“Congratulations to these researchers who are probing new directions in social sciences and humanities research,” said Mario Pinto, vice-president (research & international). “The success of these projects speaks highly of the quality of emerging fundamental research at UM.”

UM 2024 Insight Development Grant recipients include:

Namita Bhatnagar, Professor & F. Ross Johnson Fellow, Marketing Department

Sensitive women and rational men: Bridging the gender divide in consumer and employee green behaviours

This project seeks to facilitate greater participation of both men and women in pro-environmentalism by identifying de-stigmatizing strategies in the current discourse. Men may worry about a “green-feminine” or “caring women” stereotype, while women may be hindered by heightened anxiety in male-dominated domains associated with a “tech-savvy men” stereotype. Bhatnagar proposes a multi-phase consumer and organizational exploration of the interplay between varied gender stereotypes and environmental sustainability in contexts that are traditionally homemaking adjacent and those that are affiliated with the contemporary green tech movement.

David Drewes, Associate Professor, Department of Religion

Early Scholarship on Buddhism

Focused on the beginnings of scholarship on Buddhism in the first half of the nineteenth century, Drewes seeks to examine two lesser known but significant sources of ideas and influence. This includes early publications of the Wesleyan Methodist Mission to Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) and the work of Horace Hayman Wilson, the first Boden professor of Sanskrit at Oxford.

Amy Farrell, Assistant Professor, Curriculum, Teaching and Learning

Ikwe and Amik: Indigenous storying and feminine being within and beyond the Fur Trade, an educational inquiry

Farrell seeks to address the urgent need for Indigenous women’s voices in the history of the fur trade, which have been largely excluded from literature and records. This research employs an innovative Indigenous storying methodology to intricately blend culturally significant Indigenous knowledge and worldview. Using creative fiction to portray collective experiences, the enduring value of women’s roles can be emphasized.

Jennifer Watt, Assistant Professor, Faculty of Education

We Interrupt this Programming: Confronting Gender Based Sexual Violence through Critical Media Literacies in K-12 Schools

With this project, Watt and co-investigator Shannon Moore aims to confront barriers to teaching about consent, gender-based sexual violence and support survivors in K-12 schools using popular media as a catalyst for change. This research is urgently needed by educators and school systems to understand how critical media literacies can be harnessed to confront and disrupt the many ways that gender-based sexual violence exists in society. Learn more on the We Interrupt this Programming webpage.

Bruno De Oliveira Jayme, Assistant Professor, Curriculum, Teaching and Learning

Social Movement Learning – An Exploration of Quality Education Through Participatory Video

De Olivera Jayme seeks to address the gaps between formal and informal education with actionable steps for more equitable and participatory learning practices. What and how Canadian school system can learn from educational grassroots movements from South America? Working with the vibrant Slum Defense Movement from São Paulo, Brazil, this study uses arts-based participatory action research to identify insights that can inform formal education in North America.

Muhammad Kabir, Assistant Professor, Accounting & Finance Department

Auditor Liability, Firm-level Audit Quality, and Investment: The Effect of the Livent Case on Canadian Firms

This project will test how changes in auditors’ litigation risk affect audit quality and investments in Canada, providing empirical evidence supporting the work of regulators. Kabir will mobilize this evidence to inform how increased liability may positively or adversely affect audit quality and demonstrate how firms respond to their investment decisions as their auditors’ liability changes. Read Muhammad Kabir’s most recent publication on ScienceDirect.

Jody Stark, Associate Professor, Desautels Faculty of Music

Developing and Piloting a Local Music Pedagogy

This collaborative research project engages local music educators along with representatives of various community arts organizations to create a decolonizing framework for music education in Treaty 1 territory. The results of this innovative project will allow the Stark research team to pilot a locally-informed music pedagogy and provide guidance to educators, policy makers and community arts organizations for community-school collaborations as a way to decolonize and Indigenize music education. Read Jody Stark’s publications on Academia.

Jie Yang, Assistant Professor, Business Administration Department

My Turf, My Rules: Investigating the Roles of Customers in Product Categorization

This project will offer a more holistic understanding of product categorization by investigating the roles of individual customers in the categorization process. Product categorization involves assigning one or more category labels to a product. Existing literature has predominantly focused on how producers, for the purposes of capturing monetary value, dominate the categorization of their products. Yang seeks to address the imbalance in category literature by reframing the relationship between product categories and economic outcomes within a customer-centered framework. Read Jie Yang’s most recent publication on SageJournals.

Xiumei Li, Assistant Professor, Business Administration Department

Entrepreneurial Success in Crowdfunding: The Art and Science of Sensemaking

Li employs a mixed method approach to investigate how entrepreneurs develop effective referencing strategies to actively engage audiences and secure necessary resources with crowdfunded ventures. This study will examine popular crowdfunding platforms such as Kickstarter, with a focus on entrepreneurs’ sensemaking around the relative nature of novelty and other key reference points.

University Gold Medal
Karlynne Sagert
B.A. General (Psychology)

Karlynne Sagert

The University Gold Medal is an opportunity to honour the best in the undergraduate graduating class of each faculty. A gold medal is awarded to the undergraduate student in the Faculty of Arts who has achieved the highest standing. This year’s recipient is Karlynne Sagert. Karlynne is graduating with a B.A. General degree with a major in Psychology and a minor in Family Social Sciences.

