Michelle Grahame

After doing a few tours of campuses in the pacific north west and Vancouver Island, Michelle Grahame decided that the Okanagan was the place for her at the time. With her sights set on a university where she could pursue a program in creative writing, she chose UBC Okanagan to complete her undergraduate degree.

“When I was looking at places to study and where I might be living, the campus in Kelowna just appealed to me a little bit more than others I had been to,” she says.

Coming from North Vancouver, she was looking for somewhere that was not so close to home. “As a first-year student, you’re spending pretty much all your time on campus, the Okanagan and the UBCO campus was somewhere I could picture myself.”

Grahame started her degree in 2010, and was on a fast track to complete by 2013. To do so, she took advantage of the classes over the summer, allowing her to earn her degree within three years.

“I think school had always kind of been my safe place, so I didn’t really know what it was like to be working or out in the world.” Grahame explains that she was eager to work on her courses throughout the summer to keep her engaged in her studies.

Realizing that everyone’s path is a little bit different, after graduation, she decided that she needed to go a different direction, took a working-holiday in Australia, came back and became a certified personal trainer before eventually undertaking a graduate diploma in business administration.

“One of the biggest pieces of advice that I often give people is take your time. There’s so much you can get out of things when you’re not rushing through them.”

“When I went into my undergraduate degree, I knew I wanted to do creative writing and was considering a double major, but without having much experience outside school never found the right fit.”

Grahame adds: “When I entered into the diploma in business administration, I thought to myself, ‘Ok, I have this creative writing degree, I’ve done all of these really random things with my career and I don’t really know what direction I’m going.’”

Deciding to gain business knowledge helped her grow and shift her thinking and begin planning for her future.  “Instead of thinking about my end destination, I started to consider what are some of the things that I enjoy doing? What motivates and drives me? How might I grow and build on the things I have studied and learned?”

Grahame currently works at Simon Fraser University as an Associate Director in the Graduate Studies office, and is working to complete her Master’s in Business Administration (MBA).

During her undergraduate degree, Grahame focused mostly on poetry, and towards the second-half of her degree, she started doing a more nonfiction memoir writing.

“Learning to write in these different genres has really helped me as I’m working towards my MBA where there is a lot of reflective writing that is required,” she notes. “Although I’m not writing as much creatively right now, it’s having the ability to look back on your experiences and then present that to people, to be able to convey that message – that is something that I find most valuable from my degree.”

Grahame remembers that her classes at UBCO were intimate environments where you get to know both your professors and your peers quite well. The workshop experience really teaches you how to give constructive feedback but also receive and implement that constructive feedback.

“Being in the MBA program, it is team based, so having that experience at an undergraduate level made it quite an easy transition for me.”

Grahame adds that in her current career as a leader and manager, having that ability to work with your team and give that feedback is really important, and that practice with creative writing prepared her to be able to do just that.

“In those classes you are often sharing things that that are more intimate and makes you vulnerable. That experience has served me well in my workplace.”

Symposium organizer Jodey Castricano (back left) along with graduate students Annie Furman (left front), Madeline Donald (middle), and Zach DeWitt (right)

A unique collaboration is providing a research exchange between UBC Okanagan and soon-to-be visiting faculty from England’s University of Exeter, at UBC’s Okanagan campus. Entitled, Telling Stories: The Humanities in an Age of Planetary Agenda-Setting, this initiative involves collaborators Dr. Jodey Castricano (UBCO), Dr. Ina Linge (U Exeter), Dr. Paul Young (U Exeter). This event is stage two of a series of events housed at both University of Exeter and UBC Okanagan, and aims to move towards and make space for an Arts/Humanities response to climate change, mass extinction, and environmental degradation, in order to drive healthy, sustainable, and just social and environmental change.

At a time when demands for environmental sustainability and food system justice are increasingly urgent, and planetary agendas are being set by scientific and financially interested parties, this project explores how Arts and Humanities scholars and artists at both Exeter and UBC Okanagan can contribute to agenda setting and climate justice through storytelling methods. This approach is important because stories serve to naturalize certain ways of thinking about and acting in the world, and because they can invite and inspire meaningful social and cultural engagement and action.

By engaging scholars, thinkers, makers, and creatives, we aim to reframe and rewrite climate justice narratives–ie. stories–that are currently exclusive to science, technology, and economics.

