gulch in collaboration with POWER (Prostitutes of Ottawa/Gatineau Work, Educate, and Resist) as a fundraiser for La Sala, Costa Rica’s sex workers’ rights organization. 

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by Monica Eileen Patterson, Assistant Professor, Institute of Interdisciplinary Studies

On a bright autumn day this past September, sixty or so members and friends of the �Ӱ�ԭ�� community gathered in front of Ottawa’s City Hall to embark upon an experimental walking tour of our city’s parliamentary precinct. A dozen speakers staged short, five-minute provocations at eight sites of existing, proposed, or future memorialization. Standing on a soap box and speaking into a bull horn, speakers probed the palimpsest nature of Ottawa’s memorial landscape while bearing witness to counter-memories and hidden histories that official sites often obscure.

Our walking tour was part of a broader conversation taking place that weekend which included the opening of the art exhibition “” at AXENÉO7 and a at the Université du Québec en Outaouais on the Commons, Counter Monumentality and Decolonization. In response to the Harper government’s controversial (and with the October 19th election of a Liberal majority, indefinitely stalled) for a Memorial to the Victims of Communism, a group of publically engaged academics, artists, and activists from Montreal and Ottawa participated in this constellation of events.

Our intention was to engage history in public, and to engage public history, in a playful, critical, embodied, and interactive way. Traipsing through the symbolic cultural capital of Canada’s capital city, we explored the spatial history of memory practices in Ottawa as represented in memorials to the past, the politics of the present, and proposals for the future.

I kicked off the tour with a stop at Nelson Mandela Square. Adjacent to the International Human Rights Monument where the South African leader stood during his 1998 visit to Canada, the square was commemorated in July 2014, a year and a half after Mandela’s death at the age of 95. Officiating the event, Mayor Jim Watson noted that “Mandela was a great leader and humanitarian who devoted his life to the pursuit of democracy and equality.” While few would disagree with this statement, it belies less comfortable truths that are often forgotten: namely that Mandela endorsed the use of violence and was active in the South African Communist Party.

Memorialization relies on selective memory. Monuments are always political and designed to shape values. In importing the figure of Mandela as a human rights defender to Canada, the complexity of his political ideologies and apartheid’s realities have often been flattened. The sanitizing of the history of the struggle against apartheid elides the crucial role of the South African Communist Party (SACP) in both Mandela’s political career and the struggle more broadly. The erasure of the SACP and other Communist orientations in the branding of the South African “miracle” of “reconciliation” and the production of Mandela’s celebrity are part of age-old and hegemonic tendencies to represent comfortable and convenient truths.

Speaking of hegemonic tendencies, our next stop was the National War Memorial. A popular destination on many tourist itineraries, it is also frequented by many locals, especially on commemorative days throughout the year. Rebecca Schein explained that pilgrimage sites such as Ottawa’s Parliamentary Precinct and the National Mall in Washington, D.C. “compress the geography of the nation into a walkable strip” that constructs a sense of historical continuity. This continuity connects past, present, and future, and asks visitors, “Why are we here, together? Who was here before? Who will be here later?” Seeking to open space for the profane in a site heavily freighted with sacred symbols and meaning, Schein asked group members to resist further sacralizing this site as a result of the recent shooting of Cpl. Nathan Cirillo that took place here, and asked us rather “to hold open space for the profanity of randomness, of mental illness, and of tragedy that is subnational in scale.”

We then walked over to Parliament Hill, to consider the large bronze statue of Emily Murphy, Henrietta Muir Edwards, Louise McKinney, Nellie McClung, and Irene Parlby, better known as “the Famous Five” for their efforts in the late 1920s to advocate that Canadian and British court systems recognize women as persons. Samah Sabrah began by noting her deep ambivalence about the monument. While she is grateful to these women for paving the way for many of the rights she now enjoys she acknowledged, “many of the rights they won were for a limited, namely white and upper-class segment of the population. I also know that their arguments were built on racist and eugenecist foundations.” Citing Emily Murphy’s inflammatory book The Black Candle, which reproduced fears of black men as hypersexual predators who posed a danger to white women’s innocence, Sabrah noted that while fighting for her right to own property and enjoy the full benefits of personhood, Murphy “infantalized women in the service of racist ideals.”