Karlynne has a passion for working with children. Her academic and work choices so far are leading her toward a long career in a helping profession. During her undergraduate degree, Karlynne took courses in psychology, anatomy and family social sciences to learn more about how to help children with their reading, writing, gross and fine motor skills and self-regulation. She didn’t hesitate to list her favourite course as PSYC 2290 Child Development. “I enjoyed learning about the developmental milestones throughout childhood,” said Karlynne. “We had the opportunity to raise a virtual child which was really fun and an interesting way to comprehend the course content.” While working as an educational assistant with the Swan Valley School Division, she saw the need for occupational therapy services in rural areas and felt her bachelor’s degree choice would help her reach her goal. She plans to continue her studies with the Masters of Occupational Therapy program at UM. Karlynne would like to thank her “family, friends, professors and peers for their support and guidance” throughout her undergraduate studies. “I also want to thank the Faculty of Arts for granting me this award. It is a true honour and I am forever grateful for this recognition.” We congratulate Karlynne on her outstanding academic success.

Faculty of Arts Honours Medal
Volodymyr Shevchenko
B.A. Honours (Philosophy)

Volodymyr Shevchenko

Volodymyr Shevchenko is this year’s recipient of the Faculty of Arts Honours Medal awarded to the student with the highest standing in a Bachelor of Arts four-year Honours Degree Program. Volodymyr is graduating with a Philosophy major and a Religion minor. 

During his degree, Volodymyr was encouraged by how much the Philosophy faculty and staff genuinely care about their students and noted how that bond boosts the overall university experience. “Each of my professors was willing to take time to meet with me, answer my questions, review my grad school application and just connect with me on a human level,” he shared. Volodymyr will begin a PhD in Philosophy studies at the University of Toronto this fall. He applied to the masters program only to have them reach out to him with a spot in PhD studies – a credit to his past academic success and future potential. At the same time, Volodymyr plans to write the LSAT this summer and apply to U of T’s school of law so that he can pursue a joint JD/PhD. Volodymyr would like to thank “God, my wife Caitlyn, and my family for being my support during my studies.”

Faculty of Arts Advanced Medal
Taleah Taves
B.A. Advanced (Psychology)

Taleah Taves

The award for the highest standing in a Bachelor of Arts four-year Advanced Degree Program goes to Taleah Taves. During her undergraduate degree, Taleah majored in Psychology and minored in Sociology. 

The transition to virtual learning during a large portion of the degree was difficult for many students. Taleah credits her fellow classmates, peers and instructors for showing compassion to each other and for working together to help students like her not only make it through the degree, but also complete it with such success. “In my last term, I took SOC 3720 Criminal Law and its Procedure with Jodi Koffman, and it was by far my favourite course I have ever taken,” she said. “I looked forward to the course each week despite it being over Zoom. (Koffman) created a safe and relaxed environment for us, which allowed us to get to know each other better and feel comfortable sharing our experiences and thoughts. I could not have asked for a better instructor and group of classmates to end my degree with!” Taleah plans to go on to an education degree, with a desire to teach history (including Indigenous perspectives) at the high school level. “My experiences coaching, tutoring and mentoring helped me decide to pursue a teaching career,” she shared. “I believe teaching is one of the most rewarding jobs one can have. I am so excited for the future!”

Faculty of Arts General Medal
Delaney Fehr
B.A. General (Psychology)

Delaney Fehr

Delaney Fehr is the 2022 recipient of the Faculty of Arts General Medal, awarded for highest standing in a Bachelor of Arts three-year General Degree Program. Delaney completed a major in Psychology and a minor in Sociology.

At the beginning of her degree, Delaney struggled with deciding on her path because she had too many interests. She knew she wanted to work with people and needed variety. The courses taken in her Bachelor of Arts undergraduate degree will provide a fantastic base as she begins the Masters of Occupational Therapy program at UM. “I love that OT focuses on all aspects of an individual’s health, such as physical, mental, social, emotional and spiritual,” said Delaney. She reminds us that getting a degree isn’t just about the studies. One of her favourite moments came from her UM intramural soccer team Neymar Mr. Nice Guy. “I played in my first year and again in my final semester. We won the Winter 2022 tournament which was an awesome way to end my three years at UM!” Delaney would like to thank her family and friends for their support during her studies.

Congratulations to the Arts medal winners.

At its 2022 UM Convocation, the University of Manitoba will confer degrees, diplomas and certificates on 2,835 graduates.
Visit the UM Student Instagram  and Faculty of Arts Instagram to learn more about some of the students graduating in 2022. You’ll find congratulations messages from fellow graduates and professors, stories about fellow graduates, more information about convocation and tips for new alumni. You can also join the ‘Convocation conversation’ on social media by following #umanitoba2022.

This last book, written with educators, government officials and curriculum-makers in mind, was a collaboration with Drs. Bruce MacDougall (Allard School of Law, UBC) and Paul Clarke (Faculty of Education, University of Regina). Dr. Short is the founding and current editor-in-chief of the Canadian Journal of Human Rights and a former member of the Manitoba Human Rights Commission. Robson Hall was able to catch up with him to learn more about this final portion of his current body of research.

What was your motivation for pursuing this area of research, and in particular this latest book?

With Making the Case, I wanted to produce a book that was empowering to people who were interested in or who are working towards supporting 2SLGBTQ+ students in their quest for equal access to education, full citizenship in schools, and creating schools that are places of inclusion for 2SLGBTQ+ students. This book is for those who may have been feeling un-empowered or insecure about what the law was around all that, particularly in the context of opposition based on religion-based rights claims.

I really wanted to put together a book that made it clear just how much support there was out there for anybody wanting to make schools safer and more inclusive spaces for 2SLGBTQ+ students. So, this book is meant to be empowering and encouraging to people doing this kind of work, that is, 2SLGBTQ+-inclusive education.

Who is this book for?