This event is stage two of the collaboration and includes both a symposium (July 19th, 2023) and a Multispecies Storytelling Workshop (July 21st, 2023). Our symposium takes place at UBC Okanagan campus, while the Multispecies Storytelling Workshop is situated on the land at Woodhaven Eco Culture Centre, both of which are on the unceded and ancestral land of the Okanagan Syilx people.

Follow the link below to learn more and to register for the symposium and workshop.

Telling Stories Symposium and Workshop

This event is supported by a UBC Okanagan-Exeter Excellence Catalyst Grant entitled “Telling Stories: The Humanities in an Age of Planetary Agenda-Setting”, the Faculty of Critical and Creative Studies and is organized by the Post-Anthropocentrism and Critical Animal Studies Research Group [PACAS].

Students walking to the convocation ceremony, MFA student Umar Turaki pictured at the front

The year’s convocation ceremony was held in person on June 8^th, and the faculty and staff in the Faculty of Creative and Critical Studies are happy to congratulate all of the students who completed their degrees in 2023.

This year we have sixteen masters students, four doctoral students, fifty-one Bachelor of Arts students, seventeen Bachelor of Fine Arts students, and four Bachelor of Media Studies students who are graduating with their degrees.

Breckin Baillie, who completed his BA degree with an Honours in English, and a member of the graduating class of 2023, was the student reader at our ceremony, and shared these words with the graduating class:

“These years of our lives, will not be idly shelved into the recesses of our brain to be forgotten. While we have been here, we have fulfilled this etymology of nourishing – we have been nourished by this institution, by the education we have received,” he said. “We have been nourished as adults, as future leaders, as pioneers in our fields, the giants whose shoulders will be stood on, we have learned to speak, to read, to think, our minds, our greatest gifts, have been challenged, corrected and expanded.”

Breckin reminded us all that these graduating students are now part of the alumni family of UBC: “Never forget the nourishment we have received here. While our time as students may be over, our relationship has just changed status. As alumni we are now part of a great family – a family of scholars, creators, world builders. We now belong to a community of changemakers and leaders.”

After the ceremony, a reception was held in the Creative and Critical Studies building for all of the FCCS graduates and their guests to continue the celebrations of the day. Bryce Traister, Dean of the faculty raised a glass to toast this year’s graduating class and their families.

“There are moments when I feel very proud to be part of an institution, and today was one of those days,” Traister said. “I always feel lucky to say I get to spend a life in schools, it has been my privilege to be able to do that. And I want to extend a welcome to each of you to come back and see us, tell us what you are doing, what you want to do, and what we need to do better. The faculty and all of the staff are full of excitement for your future.”

FCCS is also pleased to recognize the achievements of the following graduating or continuing students who received awards for their outstanding academic performance this year:

• Savanah Babij, Kelly Curtis Memorial Scholarship in English
• Sonja Berg, Jaeger Entrance Award
• Aditri Chatterjee, Faculty of Creative and Critical Studies International Student Award
• Ronnie Cheng, 2021 Vernon Film Society Media Prize
• Mihai Covaser, FCCS French Essay Prize
• Rain Doody, Jill Douglas Entrance Award
• Katja Ewart, Asper Scholarship
• Cady Gau, Visual Arts Scholarship; Murray Johnson Memorial Award in Visual Arts
• Madeline Grove, FCCS International Student Award
• Makeena Hartmann, Elinor Yandel Memorial Award in Fine Arts; Norma and Jack Aitken Prize in Visual Arts
• Jaine Hillier, Media Studies Scholarship
• Josie Hillman, Asper Graduating Prize
• Chloe Jenkins, Visual Arts Prize
• Simone King, Doug Biden Memorial Scholarship in Visual Arts
• Peyton Lynch, Craig Hall Memorial Visual Arts Scholarship in Printmaking
• Elizabeth MacDonald, FCCS French Scholarship
• Emily-Jayne May Myatt, FCCS Dean’s Award for Visual Arts
• Mariah Miguel-Juan, Visual Arts Prize
• Claire Miller-Harder, Campbell Family Graduate Award in Fine Arts
• Carrie Mitchell Jack and Lorna Hambleton Memorial Award
• Alberte Patenaude, FCCS Spanish Scholarship
• Christal Perdison, FCCS Languages Scholarship; FCCS International Student Award
• Rachel Pickard, FCCS Cultural Studies Scholarship
• Arthur Pielecki, Asper Scholarship
• John Prendas, Frances Harris Prize in Fine Arts; Henderson Award in International Development
• Calise Stankoven, Creative Studies Transfer Prize in Creative Writing
• Marissa Thompson, Creative Writing Prize
• Naomi Ukrainetz, Jessie Ravnsborg Memorial Award
• Mathew Wanbon, FCCS Creative Writing Scholarship
• He Wanling, FCCS Art History and Visual Culture Scholarship
• Ziv Wei, FCCS International Student Award
• Abigail Wiens, FCCS English Scholarship
• Margaret Wileman, Dr. Shelley Martin Memorial Scholarship