Reflecting on the ways in which the Famous Five’s commitments to rights and equality “extended only to some people at a cost of excluding and criminalizing others,” she invoked another famous five: The Security Certificate Five. “These are five men who, as noncitizens, have been held in custody first in prisons built specifically for them, then on extremely strict bail conditions. They are men whose legal and human rights have been denied. They are noncitizens who are accused of ties to terrorism and whose incarceration is on the basis of evidence that neither they nor their lawyers were allowed to access.” Arguing that legal tools like security certificates are part of broader discourses that work to instill fear of racialized men, Sabrah urged us to think about the ways in which these contemporary manifestations of denied personhood are also a part of the Famous Five’s legacy.

Brian McDougall then directed us to the “Triumph Through Diversity” Monument, erected last year as part of Harper’s $35 million campaign to celebrate Canada’s military accomplishments in the War of 1812. Drawing our attention to the generic First Nations man depicted in the statue, he noted that the only specific Indigenous individual depicted in Ottawa’s official statuary is Mohawk and British ally Joseph Brant. He next identified the first Metis figure to be depicted in statue form in the city, observing that “this generic British colonialism-defending Metis figure, a ‘good Metis’ is easily contrasted with ‘bad Metis’ leaders such as Louis Riel and Gabriel Dumont, who are not commemorated in Ottawa at all.”

Urging us to consider this recent monument within a broader effort by the Harper government “to use a cold-war revival to boost their case for militarism,” McDougall reminded us that in its earliest attempts to establish its militaristic credentials, the Canadian ruling class waged war against the ‘enemy within’: Indigenous Peoples.

In closing, he declared, “Sometime in Canada’s future, when the cold-warriors, businessmen, and defenders of colonialism are no longer in power, statues like this one will be melted down so people can adorn this city with more appropriate commemorations: Parliament Hill will be renamed Penency Hill, after the Algonquin family whose hunting ground this is; Tecumseh will be commemorated for his political and military accomplishments in the effort to defeat colonialism with an appropriate memorial; and Metis leaders like Louis Riel and Gabriel Dumont will be remembered for their vision of an Indigenous homeland free of the worst aspects of Canadian colonialism.”

Our next stop was in many ways the lynchpin for the various events of the weekend: the proposed site for the Memorial to the Victims of Communism. Resting on the grass beside the Supreme Court of Canada, we listened as long-time Ottawa architect Barry Padolsky described his protracted battle to halt plans for construction of the memorial. Next, Jennifer Henderson provided context for understanding the aesthetics and meanings associated with the brutalist architecture used by the memorial designers. Redeploying the exposed concrete and massive fortress-like structures “for the remembrance of communism as a historical ‘wrong,’” she argued, “the style announces in its scale and its material and its outmodedness that all communisms, the very idea of communism is passed, and distant, and monstrously inhuman.” Situating the proposal within the broader political context of the (then) Harper government and larger neoliberal project, Henderson argued that it “declares a permanent rejection of the model of social citizenship, of state-guaranteed welfare rights,” and lets us “know that the state is an agent of terror when it is turned to the goal of ‘equality.’”

Expanding on Henderson’s argument about Canada’s selective recognition of the wrongs in its past and its celebration of privatization, Stacy Douglas explored the broader ways in which memorializing practices function to manufacture a sense of collectivity. But she urged skepticism of such projects, rejecting a simplistic equation of representation with democracy in favor of a commitment to “disrupt the ideas of community that animate these institutions as well as the calls for more and better representation within them.”

Winding our way down the hill to the large empty field across from the Canadian War Museum, we stopped along the banks of the Ottawa River where Shady Hafez reflected on the divisive debates taking place around Windmill’s Zibi development project. Located on unceded Algonquin Anishinabe territory, like most of Eastern Ontario and Western Quebec– including Parliament Hill– the controversial project has ignited competing claims to indigeneity, and interference by self proclaimed allies. Hafez argued for the importance of giving Algonquin people the same space for complexity, disagreement, and diversity of interests that other communities are afforded, and urged allies to refrain from judging, co-opting, and speaking on behalf indigenous people.