Teacher organizations, government workers including ministers of education, equity or human rights officers, curriculum directors or specialists, and local MLAs and MPs. Also School districts, super-intendents and trustees, and within schools, a school’s administration from principals to guidance counsellors to student councils. Outside schools, certainly parents, siblings, allies of every sort. With respect to teacher training, I think this book would be very useful to faculties of education, new hires, and especially for new teachers at all levels.

Finally, I’d love to see the book read by those working in faith-based schools: Catholic school systems – principals’ associations; trustees; Canadian Council of Catholic Bishops; the Ontario English Catholic Teachers Association; Edmonton Catholic Teachers (local 54 of the Alberta Teachers Association) and so on, other groups like that.

What is the main message in the book, Making the Case?

The main goal of this book is to empower people to understand what the law says or where the law is leaning. It’s not enough to say that something is against one’s religious beliefs or practices for it to be banned or forbidden: there needs to be objective evidence of that infringement. In the context of schools, if someone feels that a particular educational initiative infringes an individual’s or community’s expression of their religious beliefs or practices, then you have to prove it – it’s not enough just to say you think that it does.

There are some very basic concepts for law students, lawyers and professors. But I came to realize that “on the ground”, these concepts were not very well understood by many people. Of course, things can get much more complicated when you then move on to competing rights. Very often it is religious beliefs and declarations of infringement that are weaponized against 2LGBTQ+ equality rights. It seems to come as a shock to a lot of people asserting religion-based claims that their rights are not absolute – rights have limits – especially when those rights interfere with public safety or the rights and protection of other people.

So the second book looks at what teachers and the administration need to know when confronted with teachers or students or parents with religious objections to ensuring 2SLGBTQ+ rights for students in their schools. And at the time, this was during the years I think of as the GSA-wars, years of mounted resistance against gay-straight alliances, or gender-sexuality alliances, more often that not based upon the assertion of religion-based rights claims. I do want to stress, however, that there were many religious-based or affiliated groups who worked hard to support GSAs in their schools – OECTA, the Ontario English Catholic Teachers’ Association, for instance. It was the bishops and trustees who opposed GSAs in many cases. A lot of school boards and schools opposed them, too, but many were supportive.

How does Making the Case fit in with your previous publications?

The role of religion has filtered through all of my work to this point, the use of religion on the marginalization of these students. So I wanted to work on something that drilled down into that religious piece, which is this third book. The role of religion, the use of religious beliefs and practices to oppose or stymie equality rights – and what the law had to say about those kinds of claims, were themes that were present in both of the other books, and in many of my articles, in all of the research I was doing.

Making the Case confronts religion head on. The book was asking to be written. I asked Bruce MacDougall, who has written extensively about the legally-constructed queer child and law and religion, and Paul Clark, who has written a good deal about GSAs, to join me.  But for me, it’s really the culmination of fifteen years’ worth of work.

The first book, Don’t Be So Gay! Queers, Bullying, and Making Schools Safe (2013), was very student-focused, looking at safety and inclusion from the point of view of students, treating them as experts of their own experiences, listening to and privileging what they had to say. This all started at the time when discussions around the country were about “safe schools” and “zero tolerance”, very punitive or response-oriented approaches. But the first book was the culmination of a number of years work that I undertook before the book was ready to be published and took things in a very different direction.

Early discussions about keeping schools safe took place at a time when school boards, safe school committee, parents viewed safety in terms of cameras, surveillance, guards in schools, zero tolerance policies. In other words, students were perceived as the threat to school safety. 2SLGBTQ+ students were largely ignored in that equation. The students I spent time with and listened to conceptualized safety very, very differently. They viewed safety very broadly, as a concept that included equality rights, safety as much more than just responding to bullying – safety that was really about the need to change the culture of schools in order to include and celebrate sexual minority students, to respond to heterosexism and homophobia and transphobia. So in this new conception of safety, students wanted the people who could make a difference to understand that heteronormativity itself in schools was the problem, the threat to the safety of these students.

The next phase of my work put more emphasis on teachers and how teachers could bring to life those aspects of making schools safe for students – primarily educative responses, the educative piece, the transformative piece, that would change the climate of schools. It’s that educative piece that ends my first book and is really the point of launch and the focus of my second book, Am I Safe Here? LGBTQ Teens and Bullying in Schools(2017). This was a question a student I met had posed to his school, to his teachers, his principal. What are you doing to keep me safe in this school? This book fit very nicely with other research I was doing at the time, that also focused on teachers and what teachers need to do to help 2SLGBTQ+ students achieve full citizenship.

I’m very happy to have these three books, and to have this as the last of the three because there is, for me, a sense of completeness to them, a sense of completion of 10-15 years of work.

What further work needs to be done in this area?

I think a study of religious schools, or people of faith at non-religious schools would be very, very useful – to really get that qualitative understanding of “why” – why do some people oppose this kind of work? Maybe even more interestingly, would be to look at the religious folks who support it, who don’t see their religious life, beliefs, practices as any kind of bar to, and at the same time, might even be pursuing, supporting 2SLGBTQ+ rights in schools. I think that kind of study would be very useful and empowering for other like-minded people. I do not think I will be the one to do it, however.

The final frontier (is anything final?) seems to be – and you see this right now in Florida – is getting past this idea that 2SLGBTQ+ inclusive-education is something that must be restricted to the higher grades. Listen, kids are already learning about sexual orientation – very largely negatively – in the early grades, as early as Kindergarten. The so-called “curriculum”, the unofficial ways students learn, through each other, sometimes from teachers, by listening to what the culture is already saying, they learn. At school, whether through sports, schoolyard conversations, all aspects of youth culture, really, are already “teaching” kids what to think about 2SLGBTQ+ students or their parents. So, it’s really important that the “official” or manifest curriculum – all the official spaces of the school – are brought into play, to respond to the negativity of that unofficial but very real learning, to counter it. 2SLGBTQ+ students need to be welcomed and celebrated and included officially as full citizens of every school from the first grade to the moment of graduation just as they are often denigrated and excluded unofficially. And, of course, very often officially marginalized, as well. Justice and injustice vary according to the particular school.