The FCCS Dean’s Honour list recognizes students in all years of the BA and BFA degrees, who are at the top of their class with a GPA of 85% or better.

Bachelor of Arts Students

Bachelor of Fine Arts Students

Bachelor of MEdia Studies Students

BFA student Angela Wood walking to the ceremony

Faculty members congratulating the graduates before the ceremony

FCCS faculty members Myron Campbell, Ramine Adl, Michael V. Smith, Francis Langevin and Nina Langton before the ceremony

Dean Bryce Traister raising a glass to the class of 2023

FCCS post-convocation reception, 2023

MFA graduate Rylan Broadbent with his partner at the FCCS reception

English Honours students Breckin Baillie, Zachary Sawchuk, Abigail Wiens, 
Maggie Wileman faculty members Robert Eggleston and Marie Loughlin

MA English graduate Dana Penney with supervisor Marie Loughlin

BA graduate, excited about this day!

Eun Jee Lee (centre), Co-op student and Art History and Visual Culture graduate with co-op supervisors Shauna Oddleifson and Jessica Beck

Rina Garcia Chua, PhD graduate

The Critical Relations Symposium was held on April 28 and 29^th, 2023. Organized by the It’s Lit! Club, the symposium offered undergraduate and graduate students an opportunity to share their research with the wider campus academic community.

Below is a recap of the events held in April, from the desk of co-organizer, and It’s Lit! Club Treasurer, Jess Beaudin:

The 2023 Critical Relations Symposium: Encounters was opened with song, story, and collective discussion by Anona Kampe, a knowledge keeper from the Penticton Indian Band. Anona’s requested self-introduction highlighted for us the critical role her own relations play in her interwoven understanding of self and place–she is a mother, a daughter, a teacher, a student, and she lives in mutually fruitful relation with nonhuman beings and with the land that is often called Penticton, on Syilx territory.

Anona shared a simultaneously traditional and seasonally non-traditional telling of captikʷł–a story of a boulder-carrying competition among the earth’s beings– after which we were each called to share our personal takeaway or experience of the story. Like the repetition and emphasis used throughout the story, this collective and iterative processing reinforced the multiple meanings of the story, and inscribed these meanings for those in attendance onto the non-consensual marked land to which the story refers: the now-settler-deconstructed boulder heritage site near Summerland, BC. Opening our symposium in this way drew attention to the encounters between settler and Indigenous lifeways, as well as human encounters with what we linguistically collapse, violent in its terminological simplicity, into ‘the land’.

Read about the site and its alterations.

The intimacy of this opening to our symposium and welcome to those attending perfectly framed our topic of Encounters across story, history, and forms of being.

Our first and only panel submitted as such, “Fostering Interconnectedness through Artistic Interjections” hosted Miriam Cummings, Ronan Fraser, and Annie Furman, three MFA students from UBCO working in theatre and creative writing. As a throughline, their presentations employed art as a method and mediating encounter, intervening politically, environmentally, and interpersonally through a desire to do better, be better, and make better through their work.

Our second and concluding panel of the day, “Encounters Across the Mechanical”, brought together Larissa Piva (UBCO MFA), Brianne Christensen (UBCO MA), and Nathalie Kurkjian (UBCO BA). We witnessed explorations of artificial intelligence technologies and art, the author as function set in conversation with paratexts, and epistemological liberation and limitations through language construction. These considerations for how we encounter texts–considerations of form, construction, language, and boundaries, helped shift our framing to the how of encounter, in addition to the what. 

Presenters, organizers, and faculty enjoyed dinner together the evening of April 28th, 2023 at Kelowna’s Frankie We Salute You, before returning, rested and well-caffeinated the next morning for our third panel: “Encountering Loss and Memory”. This panel hosted Bibek Sharma (MFA), Zev Tiefenbach (MFA), and Andisha Sabri (MFA), all of whose works confront geographical space and disconnection, cultural inheritances, and post-memory in exploring identity.

