We are thrilled to share that , co-edited by Fady Shanouda, Chelsea Temple Jones, and Lisanne Binhammer, is officially out today through Athabasca University Press! Published as part of the Issues in Distance Education series, this collection brings together scholars, educators, poets, and activists who explore how ableism persists in online learning spaces鈥攁nd how we can do better.

Often framed as a tool for inclusion, online education is too frequently designed without the leadership or experiences of disabled, sick, mad, and crip educators and students. This timely volume challenges that gap. Through essays, conversations, interviews, and poetry, contributors reimagine what access could look like when rooted in justice, not just compliance.

In Fady Shanouda鈥檚 own chapter, “Caring Online: A Justice-Oriented Approach to Online Pedagogy” (co-authored with Jenna Reid), we鈥檙e invited to rethink care and connection in virtual classrooms. Rather than positioning access as a checklist or afterthought, the chapter鈥攁nd the book as a whole鈥攑ushes us to center accessibility as a collective and political commitment.

In a time when digital learning is rapidly expanding, is an essential intervention. It expands our collective thinking about disability, design, and education鈥攅specially in spaces where the harms of inaccessibility are too easily hidden behind screens.

Please join us in congratulating Dr. Fady Shanouda and the entire editorial team on this powerful and much-needed publication. We look forward to seeing how it informs teaching, organizing, and advocacy in and beyond the academy.

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We are excited to share the launch of , edited by Christina R. Clark-Kazak from the University of Ottawa. Hosted by 杏吧原创 University’s Migration and Diaspora Studies program and the Local Engagement Refugee Research Network (LERRN), this event provides a platform to explore critical new perspectives on forced migration in Canada. This discussion will take place on October 28, 2024 at 12:00 PM to 1:30 PM at 2420R Richcraft Hall, 杏吧原创 University.

The book examines Canada鈥檚 history as a settler state shaped by forced migration and addresses contemporary issues like refugee resettlement, trafficking, and environmental displacement. Contributors, including Amrita Hari, Director of the Feminist Institute of Social Transformation, offer insights into migration policies and lived experiences through diverse disciplinary lenses, with a special focus on intersecting identities such as disability, race, gender, and social class.

Attendees will have the chance to participate in discussions with the editor and contributors and enjoy light refreshments. This comprehensive resource is essential for researchers, practitioners, and anyone interested in understanding Canada’s role in global migration trends. Event discussions will feature Christina R. Clark-Kazak, Amrita Hari, and other notable contributors, with Laura Madokoro serving as discussant.

Registration for this event is limited to 25 attendees. To learn more about the event, please visit: www.carleton.ca/mds/cu_event/book-launch-forced-migration-in-to-canada-from-colonization-to-refugee-resettlement

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We are delighted to announce the publication of “.” in the Studies of Social Justice journal by Professor Manjeet Birk. In this paper, a profound exploration into the intricate dynamics of antiracism projects within feminist nonprofit organizations in Vancouver, British Columbia has emerged. Drawing on extensive research conducted on the unceded territories of the x史m蓹胃k史蓹y虛蓹m (Musqueam), S岣祑x瘫w煤7mesh (Squamish), and s蓹lilw蓹ta涩 (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations, the paper delves deep into the role, relationship, and responsibility of advocating for antiracism and social justice in these critical spaces.

ABSTRACT: 

Building on research conducted in feminist organizations in Vancouver, British Columbia, on the unceded territories of the x史m蓹胃k史蓹y虛蓹m (Musqueam), S岣祑x瘫w煤7mesh (Squamish), and s蓹lilw蓹ta涩 (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations, this paper explores the role, relationship, and responsibility of advocating for antiracism and social justice in the context of antiracism projects in feminist nonprofit organizations. In doing so this paper asks: What do antiracism projects look like in feminist organizations? And how are these projects informed or interrupted by racialized and Indigenous activists within these spaces? Using critical race theory鈥檚 composite counterstory, this paper uses storytelling methodologies to understand how racialized settlers and Indigenous folks can collaborate and thrive 鈥� as they have been doing 鈥� on occupied unceded territories in Canada. Based on a series of interviews with racialized and Indigenous activists engaging in feminist nonprofit organizations, these stories shed light on contemporary realities of colonization, including collaboration within white settler systems.

杏吧原创 Manjeet Birk:

Manjeet Birk (she/her) is an Assistant Professor at the Feminist Institute of Social Transformation and an interdisciplinary scholar whose work centers the lived experience of racialized and Indigenous girls and women in Canada. Her research focuses on women鈥檚 organizing, social justice and institutional racism using critical race, intersectional and decolonizing theories and methodologies. Her interests are grounded in her community activism working with women鈥檚 organizations locally, nationally and internationally.

Dr. Birk recently returned from a year in Aotearoa, New Zealand, completing a SSHRC postdoc focused on her project Pathways to Inclusion of Indigenous and Racialized Communities: A Comparative Analysis Between Canada and New Zealand. This project involved collaborating with a team in the Department of Public Health at the Auckland University of Technology, in Auckland NZ to think through systemic and institutional racism particularly as it relates to racialized and Indigenous communities in Auckland. This will form the basis of a comparative analysis between Canada and Aotearoa New Zealand. With a lifetime of experience organizing, troubling and challenging systems, Dr. Birk is always looking for new ways to re-conceptualize a more beautiful world. To learn more about Dr. Birk鈥檚 work, you can also check out this FASS interview.