What lessons do you most hope readers of Making the Case will take away?

The law is more supportive than people think, particularly when competing rights come into play. A rights claim made by one person will sometimes conflict, or appear to conflict, with a rights claim made by someone else. This can happen when a 2SLGBTQ+ student asserts the right to be free from discrimination which a teacher, or another student, complains violates their legally protected religious freedoms. If possible, the courts will try to accommodate both rights. Sometimes that is not possible. In such cases, the courts will then ask if the 2SLGBTQ+ rights claim infringes on the religion-based right in a significant way? If the answer is no, the religion-based claim will give way to the rights claim. In these scenarios – and the book is full of them – the law, more often than not, supports educational initiatives that are intended to target the discrimination of 2SLGBTQ+ students in schools, to ensure their safety and inclusion. The courts are very likely to find that it’s a reasonable limitation on religious rights to ensure equal and open access of schools by 2SLGBTQ+ students and that it’s harmful to these students if the initiatives are not in place. In other words, religious rights are not absolute. And connected to that is the requirement that evidence of infringement of religion-based claims must be affirmatively shown – your religion-based rights are not infringed just because you say they are.

So with respect to all of that, Making the Case makes that case. It explains in a very straightforward, understandable way what “competing rights” are all about, what the issues are and how they are often resolved in favour of supporting a broadened conception of safety for 2SLGBTQ+ students.

Looking back now, these three books seem very cohesive to me as a body of work that adds up to something. That’s why I think I have completed this part of my research life. It feels all of a piece. The work is not over, making schools better has not come to an end, but my contributions may have.

Dr. Asomah

Dr. Joseph Yaw Asomah joins the Department of Sociology and Criminology as Assistant Professor. He hails from Ghana, where he obtained a BA in Political Science and Sociology from the University of Ghana, Legon. Dr. Asomah is a proud alumnus of the University of Manitoba, where he completed an MA in Sociology in 2015. His research interests generally focus on human rights, international development, mass media, policing and white-collar crime. He has attended several conferences and has also published in both respected Canadian and international journals. Prior to joining UM, Dr. Asomah has taught at St. Thomas University (Fredericton, NB) and the University of Saskatchewan (Saskatoon, SK), where he also obtained a Ph.D. in Sociology in 2018.  

Dr. Brosowsky

Dr. Nicholas Brosowsky joins the Department of Psychology as an Assistant Professor. He is a UM alumnus, receiving a BA (Honours) in 2021 and an MA in 2014. His PhD was earned from the City University of New York and he held a postdoctoral research position at Duke University. Dr. Brosowsky investigates how people adaptively regulate attention and the consequences of control regulation across a variety of domains such as skill learning, creativity and multi-tasking. At UM, he is starting the Attention and Learning Lab.

Dr. Diehl

Dr. Lindsay Diehl joins the Department of English, Theatre, Film & Media as Assistant Professor. She received her PhD in Interdisciplinary Studies from the University of British Colombia, Okanagan campus. Her areas of expertise include Canadian literature, Asian Canadian studies, postcolonial theory and transnational feminism. As a creative writer and critical scholar, Dr. Diehl often blends scholarly and creative methodologies to explore intersecting issues of nationalism, settler-colonialism, race, gender and identity. She is particularly interested in how storytelling allows for personal, emotional and affective elements frequently overlooked in conventional forms of criticism. 

Dr. Gadzala

Dr. Krysteena Gadzala joins the Department of French, Spanish and Italian as a French Instructor. She earned a BEd from Nipissing University as well as a BA, MA and PhD from the University of Waterloo. Her research focused on child loss in 21^st century French literature as experienced by fathers. She specifically looked at the rituals, material culture and the writing process as they relate to the loss of a child. She has been teaching in universities across Canada and in France since 2012.  

Dr. Goulet

Dr. Nicole Goulet joins the Department of Religion as an Instructor. After completing her PhD in Religion at UM, she went to Indiana University of Pennsylvania, where she became Associate Professor in the Department of Religious Studies, and was Acting Director for Women’s and Gender Studies. Her research focuses on representations of race, class, gender and sexuality in religion, with a primary focus on Hinduism. Some topics of publication include how people use religion to fight gender-based violence and how to teach World Religions with attention paid to race, class, gender, and sexuality. At UM, Dr. Goulet’s teaching focuses on introductory and themed religion courses, as well as Eastern religions specifically.

Dr. Jenner

Dr. Jonathan Jenner joins the Department of Economics (Economics & Society stream) and the Global Political Economy Program as Assistant Professor. He received his PhD in Economics from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. Prior to arriving at UM, Dr. Jenner completed a postdoctoral appointment at the University of Johannesburg. His research, situated in the political economy tradition, explores the roots and effects of colonial labour regimes, particularly in East Africa. Dr. Jenner is also a member of the Center for Popular Economics, an instructor at the Center for Justice & Peacebuilding in Harrisonburg, Virginia, and a Senior Researcher at the South African Research Chair (SARChI) in Industrial Development at the University of Johannesburg. He is excited to continue researching, teaching and learning at the University of Manitoba.