We were honoured to have Nancy Holmes present her work, “Place, Play, Love: Community art as ‘non-proscriptive space” as a keynote for our symposium. Dr. Holmes’ presentation came in two parts: first, she shared stunning images and information about the MANY bee species local to the Okanagan and British Columbia more broadly–an educational talk very much in line with her work as representative of Border Free Bees; second, she spoke to the value of community-based art projects and the power such projects hold for incremental ethical shifts toward nonhuman beings with whom we share this earth. Her presentation articulated a powerful message regarding how artists and academics alike can engage with and activate critical masses in the public in order to create change.

Our final panel, “Living Precariously: Embodied Encounters”, was composed of Karyann Dorn (M-IGS), Claire Miller-Harder (MFA), and Britt Mackenzie-Dale (PhD Candidate UNB) (absent). Like some of our other panels, our final panel was emotionally-laden insofar as it drew together systemic homelessness and the opioid crisis in southern Alberta and elsewhere, and Mennonite women’s embodied resistance to abuse and silencing. In both cases, the act of writing and its oration became an outcry–a site and an encounter with truths that are both repressed and ignored.

We are so grateful to all who shared their work and attended The Critical Relations Symposium: Encounters. In closing, I want to extend our collective gratitude to Dr. Nancy Holmes, whose donation back to our conference enabled us to create our first Critical Relations Symposium Student Paper Prize, awarded to two participants in this year’s symposium! To this, we also extend our heartfelt congratulations to both Brianne Christensen and Zev Tiefenbach, whose exceptional presentations are well-deserving of extra accolades. We treasure all the incredible presentations and the work that made selecting awardees so very difficult for this event. Lastly, we look forward to the next iteration of the Critical Relations Symposium, hosted by It’s Lit! Club!”

Below are some photos from the two-day symposium.

Espaces francophones Team 2022-2023; Carl Ruest, Aradhita Arora, Francis Langevin, launch event, September 2022.

A joint initiative between the Okanagan School of Education (French Pathways) and the Faculty of Creative and Critical Studies (French programs), Espaces francophones’ mission is to cultivate a sense of belonging among Francophones (first language or other) at UBCO. 

Over the last year, Espaces francophones has organized a number of successful events for students, faculty and the campus community, including a launch for the initiative, French film nights, social event for French speakers and learners, crêpe breakfast with the chance to socialize with other francophones, and creative writing sessions, in French.

Find out more about the past year’s events and what Espaces Francophones has to offer.

Matthew Davis

Matthew Davis is a Lecturer in the Department of English and Cultural Studies and the Co-Coordinator of the Digital Arts and Humanities program at UBCO. His research investigates the connections between embodiment, gender, and technology in place, space, and religious practice in pre-modern material, textual, and performance cultures.

Davis received his PhD in English literature (with a certificate in Digital Humanities) from Texas A&M University in 2013.  Before coming to UBCO, he was a ZKS-Lendrum Assistant Professor (Research) in the Scientific Study of Manuscripts and Inscriptions at the University of Durham for 2022, a postdoctoral fellow at the Ruth and Lewis Sherman Centre for the Digital Scholarship at McMaster University, a Lindsey Young Visiting Faculty Fellow at the University of Tennessee’s Marco Institute for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, and the Council of Library and Information Resources/Mellon Fellow in Data Curation for Medieval Studies at North Carolina State University.

Dr. Davis shared some insights on his research and teaching practices here at UBC Okanagan.

Tell us about your research interests and what excites you about your field of work

My research investigates the connections between embodiment, gender, and technology in place, space, and religious practice in pre-modern material, textual, and performance cultures. The goal there is to tease out what I call semiotic palimpsests–elements of the ways people thought about themselves in the late medieval and early Tudor periods that have been lost or suppressed due to the expectations of people in subsequent centuries. This means I’m primarily concerned with the cultural contexts works are produced within, their relationship to contemporary ideas, and the lives of the people who produced and consumed them.

I liken what I do to a form of literary archaeology; there’s the general study of literature qua literature, of course, but beyond that there’s insights to be gained about medieval culture and in the case of drama, how these works might have been put into practice in a real, ephemeral moment of performance. That sort of sense that the medieval should be allowed to stand as it’s own thing and not as part of or in opposition to something else seems to largely be missing today. We live in an incredibly presentist time; everything is focused on the eternal now and things are often taken out of context and put to work to shore up our beliefs, whether for good or ill.  I see the broad goal of my work in the middle ages to be in some ways an act of decolonization; not, in this case, of settlers colonizing indigenous lands but of the present colonizing the past and taking from it what they find useful.