Our next stop was another proposed site: that of the National Holocaust Monument. Nadine Blumer invoked the monument’s dual goal of honouring and mourning the victims of the Holocaust as well as celebrating the survivors who were given a second chance as refugees in Canada. Arguing that the NHM represents a rescripting of history, she noted that of all Western nations, Canada accepted the least amount of Jewish refugees between 1933-45, it turned away the S.S. Louis ship in 1939 carrying 903 Jewish refugees, most of whom were sent to concentration camps upon their return to Europe, and only opened its borders to Jewish refugees in 1948. Blumer also noted that “the NHM’s focus on ‘survivors’ and Canada’s ‘benevolent’ asylum policies mask contemporary restrictions in asylum law, particularly vis-à-vis Syrian asylum seekers today, who are being framed by the media and politicians as carriers of extremist and terrorist ideologies and religious fundamentalism.”

We completed our tour at one of Ottawa’s lesser known sites: Douglas Coupland’s Canadian Firefighters Memorial. Ian Mortimer and David Hugill led us in a thoughtful and at times ludic consideration of Coupland’s intentions in designing this colossal statue. As Hugill observed, the aesthetic of this giant statue of a lantern-jawed, brawny firefighter may be seen as an example of socialist realist monumentality in that it is proletarian, typical, realistic, and partisan. For him, however, Coupland’s reliance on familiar clichés “yielded the tragedy of these people’s demise to the dubious cult of hero worship and sacrificial glory.” Hugill prefers to focus on fallen firefighters as “not so different from ourselves… too fragile, vulnerable, and contingent, just like the rest of us.”

* * * * *

History is always selective. It always represents larger struggles, and always involves the romanticization and simplification of the past. For those interested in scratching below the surface of official narratives and generic forms, a walk through the memorial landscape of Ottawa yields many insights into the unresolved fissures of the past, the competing aims and interests of the present, and the attempts to harness and control the power of the future.

Check out video clips in our evolving digital platform document the  and on .

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Smithsonian archaeologist to visit �Ӱ�ԭ�� to speak about his work investigating the online trade in human remains on sites like Instagram

These days, it is said that you can find anything online. The research of Dr. Damien Huffer, post-doctoral fellow at the and , as well as colleagues at the , , and the , certainly adds clout to this theory.

Huffer, who will visit �Ӱ�ԭ�� on October 22-23, 2015 is sponsored by the and the Institute of Comparative Studies in Literature, Art and Culture, has been collaboratively researching the illicit trade of ethnographic and archeological human remains through online platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and eBay.

The practice of purchasing and selling the physical remains of those who have passed is but a subset of a much larger global emporium of the human body known as the “red market.” The red market includes the sale of everything from human blood, organs and tissues to the trafficking of living human beings. Though there is a significant amount of academic study and effort put towards understanding the illegal channels of commerce used to buy and sell rare antiquities, Huffer explains that much less is known about the shadowy trade of the dead that exists within today’s red market:

“Professor Duncan Chappell (a lawyer and criminologists from the University of Sydney, Australia) and I found there was a gap in the literature investigating this private trade in all types of human remains, so we began to combine our divergent but complimentary skill sets to find out more.”

“We discovered there’s a market for nearly all imaginable kinds of remains – Tibetan Buddhist paraphernalia such as drums and flutes made from human bone, mummies, so-called “trophy skulls,” World War skeletons, etc. are all coveted to one degree or another. Collectors want a piece of authenticated history. It really is the story the sells the skeleton.”

This unethical, oft-times shocking commodification of the dead is heavily sanctioned around the world, but, because there is little legal cohesion from country to country, there are some problematic loopholes in the enforcement of laws curtailing the illicit aspects of this trade. Consequently, many sellers have become quite resourceful in finding methods to move their products, and as demonstrated in Huffer and colleague’s research, hiding-in-plain-sight seems to be one of their preferred avenues. In their recently released paper, , the scholars depict a multitude of instances of how sellers have created online markets through the use of popular social websites like eBay, in addition to galleries and auction houses with a more public face. Considering the vastness of the internet, conducting the sleuth work necessary to track and record these occurrences took a great deal of time and concerted effort. This work has since expanded to Instagram, an unexpected marketplace.