Dr. Murchison

Dr. Melanie Janelle Murchison has joined the Department of Sociology and Criminology as an Instructor and is happy to be back in Winnipeg. After earning her PhD in Law from Queen’s University Belfast in 2016, Melanie then spent six years at the University of Wisconsin-Madison as a Lecturer in Legal Studies. She recently held a British Academy Leverhulme Grant as a Co-Investigator with Dr. Alex Schwartz on Ethnic Voting Behaviour on the Constitutional Court in Bosnia-Herzegovina. Melanie’s recent work has been with Dean Jochelson (Law) and Assistant Professor Ireland (Law) on legal pedagogy in the pandemic.

Dr. Nijdam-Jones

Dr. Alicia Nijdam-Jones joins the Psychology Department as Assistant Professor. She earned her PhD in Clinical Psychology (forensic specialization) from Fordham University and has an MA in Criminology from Simon Fraser University. After her doctoral studies, she completed a clinical psychology postdoctoral fellowship at the University of California, San Francisco. Dr. Nijdam-Jones specializes in the area of violence risk assessment, malingering assessment, stalking, and the use of forensic assessment measures with linguistically, ethnically, and culturally diverse samples.  At UM, she is starting the Cross-Cultural Forensic psychology lab. 

Dr. Paris

Dr. Jamie Paris joins the department of English, Theatre, Film & Media as an Instructor. He is a mixed-race scholar from Winnipeg, Manitoba. He received his PhD in English from the University of British Columbia (UBC) in Vancouver in 2015. Before coming to UM, Dr. Paris was an associate professor of English for Corpus Christi College at UBC. Dr. Paris works primarily in the field of premodern critical race studies, where his research focuses on the representation of whiteness in the work of William Shakespeare and his contemporaries. His secondary field is Canadian literature and culture, with a focus on non-dominative Black and Indigenous masculinities. Dr. Paris has published scholarly articles in Digital Studies, Canadian Literature, Renaissance and Reformation, Early Theatre, and the Journal for Early Modern Cultural Studies. He is in the process of completing a book on whiteness and racial crossdressing in early modern drama.

Dr. Schnerch

Dr. Gabe Schnerch joins the Department of Psychology as an Instructor. He has a range of teaching experience in undergraduate and graduate psychology courses across numerous institutions, both as a sessional instructor and as an assistant professor. He is UM alumni, having received his PhD in Clinical Psychology from the University of Manitoba. He completed his pre-doctoral residency/internship in Atlanta, Georgia, USA. His primary areas of teaching include ethics and assessment in school and clinical psychology. His areas of current research interest include the intersectionality of neurodivergent (e.g., autistic) and trans experiences; autistic-prioritized outcomes in therapy; and operant learning relating to infant and early childhood development.

Dr. Shaw

Dr. Kris Shaw joins the Department of Economics as Assistant Professor in the Economics & Econometrics stream. He grew up in Winnipeg and completed his undergraduate studies at the University of Winnipeg. After earning an MA from Queen’s University and working for several years in economic forecasting, he entered the PhD program at the University of Pennsylvania and successfully defended his dissertation last spring. His job market paper studied the macroeconomic implications of replacing a progressive labour income tax with a progressive consumption tax. His research interests span the areas of public finance, labour economics and quantitative macroeconomics. At UM, Dr. Shaw will be teaching macroeconomic theory at the advanced undergraduate and graduate level.

Dr. Weinberg

Dr. Erin Weinberg is a new Instructor in the Department of English, Theatre, Film & Media. She has taught at Queen’s University, Brandon University, University of Alberta Augustana and Royal Military College. She earned her PhD from Queen’s in 2017, where she researched the emotions in Shakespearean comedy. She has showcased that work internationally, including a presentation at Shakespeare’s Globe and articles in New Statesman and Early Modern Literary Studies. She is passionate about teaching and learning and intends to dedicate her time to mentoring and collaborating with the CATL. Erin teaches entirely first-year English courses; her contagious enthusiasm has influenced a number of students to take further English courses, major in English and pursue graduate study. 

Dr. Yadav

Dr. Srishti Yadav joins the Department of Economics as an Instructor for the Economics & Society stream. She has a PhD in Economics from The New School in New York. Her dissertation research focuses on the political economy of development in India, investing the relationship between agrarian change and structural transformation through the framework of the Agrarian Question. Her ongoing research examines changing agrarian class relations in the face of growing rural-urban migration and the caste- and gender-based dynamics of this process through fieldwork. Her teaching interests are in Marxian Political Economy and Development Economics. 

She never expected to work for an establishment law firm in Calgary and no one could have guessed that she would eventually lead a yet-to-be-dreamed-up national museum back in her home town.

Khan joined the Canadian Museum for Human Rights as chief executive officer last year during a moment of reckoning, after simmering complaints about racism, homophobia and sexual harassment boiled over.

“The work to build relationships or to repair relationships is going to take time because it involves trust and true, meaningful partnerships and friendships,” said Khan, who considers it a huge privilege to share that work with her team.

Human rights experts are optimistic that the museum might fulfill its potential now that it is finally led by someone with solid human rights experience, including nine years with the Manitoba Human Rights Commission.

However, Khan advises students that the best preparation for a human rights career might not be what they expect.

“Sometimes it’s the experiences that don’t really look like they’re lining you up for a human rights job that actually do,” she said. “If you have a retail job or you work in a restaurant, that’s a great job in terms of meeting people who you might not normally interact with.”

Khan is often questioned about her plans for training and hiring to improve diversity. However, she said transforming museums and arts institutions that evolved from a colonial history of collecting artifacts and telling stories about other people’s cultures requires deeper change.

She is proud of the work done to protect the Witness Blanket art installation through a unique agreement that recognizes the museum and artist’s shared responsibility to care for something no one should own.