How did you know you wanted to be a professor?

I started out working on a degree in International Relations with the original goal of wanting to join the Foreign Service in the United States. About two years into that program I decided that the life of a Foreign Service Officer, where you change locations every three years, wasn’t conducive to building a life. Which is a bit ironic, considering my post-degree pinballing around the world, but nevertheless that was my thinking.

Once I’d made that decision, I needed to figure out what I did want to do with my life. I was sitting in a computer lab on my undergrad campus when it struck me that what I really wanted to do was talk about ideas. That’s the thing that most excites me, and the job that seemed most likely to let me do that as a major part of my job was to be a professor.

What kind of learning experiences do offer your students

It depends on the course I’m teaching, obviously, but in general a student in my courses can expect to encounter what the digital world calls “Critical Making” and what might more broadly be considered experiential learning.

For my digital courses like the ones I’m teaching here at UBCO, I am a big believer in learning-by-doing and failure being built into the learning process. Much of the work in my class is trying out various digital tools and methods while I talk to students one-on-one or in small groups. I see my goal in these courses to make students aware that these tools exist and to give them a basic understanding of how they function under the hood. If it turns out that the tool or method has use for them they can explore it further, but knowing the tool is available in their metaphorical tool-chest is what I hope they get out of the courses I teach here.

Left to right: Jason (Darian Detta’s brother who accepted the award on his behalf), Kristen Burns, Alison Braid, and Corinna Chong. Not pictured: Madeleine van Goudoever

Local author Corrina Chong was the judge for the 25th annual Okanagan Short Story Contest, and announced the 4 finalists at a public event held at the Alternator for Contemporary Art last week with each of the writers reading a part of their story.

The winning author, Alison Braid of Summerland, took first place for her short story “Two Day Summer”.

“Upon reading the very first sentence of “Two Day Summer,” I knew I was in the hands of an expert. Every sentence of this story is beautifully crafted, the characters are richly drawn, and the conflict is layered with delicate precision,” explains Chong.

Alison Braid’s work has been shortlisted for the Montreal International Poetry Prize, Arc Poetry Magazine’s Poem of the Year Contest, and The Bridport Prize in Flash Fiction. She is the author of the chapbook Little Hunches (Anstruther Press, 2020.) She holds an MFA from the Vermont College of Fine Arts, and is currently working to finish a collection of short stories, titled Look Both Ways & Other Stories.

Madeleine van Goudoever, placed second with “Peachy Like Nietzsche”.

Chong says this about van Goudoever’s story, “This story is the best mixture of funny and tragic, its quirky, unpredictable characters grounded in decisive, vibrant writing. The concluding paragraphs, in particular, weave its narrative threads together with remarkable poise and sensitivity.”

Madeleine van Goudoever is a former graffiti artist from Montreal, who currently resides in Kelowna. She also writes poetry.

Third place went to MFA alumna Kristin Burns for her story, “Heat”.

“This is a writer who understands their characters as complex, three-dimensional people, and also has a keen ear for crafting propulsive, rhythmic sentences and images sharp enough to cut.” Says Chong.

Kristin is a queer MFA graduate currently living back in her hometown Vernon. She’s previously won second place in the Okanagan Short Story Contest, and her short story “The Lakeweed Girl”, shortlisted in 2022, will appear in this month’s issue of Carousel Magazine along with an accompanying illustration she made.

Finally, Darian Detta took the top prize for the high school category for his story, “The Place Where None Can Grow.”

“I was struck not only by the seamless way this story integrates the Ktunaxa (too-NA-ha) language and honours indigenous oral storytelling traditions, but also by the vivid, elegantly rendered imagery—tears transforming into thousands of silk strings, samaras plucked out of the wind’s grasp by the roiling tar, yellow flowers erupting from the earth. This was a deeply atmospheric and moving story by an undeniably talented young writer,” explains Chong.

Darian Detta is a grade 11 student and aspiring author at Mount Baker Secondary School in Cranbrook. He has a soft spot for both fantasy and science fiction (though a blend of both is his first and foremost preference.)