“My colleagues and I would often find ourselves lost down eBay and Instagram rabbit holes. We came to understand that sellers would introduce their auctions online, but would finish the sale offline. There is so much data to analyze and the sellers are crafty. They can make it rather challenging to follow their paths” said Huffer.

Unfortunately, many of these sites rely very heavily on self-reporting from vigilant citizens and thus don’t police this phenomenon efficiently or effectively.

As exemplified by Huffer’s work, when archeology and the internet collide, a lot of new and important questions begin popping up. Professor Shawn Graham of the and member of the , who was instrumental in bringing Huffer to CU, believes this type of scrutiny is vital for a variety of reasons. “Damien’s work sits at the intersection of archaeology and the digital humanities in that it uncovers ways in which social media has real impact on the ground in the communities he works with. ‘Digital’ sometimes is imagined as existing ‘somewhere else’ – but what Damien’s research shows is that the digital and the material are horribly complicated with each other. There is no ‘virtual world’. There’s just this one!”

Graham also points out that Huffer’s work confronts the increasingly pervasive reality that many of our historical artefacts and symbols are being destroyed for completely illegitimate reasons. “Damien’s research sheds light on a trade that is abolishing our communal world heritage. By fighting this trade, his research restores a measure of dignity to the dead.”

During his visit, Huffer will expand on the illicit trade in human remains and his collaborative work researching the murky regions of the internet. He will also address the realities of conducting archeological work in the online age. Huffer will certainly deliver a prudent and empowering message to the �Ӱ�ԭ�� community.

“I hope to explain that anyone can do the type of research I’m doing. The good thing about the internet is that it is available to anyone, and simply put, we need more eyes watching this problem. There are a lot of terrible things occurring that we can all help monitor,” said Huffer.

Dr. Huffer will be meeting with graduate students and speaking to undergraduate students in the following courses: ‘Introduction to Archaeology’, ‘Historian’s Craft’, and ‘Issues in Digital Humanities.’

If you would like to meet Dr. Huffer while he is visiting �Ӱ�ԭ��, please email Professor Shawn Graham: shawn.graham@carleton.ca

Dr. Damien Huffer is a postdoctoral fellow at the Smithsonian’s Museum Conservation Institute and department of physical anthropology. His current research uses stable isotope geochemistry to investigate diet and movement over the lifespan, at the community level, and over time; most recently using museum collection from Jordan and Bahrain. He has been involved in excavations around the world, from Vietnam to Arizona, Polynesia to Australia. He also actively researches and tirelessly advocates for the documentation and exposure of the illegal antiquities trade.

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The Centre for Transnational Cultural Analysis Presents:
Black Diaspora Art Practices Since the 1980s: Critical Reflections on a Journey
Dr. Kobena Mercer, History of Art and African American Studies, Yale University
FASS Distinguished Visiting Professor
Public Lecture — October 5, 2015
6:00 pm
Lecture Hall
National Gallery of Canada

Dr. Mercer is a specialist on the visual arts of the Black Diaspora and World Art Histories. His work has been instrumental in shifting discourses in Art History from a nation-based model to transnational narratives, in particular his series on Annotating Art’s Histories, published by MIT Press. This lecture will explore the changing contexts and discourses of and around Black Diasporic artistic practices since  the 1980s.

On-Campus Workshop— October 6, 2015
9:30 – 11:30 am
“At the Intersection of World Studies and Diaspora Studies”
Multimedia Lab, Discovery Centre
�Ӱ�ԭ�� University Library

This on-campus workshop will explore the intersections between World Studies and Diaspora Studies in a collaborative environment with Dr. Kobena Mercer.

Organized by the Centre for Transnational Cultural Analysis

Sponsored by:

�Ӱ�ԭ�� University Art Gallery, Bachelor of Global and International Studies, Institute of African Studies, Institute for Comparative Studies in Literature, Art, and Culture, Migration and Diaspora Studies, School for Studies in Art and Culture, and the National Gallery of Canada

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, Assistant Professor and a health geographer in the Institute of Interdisciplinary Studies, is this week’s FASS blogger. In his entry, Professor Mkandawire writes about an exciting opportunity for �Ӱ�ԭ�� students to participate in an study abroad course in Malawi. This spring 2016 course will focus on global inequalities in health care, specifically those related to HIV/AIDS.