“That’s a model for other work that we might do together.”

A video interview of Khan by Dr. Adele Perry, director of the Centre for Human Rights Research, can be viewed online.

“Bigotry and racism are among the deadliest social ills plaguing the world today… if man is ever to be worthy of his destiny, then we must fill our hearts with tolerance.” – Marvel comics’ creator Stan Lee, in Stan Lee’s Soapbox, December 1968, in Fantastic Four #81.

To mark Black History Month, the University of Manitoba’s Visionary Conversations on Feb. 13, 2018, at the Canadian Museum for Human Rights will explore issues affecting the Black community and celebrate its stories, asking: “Are Black Canadians Equitably Represented in Positions of Power and Influence?”

That same day, the Marvel Studios’ movie Black Panther begins its set of premieres, opening first in England and later in the week in the U.S.A. and Canada. It’s  the 18th film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe and follows the events after Captain America: Civil War. The Black Panther teams up with Wakanda’s special forces, the Dora Milaje, to prevent a world war.

Pop culture expert and U of M professor of religion Kenneth MacKendrick sees Black Panther as a complex but familiar story about the struggle of good versus evil.

“There are a lot of high hopes for the Black Panther movie and certainly Marvel has arranged the talent to pull off one of their most successful feature films yet,” he says. “Over the past few years, the comic has attracted some high profile writers and artists and have all done very well. There is an expectation that Black Panther will break barriers along the same lines as Wonder Woman.”

MacKendrick adds: “The hope seems to be that the door will be opened not simply for a wider range of representational roles in superhero films, but a wider range of positions for African Americans, Latinos, and Asians across the industry. This is a fairly lofty political ambition for a comic book character, but it is fair to say that comic books have never been just comic books.”

As a professor of religion, MacKendrick views comic book heroes in a different way than most fans. He explains: “I see Wakanda as one of the major world religions of Marvel, if I can put it that way.”

Marvel has the religion of the family (Fantastic Four), the religion of The Avengers (an elite superhero team), mutants who survive (X-Men), the world of the street (Spider-Man, Daredevil, Ms. Marvel), the underworld (Punisher, Moon Knight), the quirky (Gwenpool, Deadpool), the space opera (Guardians of the Galaxy), the youth (Young Avengers, Runaways, Squirrel Girl, Champions), the alien royalty of the Inhumans as well as Namor and Atlantis, and so on.

“In each of these domains, creators are able to experiment with art, narrative, and social and political relevance,” says MacKendrick. “The world of the Black Panther crosses into most of these other spheres. He’s royalty, but he’s also a scientist and explorer, like Reed Richards of the Fantastic Four, as well as an inventor, like Tony Stark. The otherworldly nature of his powers also links him with the figures of Doctor Strange and Thor. In addition, he’s an Avenger.”

“The imaginary world of Wakanda is ripe with possibilities. It captures two sides of a coin that many people find fascinating, the juxtaposition between the archaic and the technological. Fans of the Black Panther are probably right at home with the Jedis from Star Wars,” says MacKendrick.

MacKendrick cites Adilifu Nama, a professor of African studies at Loyola Marymount University and an expert on African American pop culture: “What black superheroes may lack in mainstream popularity, they more than match in symbolism, meaning, and political import with regard to the cultural politics of race in America.” (“Color Them Black” in The Superhero Reader, University of Mississippi Press, 2013).

Black Panther was introduced in the Fantastic Four comic in July 1966, three months before the founding of the national Black Panther Party. The comic book character has an origin story much like Batman: his father is murdered and he vows revenge. In his premiere, Black Panther defeats his enemy with the help of the Fantastic Four. In 1976, Black Panther even battled the KKK.

Marvel has introduced many black characters over the years. Bradford Wright, author of Comic Book Nation, says Marvel was the first publisher to integrate African-Americans into comic books. Wright explains that Marvel gradually introduced “random African Americans citizens into common street scenes, in which they appeared as policemen, reporters, or mere passers-by. It was a belated but meaningful comic book illustration of America as a multiracial society” (Comic Book Nation, ibid.).

In 1967 the character of Robbie Robertson was introduced as a newspaper editor at The Daily Bugle. Also in 1966 Bill Foster was introduced, a bio-physicist appearing in The Avengers who would eventually become the superhero Black Goliath. Stan Lee gave Captain America an African American sidekick, the Falcon (Sam Wilson) in 1969, partnering with Cap in 1971. For a time, Falcon took over as Captain America in 2012-2015. The popular African-American Marvel superhero Luke Cage was introduced in 1972 and his recent revival in a Netflix series has been very successful. In 1975, Marvel introduced Misty Knight, “the first African American cyborg”, and the weather-controlling Storm of the X-Men.

MacKendrick says that in recent years Marvel has been emphasizing diversity with the introduction of a number of young characters including Miles Morales (Spider-Man, 2011), an Afro-Latino teenager with spider-like powers, and Kamala Khan (Ms. Marvel, 2013), a teenage Pakistani-American with shape-changing powers.

Other familiar superhero mantles have been renewed with new characters: Thor (Jane Foster), Hulk (Amadeus Cho), Iron Man (Riri Williams, aka Ironheart), Wolverine (X-23, Laura Kinney), Star-Lord (Kitty Pryde), Hawkeye (Kate Bishop), and many others. In 2009 T’Challa’s sister Shuri took over as the Black Panther and ruler of Wakanda.

“These alternating identities have been hailed as a publicity stunts and have often been controversial,” notes MacKendrick. “Such changes have also been celebrated for moving (albeit slowly) in a more progressive and inclusive direction. It’s probably safe to say, keeping within the imaginary world of the Marvel universe, passing the torch to a new generation is part of any good origin story.”