Corinna Chong is an acclaimed Canadian writer, editor and English professor at Okanagan College. The annual contest, organized by the Creative Writing program in the Faculty of Creative and Critical Studies (FCCS), is a writing competition open to fiction writers in British Columbia’s Southern Interior. Writers submit their stories, which are then read, anonymously, by faculty, and the shortlisted stories are sent to a guest judge to choose the winners in the adult and high school categories.

The first-place writer received $1,000 plus a one-week retreat at The Woodhaven Eco Culture Centre in Kelowna; second-place winner received $400 and third-place received $200. The top high school student received a $200 prize. Co-sponsors of the contest are FCCS and the Central Okanagan Foundation.

View the full short list for this year’s contest.

Join us on April 12^th, between 11:00 am and 2:00 pm, for a symposium to showcase the work of the graduate student researchers involved in the Immersive Technologies (CITech). This symposium is a collaboration between CITech and the Media Studies program, and will be held in the Visualization and Emerging Media Studio (COM 107).

Immersive Technologies (CITech) is a multidisciplinary graduate training program focusing on skills development and collaborative research in design of immersive solutions for various real-world applications from manufacturing to healthcare, to community engagement and education. Researchers to be presented in this symposium include: Bengi Agcal, Amira Ahmed, Mohammad Amin Batouei, Bahman Fakouri, Nasim Hajati, Nelusha Hansamali Nugegoda, Leslie Saca, and Samar Sallam.

See below for a description of each student’s research.

11:00-11:30 Amin Mohammad Batouei is a MASc. student of a mechanical engineering student at UBCO. His academic journey began at the Iran University of Science and Technology with B.Sc. in Mechanical Engineering, where he discovered a passion for studying composite materials. His undergraduate thesis focused on practical uses of composite materials by utilizing finite element analysis to research “Reinforcing the corroded bottom plate of a storage tank with composite materials.” His research interest is centred on utilizing machine learning to forecast the degree of cure in a composite material that is subjected to an autoclave by analyzing the video of the procedure. He is a member of the Composites Research Network (CRN), working under the supervision of Dr. Abbas Milani.

VEMS features Canada’s highest-resolution, 3D, VR-ready video wall. It is designed for use cases that are impossible elsewhere, such as immersive experiences without VR equipment, scientific simulations with ultra-high resolution, and graphics workstations for computationally intensive tasks. The studio also offers collaboration tools, including video conferencing and recording. Although the user experience is designed to be intuitive, allowing for ease of use even without specialized training, there is currently a gap in the automation of introducing the space and its capabilities. As a result, an app is being developed with the help of Unity to serve as a tutorial, demonstrating the capabilities of the screen and how users can interact with it. The app will help bridge the gap in introducing users to the advanced features of VEMS and enable them to better utilize the studio’s capabilities for their use cases. This will provide a more seamless and efficient experience for users while maximizing the potential of VEMS.

11:30 – 12:00 Nelusha Nugegoda is a self-motivated student pursuing her MSc in Computer Science on Human-Computer Interaction at The University of British Columbia, Kelowna, BC, Canada. She has extensive experience as a software developer in a reputed Company. She is a current member of the UBCO HCI lab. Her current focus is developing a collaborative application using Augmented Reality to allow professionals to work together on a dedicated task in their remote location.

Nugegoda has collaborated on an application allowing people to play an interactive game to check and practice their garbage-sorting skills by collaborating with their friends and colleagues. When it comes to waste disposal, one of the most important things is to sort the waste into the correct bins to make the recycling process easy and efficient. This immersive game experience allows users to visually remember the correct bins to put the items that they are frequently using in day-to-day life and also the items which were most commonly sorted incorrectly. Users will have the opportunity to collaborate with others to choose the correct bin. They will have three chances to sort all the garbage items incorrectly and complete the task successfully.

12:00 – 12:30 Bengi Agcal is a multimedia artist with computer engineering and psychology backgrounds. She is pursuing her MFA alongside NSERC CREATE in the Immersive Technologies program. Through art and engineering, she aims to engage with the issues of environmental degradation. Her research interests and art practice include speculative fiction, participatory design, 3D rendering, digital sculpting, XR technologies, web computing, immersive technologies, sustainability, climate change, and material recycling.

Virtual reality, as a time-based media and digital technology, can transmit unpredictable and imperceptible sides of changes. Agcal’s project, The 8th continent/Ark Noah’s 2.0, aims to bring together a collaborative art practice in a digital realm to spread and amplify the public’s sentiments and experiences regarding plastic pollution. The experience takes place in an unreal landscape inspired by the Pacific garbage patch, and it replicates the meditative and rewarding process of environmental clean-ups by having the player clear up the space and free the animals victimized by pollution. We hope that this project will enable individuals to share their thoughts and previous exposures to pollution with the general public, thereby opening up a discussion space to drive the necessary changes.