In the spring of 2016 the will offer a study abroad course that will focus on the challenges of addressing global inequalities in health through the lens of HIV/AIDS. This course will take place in Malawi (former British colony), a small landlocked country in Southern Africa with a landmass of 11800km² (ten times smaller than the size of Ontario). In tourist travel guidebooks Malawi is popularly known as the Warm Heart of Africa. Renowned for its genuinely friendly local population, it is common for locals to wave and greet visitors as if they know them. Curious children often come by to say ‘moni’ (hello) and ‘zikomo’ (thank you) in the national language (Chichewa). Malawi is one of the most beautiful countries in the world, with a majestic lake that stretches almost the entire length of its eastern border. Lake Malawi itself, with remarkably clear waters, exceptionally splendid beaches, and mountainous backdrop, is a . There are over 1000 fish species in Lake Malawi, making it a site of immense global importance for biodiversity conversation.

Malawi’s natural beauty and scenic landscape, however, stands in sharp contrast to its high prevalence of HIV/AIDS. Since the HIV virus was first officially reported in 1985, the spread of HIV/AIDS has accelerated to its current prevalence of 10.2% in the adult population. This course will expose students to the actual realities of HIV/AIDS with the aim of helping them to develop a critical understanding of the concatenation of adverse economic, political, and economic factors that continue to fuel the spread of HIV/AIDS and create obstacles to effective response.

Early cases of HIV in Malawi in the late 1980s were concentrated amongst the wealthy, and one of the high profile cases included a former beauty queen. Most of these individuals were thought to have been infected abroad. Because HIV/AIDS was until then unknown to the average Malawian, a major challenge in crafting the first national response was choosing an appropriate local name for the disease. Valuable time was lost to nip the disease in the bud as the government wavered to acknowledge the full extent of the problem, and as scientists demanded more time to grasp of the pattern of the epidemic. In addition, the under-developed healthcare system, which had suffered underinvestment during the colonial and postcolonial era, was ill-equipped to deal with such an epidemic. As the young, educated and beautiful began to succumb, witchcraft-related jealousy was often cited as the cause. Minimal action by the government in these early days created an atmosphere of confusion and panic, especially amidst reports that HIV/AIDS was a disease without a cure.

In a context where more than 60% of the population lives below the poverty line, HIV/AIDS quickly moved down the economic fault-line, and the poor began to quickly fill the ranks of those infected and affected. To talk about the rich-poor divide in a country with a per capita income of US$300 might seem a little farfetched, but vast extremes of wealth and poverty do exist in Malawi, and there is ample evidence to indicate that these imbalances have in fact worsened over the years: stunning resorts and flimsy fishing villages; skyscrapers and steaming sweatshops; bountiful supermarkets and widespread hunger; state of the art medicine and traditional medicine; magnificent forests and degraded pastures; sumptuous mansions and sprawling shantytowns. In other words, the spread of HIV/AIDS in Malawi also has profound international dimensions. It is deeply intertwined with the rise of neoliberal austerity. Thus even Malawi, a small landlocked country which one could hardly locate on the world map has not been able to escape the long hand of neoliberal globalization facilitated by Northern donors, international financial institutions, and a cosmopolitan governing elite.

This course is a great opportunity for students to critically examine the interwoven nature of structural violence and HIV/AIDS, and to see firsthand how these deeply inequitable political, economic and social realities fuel the spread of the epidemic and hamper effective national and international response. Particular attention will be paid to the specificities of historical experiences and how they relate to larger themes scoped in the foregoing outline. Supported by �Ӱ�ԭ��’s Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, this course will be facilitated by Canadian and Malawian instructors and will combine classroom presentations with field visits to key public health institutions, civil society organizations, communities, and other relevant establishments in Mzuzu, Northern Malawi. Based at , the �Ӱ�ԭ�� students will gain incredible insights, knowledge, and life experiences to help them learn and appreciate the intricate interrelationships between health and illness and political and economic conditions at the local, national and global levels.

– Dr. Paul Mkandawire

There will be two information sessions about the course:

Friday 2 October @ 2:30 pm: 433 Paterson Hall (History Lounge)
Wednesday 7 October @ 6:00 pm: 433 Paterson Hall (History Lounge)

For more information about this and past courses, please go to:

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