Nothing informs better than engagement.

Several years ago, I attended a Shabbat gathering at a local synagogue in Kitchener, Ont. I was a college student at the time and had been given an assignment to attend a religious worship gathering distinct from my faith tradition.

The purpose of the assignment was to raise students’ awareness and understanding of a new faith, discover its particularities, and most importantly, to find the similarities with our own faith traditions.

Sitting among the congregants was an unnerving experience. I felt not only obtrusive as a spectating student, but also that I stood out like a sore thumb – the kippah I wore was not helping me blend in.

The religious customs at the service were foreign to me; the hymnal melodies were unfamiliar and my Hebrew was non-existent. Surely, I thought to myself, there must be a better way to learn other people’s religious and spiritual customs.

Following the service, a breakthrough came at last. My plan was to covertly slip out, but just as I was walking out of the sanctuary, a number of congregants graciously invited me to lunch prepared at the synagogue.

I fumbled to come up with some reasonable excuse. Timidly I remarked, “I’m not Jewish.” They responded, “We know and that’s quite all right.”

Sitting around the table, a wonderful change occurred. Not only did my inhibitions vanish, I no longer felt like an outsider. One little boy sitting beside me exclaimed to his father, the rabbi, “Dad, doesn’t he remind you of uncle Pete? Looks like him too!” Maybe it was traces of my Spanish blood, reflecting a remote Jewish and Arabic ancestry.

Whatever it was, while sharing food and engaging in good conversation, I felt a strong kinship; a bond that surpassed our religious distinctions.

I could identify with this type of learning: face-to-face engagement made all the difference.

While the winter break is reflective of how Christian tradition unwittingly still influences institutions of higher learning, students, faculty and staff partake and identify with a wide range of festival traditions.

How could those unfamiliar with such festivities gain an understanding of them? I would argue through engagement and direct participation. While perhaps disorienting and uncomfortable at first, experience has taught me there is no better way of learning than face-to-face interaction with the faithful.

Here are some major festivities, beyond Christmas, to consider this month.

• Eid al-Fitr is perhaps the Muslim holiday that most resembles other winter festivities such as Christmas. It marks the end of the month-long fast of Ramadan. Special food is prepared and friends and relatives are invited to share in the feast. Gifts are exchanged and children receive presents. Because Muslim festivities follow the lunar calendar, Eid is celebrated at varying times annually and does not fall in December this year.
• In Buddhist tradition, particularly among Mahayan Buddhists, Bodhi Day (or Rohatsu as it is known in Japan) was celebrated on Dec. 8. On this day, Buddhists commemorate the day in which Siddartha Gautama sat underneath the Bodhi tree, or sacred fig tree, and attained enlightenment. It is a day to recommit oneself to the practices of enlightenment, compassion and kindness for all living creatures.
• This year Hanukkah falls on Dec. 12 to 20. Known also as the Festival of Lights, Hanukkah is a wintertime Jewish holiday celebrating the rededication of the Holy Temple after the expulsion of the invading Seleucid Greeks in second century BCE. The eight-day festival is celebrated with a nightly menorah lighting, special prayers and fried foods.
• Yule is celebrated by Wiccans and Neo-pagans at the time of the Winter Solstice, around Dec. 21. It is the shortest day of the year and its celebration honours the winter-born king, symbolized by the rebirth of the sun. Many of the customs and practices around Yule are identified with Christmas today.
• Dec. 26 is marked by adherents of Zoroastrianism as Zarathosht Diso, or the death of the prophet Zoroaster. It is a day of mourning and praying in which people visit the fire temples and offer prayers in remembrance of the holy prophet.

If you have ever wanted to grow in awareness and understanding of differing faith traditions, why not take part in an alternative festivity this year? Faith communities, I have discovered, are eager to inform others of their significant values. In the process, you will discover the most precious value: hospitality.

Spiritual Care provides personal counselling at the Fort Garry campus and the Bannatyne campus to current University of Manitoba students. For more information, or to set up an appointment, send an email to Edgar.French@umanitoba.ca or call 204-474-7005.

…Students are also expected to create an expressive, end-of-term project. For many of them, it’s a first foray into dance.

Brenda Cantelo directs “Bodies of Water.”

Dance and religion may not seem to hold much in common at first glance, yet the relation between the two is a productive one, notes Cantelo. She cites dance practitioner and theorist Kimerer LaMothe’s
ongoing investigation of a dialogue between the body and religion through consideration of various sacred texts, historical artists including Graham, Alvin Ailey, Merce Cunningham, Robert Dunn and John Cage, and the ideas of philosophers such as Plato and Friedrich Nietzsche, who declared, somewhat sardonically, “I would believe only in a God that knows how to dance.” (He also called his daily dancing his “divine service.”)

Some religions accept and use dance as a vehicle for the sacred, Cantelo says, and there are some other religions that reject it all together as inappropriate for the sacred.

In the course, she explains, “we look at the curriculum, of dance and world religion, and [students] are thinking about dance and the way in which practitioners could connect movement to higher levels of understanding or expression or spirituality.”

Cantelo took the idea a step further. In the fall of 2015, students from the course had the opportunity to collaborate on an interdisciplinary performance with award-winning local choreographer Stephanie Ballard and students from music professor Gordon Fitzell’s eXperimental Improv Ensemble (XIE) in the Desautels Faculty of Music.