12:30 – 1:00 Amira Ahmed is an Assistant Lecturer at Cairo University, Egypt. Her background lies in Media and Communication studies. She is a second-year Ph.D. student in the Interdisciplinary Studies program, DAHU theme, at UBCO and a Center of Culture and Technology member. She participates in two academic cohorts: Digital Arts and Humanities at the Faculty of Creative and Critical Studies and CITECH training program. Her Ph.D. research-creation study investigates the role of immersive and interactive narratives in promoting Global Citizenship Education and countering extremism.

Digital media technologies provide endless possibilities for disseminating and preserving cultural heritage, opening new avenues to creative representations of cultural heritage. This research-creation discusses the design and implementation of an immersive experience where users could navigate the world’s most incredible open-air museum, Luxor city, using a Wireless Game Joystick Controller. Users will look closer at its prominent monuments and learn about ancient Egyptian history and mythology through info spots offering further details on the sites. The primary objective of the project is to examine the effects of immersion and interaction with a high-resolution, 3D, VR-ready video wall (15,360 x 4,320 px) on user experience and experiential learning. Finally, this research aims to advance the understanding of the impact of immersive technologies and interactive 3D multimedia in communicating and promoting digital heritage.

1:00 – 1:30 Bahman Fakouri is a master’s student in the Interdisciplinary Graduate Studies program, DAHU theme, at UBCO.  He completed his bachelor’s degree in industrial design and holds a master’s degree in illustration. He has worked in the entertainment industry as a 3D modeller, texture artist, and visual development artist. His research interests include data physicalization, storytelling, XR, virtual reality, and data visualization.

Virtual reality can help artists to tell their stories in an immersive environment and illustrate the sophisticated concept of time and place in a way that can be presented to non-scientist audiences. Time After Time (TAT), is a project that will focus on illustrating the impact of a Nechako building on its surroundings before and after its construction on the UBC Okanagan campus. Data required for creating this project is collected from Google Maps, and some Heli shot footage was captured by drone. Using virtual reality, viewers can explore and observe the change process as it happens over time. This will be a unique opportunity for viewers to witness the changes in their environment in a way they may not have been able to experience before.

1:30 – 2:00 Ms. Leslie Saca is a Ph.D. Student in the Electrical Engineering School of Engineering. She is part of the CITech graduate program interested in Extended Reality (XR), User Experience, Wearable Sensors, and Human Technology Interaction. Her background in the Immersive Technologies field started in 2021 while volunteering for a Canadian company, Mantis XR, where she contributed to the technology development efforts and supported their operations to enhance productivity since she found her passion in developing personalized XR experiences based on user feedback collected from wearable sensors embedded in mobile devices.

Immersive technologies create unique experiences by merging the physical world with virtual and simulated reality. Saca’s proposed research aims to develop an interface for users to immerse themselves in an XR experience using their mobile devices. This is achieved using the embedded sensors (gyroscope and accelerometer) in mobile devices to move through and interact with the environment. This interface is a proof-of-concept project that will eventually help pave the way for developing personalized XR experiences displayed on mobile devices.

Join Dr. Anita Girvan for a multi-session reading salon in which members will engage in collegial conversation about the emerging field of black feminist and coalitional ecological thought, built upon ancestral lineages. Dr. Girvan is an Assistant Professor of Cultural Studies and Environmental Justice in the department of English and Cultural Studies in FCCS.

The first session will discuss the text, Undrowned: Black Feminist Lessons from Marine Mammals by Alexis Pauline Gumbs, and will be held on April 14th from 10am to noon in ART 218.

Anyone on campus is invited to join this group who can commit to joining this community and to centering and reading Black feminist and coalitional texts and creative interventions. We are hoping to create community where BIPOC knowledges are held and centered, but all are welcome to learn and foster supportive communities of practice toward liberatory futures for human and larger-than-human kin.

In order to build good relations, the group number will be capped at 20, so please e-mail anita.girvan@ubc.ca ASAP if you are committed to attending. If you really want to join, can commit to three future sessions in the year and reading the texts chosen, but cannot make this session, please e-mail Anita. First priority in the salon will be given to those in attendance this first session.