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We are delighted to announce the publication of Prof. Dan Irving‘s chapter ‘‘ published in ‘Trans Athletes鈥� Resistance’ book released in November of 2023. This chapter offers an autotheoretical account of Irving’s experiences as a trans man training for his first amateur bout 鈥� one that has yet to come but borne out of a never-ending fight. His chapter is in conversation with autobiography (McBee, 2018), journalistic (Oates, 2006) and ethnographical scholarship addressing the intricacies of pugilistic violence as a response to systemic gender, racial, sexual and economic oppression (Beauchez, 2017; Rutter, 2007).

Professor Dan Irving is a faculty member in the Institute of Interdisciplinary Studies and the Feminist Institute of Social Transformation at 杏吧原创 University.

Irving, D. (2023), 鈥淪lipping Into the Shadows: Boxing, Affect and Healing Justice鈥�, Greey, A.D. and Lenskyj, H.J. (Ed.) Trans Athletes鈥� Resistance (Emerald Studies in Sport and Gender), Emerald Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 59-69. 

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In a recent article titled “,” Faith Stadnyk (recent graduate from the FIST Master’s Program) introduces a transformative discourse in Fat Studies: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Body Weight and Society. Fat Studies is the first academic journal in the field of scholarship that critically examines theory, research, practices, and programs related to body weight and appearance. Delving into the realm of feminist-of-color disability studies, the analysis looks at 100 popular Health at Every Size庐 (HAES庐) TikToks, unraveling power dynamics in disseminating HAES庐 frameworks and their implications for fat liberation. You can access a PDF version !

Faith Stadnyk (she/her): a feminist, disability, and fat studies scholar who draws on feminist-of-color disability studies and critical eating dis/order studies perspectives to mark and challenge white supremacy, ableism, sanism, fatmisia, healthism, (settler) colonialism, and intersecting modes of oppression in health activism, healthcare, health promotion, and well-being related landscapes. She is a white, settler, fat, disabled, neurodivergent, and queer woman living and working on the unceded and unsurrendered Algonquin Anishinaabe territories. Faith is committed to knowledge production that calls for radical social change that benefits all marginalized people, especially those living in the intersections of multiple systems of oppression.

ABSTRACT: “This article is published in Fat Studies: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Body Weight and Society. It is a feminist-of-color disability studies-oriented TikTok critical discourse analysis of 100 popular Health at Every Size庐 (HAES庐) TikToks. It evaluates the power relations surrounding how HAES庐 frameworks are disseminated on TikTok and unpacks the implications for fat liberation. HAES庐 frameworks of care capacitate the eradication of medical fatmisia and the weight-centered health paradigm. While popular among online fat activists, HAES庐 frameworks have been widely accused of perpetuating healthism. My analysis makes clear how HAES庐 discourse is often steeped in ableist, white supremacist, and colonial healthism. Through this analysis, I ultimately argue that the definition of healthism needs to shift to center ableism, white supremacy, and colonialism, as well as the co-constituting nature of how systems of oppression aggregate to weaponize health against those with embodiments marked as 鈥渦nhealthy.鈥� I argue that this shift is necessary to produce analyses committed to radical solidarity. I mark this shift by coining and utilizing the term co-healthism. To demonstrate the need for my argument, I organize the results into three themes: healthist ableism, healthist white supremacy, and healthist colonialism in HAES庐 discourse. In the discussion, I clarify the co-constitutive nature of these themes and argue for the shift from healthism to co-healthism. I also define the concept and explain its methodological potentialities.” 

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We are pleased to announce the recent publication of a chapter in the new anthology Queer Data Studies by FIST Adjunct Research Faculty member Ryan Conrad. The chapter, titled 鈥�,鈥� is a timely contribution to the fields of sexuality studies, data studies, and science and technology studies. Conrad and anthology editor Patrick Keilty are planning a roundtable on queer data practices as part of the Sexuality Studies Association鈥檚 annual meeting in June 2024 where they will discuss their contributions to this ground-breaking interdisciplinary publication.

Abstract

鈥淕enerated Vulnerability鈥� reflects on the documented and possible further harms of the Rentboy.com data breach that resulted from computer seizures by the FBI and Homeland Security in their 2015 raid of Rentboy鈥檚 offices. This chapter continues by investigating the strategies (or lack thereof) put in place by the owners of Rentmen.com to prevent similar data breaches as detailed in their data privacy and terms of service statements. Lastly, this chapter examines the data privacy strategies of online advertising platforms facilitated by sex worker-owned cooperatives like Ottawa Independent Companions (OIC) in order to contrast this hyper-local, democratic, collaborative, and demonstrably more secure data privacy model against faceless revenue-hungry transnational corporations making a killing off sex workers with little accountability to the very workers they claim to be supporting through their online advertising service.

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We are excited to announce Dr. Michele Lewis‘, 2023-2024 Fulbright Distinguished Chair, publication in . Dr. Lewis’ article is titled “” which discusses the importance of pronouns, the cultural neuroscientific challenges, and the socio-cultural stigma and resistance.

 is a 2023-2024 Fulbright Distinguished Chair, Arts and Social Sciences.  is a professor and psychologist visiting from Winston-Salem State University, NC, USA. She centers non-western frameworks in Black Psychology, cross-cultural experiences, and cultural neuroscience among marginalized populations. She writes a monthly blog for , entitled .

You can read this article in full and learn about Dr. Lewis by visiting her .

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We are delighted to announce the publication of an article in the Journal of Critical Race Inquiry () by Manjeet Birk. Titled “,” this exceptional piece promises to be a captivating addition to the JCRI’s repository of cutting-edge research.

In this thought-provoking article, Manjeet Birk introduces the innovative methodology of “Critical Race Composite Counter Storytelling.” The study explores the transformative potential of narratives in dismantling prevailing structures of racism. Through this rigorous examination, Birk emphasizes the role of storytelling as a powerful tool for marginalized communities to challenge, subvert, and ultimately reshape dominant societal narratives.

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