After working together on improvisational exercises and elements such as rhythm, space, sequencing and force, Cantelo’s students shaped their dance performance and entitled it “Bodies of Water.” The narrative of the dance was based on water: life coming out of the water, sailing through happier moments and into the storms of life struggles and ending in death, with dance movements to represent birds skimming the surface of the water and then flying into the sky.

— Mariianne Mays Wiebe

Read the rest of the story in the Spring 2017 issue of Teaching Life online.

The exhibit, Synagogues in Germany: A Virtual Reconstruction, is a large and interactive German multimedia exhibition brought to Winnipeg by the University of Manitoba, the Freeman Family Foundation Holocaust Education Centre, and the German government. It will be installed at Winnipeg’s Mennonite Heritage Centre Gallery before travelling for dates in Vancouver and Toronto.

Work on the exhibition began following the 1994 firebombing of a Lübeck synagogue, the first racist attack on a Jewish house of worship in Germany since 1945. Now, after 20 years of architectural research at Darmstadt Technical University, scholars have created elaborate 3D digital reconstructions of more than 25 of the more than 1000 synagogues destroyed on Kristallnacht.

Along with associated placards, photographs, text panels, books, and three documentary films, these reconstructions speak to the nature and significance of cultural loss as an instrument of genocide. They also visually document the extraordinary architectural variety and historical importance of the buildings the Nazis destroyed, and in so doing contribute to commemorative work ongoing in the wake of the Holocaust by providing a source for reflection on what the historical destruction of Jewish culture means today.

Exhibit hours: From Jan. 29-Mar. 4, 2o17, open weekly on Wednesdays, Thursdays, and Fridays from 9 a.m. – 4 p.m; Tuesday, 9 a.m. – 9 p.m., and Saturday and Sunday from 10 a.m. – 5 p.m.
Admission: Free
Location: Mennonite Heritage Centre, 600 Shaftesbury Blvd.
Please note: Group visits can be arranged, as can guided tours, by emailing Synagogues.Germany@umanitoba.ca. A complete schedule of exhibition-related events, themed tours by experts, and general tours for the public, will be made available later in January 2017.

The exhibition and related programming have been made possible thanks to the generous assistance of the Federal Republic of Germany / the Institut für Auslandsbeziehungen (ifa), the German Consulate General-Toronto, the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, the University of Manitoba, the Mennonite Heritage Centre Gallery, the Freeman Family Foundation Holocaust Education Centre, Kuehne + Nagel, and Hapag-Lloyd AG.

Public Programming

Admission to the exhibition and all events are free and open to everybody interested. Lecture Series (in Presentation Room, upper level of MHC Gallery)

All lectures will be between 30 and 45 minutes long with subsequent discussion. Exhibition guides are available after lectures for questions on the exhibition.

Sunday, February 12, 2 p.m.

• Belle Jarniewski (Holocaust Education Centre of the Jewish Heritage Centre of Western Canada / International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance): The Impact of the Shoah on Jewish-Christian Dialogue

Tuesday, February 14: 6 p.m.

• Prof. Stephan Jaeger (German and Slavic Studies, University of Manitoba): German Public Memory of the Third Reich and the Holocaust between 1945 and 2017

Sunday, February 19, 2 p.m.

• Sharon Graham (History, University of Manitoba): Reform Judaism from Hamburg to Cincinnati to Winnipeg

Tuesday, February 21: 6 p.m.

• Prof. Adam Muller (English, Film & Theatre, University of Manitoba): Cultural Genocide in Comparative Perspective

Sunday, February 26: 2 p.m.

• Prof. Ralph Stern (Architecture, University of Manitoba): Stolpern: Disrupting Narratives of Spatial Appropriation

Wednesday, March 1, 5:30 p.m.

• Prof. Benjamin M. Baader: (History & Judaic Studies, University of Manitoba): The Resurgence of Jewish Life in Germany Today

Public tours guided by specialists

Each tour  is about 1 hour and no prior booking is needed, just meet in the foyer of the MHC Gallery.

• Sunday, February 5, 2 p.m.: Guided tour with Sharon Graham (History, University of Manitoba)
• Tuesday, February 7, 7 p.m.: Guided tour with Prof. Alexandra Heberger (German and Slavic Studies, University of Manitoba)
• Sunday, February, 12, 1 p.m.: Guided tour with Esther Hein (German, University of Manitoba)
• Tuesday, February 14, 7 p.m.: Guided tour with Emma Mikuska-Tinman (German, University of Manitoba)
• Sunday, February 19, 1 p.m.: Guided tour with Michelle Lietz (English, University of Manitoba)
• Tuesday, February 21, 7 p.m.: Guided tour with Nicholas Mckenzie (Peace and Conflict Studies, University of Manitoba)
• Sunday, February, 26, 1 p.m.: Guided tour with Malak Abas & Braeden Hafichuk (University of Manitoba)
• Saturday, March 4, 3 p.m.: Guided tour with Prof. Stephan Jaeger (German and Slavic Studies, University of Manitoba)

Through an exhibit of photographs, text, film and computer-aided design, visitors can see the grand and varied architecture of these former Jewish houses of worship, as well getting a sense of how community and culture was destroyed with the buildings, says a Winnipeg genocide scholar.

“Genocide is the destruction of a people, not of people,” explains Adam Muller, one of two University of Manitoba professors co-ordinating educational programs and forums around the exhibit.

“You can achieve the destruction of a people through physical means and through the destruction of cultures.”

Synagogues in Germany: A Virtual Reconstruction, runs from Jan. 29 to March 4 at the Mennonite Heritage Centre Gallery, 600 Shaftesbury Blvd., on the south campus of Canadian Mennonite University. Viewers use computer workstations to see simulations of 25 synagogues, or experience the scale of the buildings through projected images on gallery walls.