Dates for following sessions will be determined by the group after the first meet-up.

Each session will focus upon a text or cultural artefacts in the emerging, but long existent, field of Black Feminist Ecological Thought.

Dr. Girvan says: My own spin on this is to call it Black Feminist and Coalitional Ecological Thought. I note that the lineages of Black feminism (eg Combahee River Collective) have always been coalitional in some form or the other – as they seek to connect with communities who have knowledges and experiences that are negatively impacted by exclusionary power – but it may be important to flag this explicitly at a time when divide and conquer politics function to maintain a troubling status quo.

Texts for future sessions will be drawn from the following (and/or participants’ suggestions at first session):

• The Deep – Rivers Solomon
• Chapter 16. “Black Feminist Ecological Thought: A Manifesto” – a chapter
  Chelsea Mikael Frazier in Ecofeminism Abrams and Gruen eds) (2nd Edition)
• World of Wonders -Aimee Nezhukumatathi
• Nia love – New York choreographer film-maker “UnderCurrents” (she performs, dances
  drowning)
• nichola fedman-kiss “Siren III” – Toronto- film and art installation (filmed underwater in
  the Atlantic ocean)
• Aph and Syl Ko. 2017.Aphro-ism: Essays on Pop Culture, Feminism and Black
• Veganism from Two Sisters. Lantern Publishing
• Octavia Butler or NK Jemison
• Dionne Brand (Map or any others of hers)

Dr. Aisha Ravindran: April 24, 1960 – March 8, 2023

The Faculty of Creative and Critical Studies mourns the loss of Dr. Aisha Ravindran, who died from cancer early in the morning of March 8, 2023.

A researcher and teacher of composition, rhetoric, intercultural communication, and literature, Aisha joined our community in 2017. Her first PhD, from Mahatma Gandhi University, 2003, was on the poetry of Muriel Rukeyser. Before her death she was poised to defend a second PhD, through Simon Fraser University, in the area of communication and rhetoric with a particular focus on the needs of International Students.

Before joining UBCO, Aisha held an appointment at George Mason University’s campus in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, where she achieved the rank of Associate Professor and served as Chair of the Department of General Education (2009-2012). After George Mason’s UAE campus transitioned to become the University of Ras Al Khaimah, she served as Chair of the Department of English (2012-2014). In 2014, she emigrated to Canada, and undertook a new academic focus in her study of educational leadership and professional communication at Simon Fraser University.

Aisha joined the FCCS community as a sessional lecturer in 2017, and spent two years teaching first year English courses for us. In 2019, she applied for an FCCS tenure-track position in the Educational Leadership Stream with the Department of English and Cultural Studies. When the department recommended her for appointment, the Dean and Provost made the decision to appoint her immediately at the rank of Associate Professor of Teaching.

With her characteristic drive, sharp intellect, and generous humor, Aisha went to work with gusto and flare. In the far, far, too brief time we had with her, Aisha worked with her colleagues to create an entirely new academic learning space—even a new program code! – for  students across the campus, with an emphasis on supporting international students. She showed us all how to get things done, winning significant grants to support her educational leadership and program development, teaching new courses, helping to craft the new certification in Professional Writing, and very recently submitting a new proposal to establish a Minor in professional writing through the Communication and Rhetoric Program (CORH). She was only getting started and was taken too soon.

FCCS extends its condolences to Aisha’s students, past and present, to the Department of English and Cultural Studies, her home unit; and, especially, to her surviving partner, Dr. Brendan D’Souza, who teaches biology at UBCO. We walk with Brendan on our shared path of grief.

Celebration of Life Event

We are hosting a Celebration of Life for our dear friend and colleague, Aisha Ravindran.

Join us and light a candle as we remember her time amongst us, her strong and generous spirit, her love for her work, for her students, and for her friends.

Date: Wednesday, March 15
Time: 5:15 to 6:45 p.m.
Location: ADM 026 (University Theatre stage)

Light refreshments will be served.

Donations in memory of Aisha can be made to the BC Cancer Foundation, specifically directed to pancreatic cancer research.

Aisha Ravindran (centre) at the English Course union Masquerade Ball with collogues, February 2023.

Aisha Ravindran at the ISSOTL Conference, UBCO in November 2022 with colleagues

Aisha Ravindran (centre) in her traditional ceremonial clothing from her home region in Kerala with colleagues Karis Shearer (left) and Sherry Breshears