WOA Spring 2012 by Faculty of Arts, University of Alberta

UNIVERSITY OF ALBERTA | FACULTY OF ARTS ALUMNI MAGAZINE

SPRING ’12

WORK of ARTS

THE MAVERICK MUSICIAN Using puppets, planes and the Twitterverse, Timothy Shantz is taking choral music to a whole new audience

Helping the whole person Three Arts alumni use very different counselling methods to treat their clients

Horsey The Cécile E. Mactaggart Travel Award for Narrative Writing

WWW.ARTS.UALBERTA.CA/WOA

LAST ISSUE OF WOA

See page 5

UAlberta-Lille

Program

Starting in September 2012, students will have the opportunity to take UAlberta courses in Lille, France, while interacting with French students and learning about French culture first-hand.

See www.lille.ualberta.ca to learn more!

Table of Contents Volume 8 Issue 1 – Spring 2012

In Every Issue Dean’s Message

Moving forward in a new budget climate

Sounding Board

Readers tell us what they think

Coffee Break

Ten minutes with Stephen Slemon (English & Film Studies)

Panorama

News and updates from the Faculty of Arts

12 COVER PHOTOGRAPH: Timothy Shantz, photo by Phil Crozier

As I See It . . . 17

Research Highlights 12

Using puppets, planes and the Twitterverse, Timothy Shantz is taking choral music to a whole new audience by Judy Monchuk

Helping the whole person

Fine Arts students on why the arts are important to our communities

Alumnus opinion column The importance of engaging young people by Christine Causing

Features The Maverick Musician

Student View

Three Arts alumni use very different counselling methods to treat their clients by Mifi Purvis

Discoveries and innovations

Ask the Expert

Lise Gotell (Women’s Studies) answers readers’ questions about religious and cultural face coverings in courtrooms

Faculty Bookshelf

The importance of performance spaces

Class Notes

Updates from alumni

Creative Writing: Horsey

2011 Winner of the Cécile E. Mactaggart Travel Award for Narrative Writing by Thomas Wharton Catching up with a previous winner of the Cécile E. Mactaggart Travel Award for Narrative Writing by Russell Cobb

Where Are They Now?

Catching up with a retired professor

In Memoriam

Bidding farewell to friends

Flashback 34 CJSR: The little radio station that could

woa | SPRING ’12

Dean’s Message www.arts.ualberta.ca

Moving forward in a new budget climate

THE FACULTY OF ARTS ALUMNI MAGAZINE www.arts.ualberta.ca/woa Photography by U OF A MARKETING AND COMMUNICATIONS (MICHAEL HOLLY)

WOA is published twice a year by the Faculty of Arts Dean’s Office and is distributed to 30,000 Faculty of Arts alumni, donors, faculty, staff, students and other interested readers. It aims to connect alumni with other alumni, to keep people informed of developments in the Faculty of Arts, and to build pride and encourage readers to become effective ambassadors for the Faculty.

Those of you living in the Edmonton area are undoubtedly aware that the University has been grappling with budget shortfalls recently, and that this situation has created challenges for the entire campus community. Faced with the need to reallocate 2.1% from our base budget for 2011-12, the Faculty of Arts implemented a special project to review our administrative procedures. The ultimate goal of this project has been to identify areas where we can be more efficient, and then to redesign our administrative structure in order to achieve these efficiencies. By taking this approach, rather than immediately resorting to cutting positions, we have also hoped to retain as many of our staff members – who are absolutely crucial to the functioning of our departments and programs – as possible. As I write this, we are in the midst of sorting out exactly what this redesign will look like. And I am confident we are on the road to devising solutions that will allow us to continue to do what we do best: offer high quality programs to our students, while engaging in inspiring research and thoughtful community collaborations. A situation like this cannot be resolved without sacrifices, however, and I regret to announce that this will be the last printed issue of WOA Magazine for the foreseeable future. This doesn’t mean you will stop hearing from us, but as the writers, designers and publishers among you will realize, printing and mailing a magazine is a significant investment. We have been incredibly proud to deliver our stories to your mailboxes twice a year, and as we move forward we 4

woa | SPRING ’12

Volume 8 Issue 1 – Spring 2012

DEAN OF ARTS Lesley Cormack EDITOR Melissa Boisvert ASSOCIATE EDITOR Carmen Rojas CREATIVE CONSULTANT Catherine Kloczkowski PUBLISHER Skinnyfish Media Inc. www.skinnyfishmedia.com 403.338.1731 ART DIRECTOR Susie Wong

intend to keep bringing you these stories electronically (please see the Editor’s Message on page 5 for more information on how we plan to stay in touch). Rest assured that your Faculty remains committed to our teaching and research goals, and in fact, it has never been more important for us to pursue these goals. I truly believe the arts have a crucial role to play in this complex, volatile world. Never have we had a greater need for critical analysis, cultural understanding, historical perspective and political involvement. Never have we had a greater need for articulate and thoughtful citizens – people with creativity, confidence and passion, who care about engaging with the world around them and making it a better place. Each and every one of you is part of this larger story, and I hope you will continue to help us tell it as broadly and as vocally as possible. Lesley Cormack DEAN OF ARTS

CONTRIBUTING WRITERS Sarah Carter, Christine Causing, Russell Cobb, Ben Freeland, Lise Gotell, Judy Monchuk, Mifi Purvis, Carmen Rojas, Mick Sleeper, Thomas Wharton PHOTOGRAPHERS & ARTISTS Kai Brigandt, Mike Burrows, Russell Cobb, Phil Crozier, Alevtina Cvetkova, Epic Photography Inc. (Ian Jackson), J. H. Gano, Greg Geipel, Peter Holloway, Catherine Kloczkowski, Tanya Lam, Maryon McClary, Longlu Qin, Giorgio Riello, Oleksandr Romaniuk, Nolan Sawatzky, Jen Shaw, Elena Siemens, Stephen Slemon, Stefano Triulzi, U of A Marketing & Communications (Michael Holly & Richard Siemens) ARCHIVAL PHOTOS AND MATERIAL Courtesy of Peel’s Prairie Provinces and the University of Alberta Archives SEND YOUR COMMENTS TO: woa@ualberta.ca or University of Alberta Faculty of Arts 6-33 Humanities Centre Edmonton, Alberta T6G 2E5 Attention: WOA Magazine Copyright©2012 WOA (Work of Arts) Magazine. Nothing in this magazine may be copied or reprinted without the written consent of the Faculty of Arts at the University of Alberta. All material is compiled from sources believed to be reliable, but published without responsibility for errors or omissions. WOA assumes no responsibility for unsolicited manuscripts or photos. Views and opinions expressed in WOA are those of the authors or interviewees and do not necessarily represent the views of the University of Alberta, the Faculty of Arts or its departments or programs.

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Sounding Board Facebook feedback

University of AlbertA | fAcUlty of Arts AlUmni mAgAzine

fAll ’11

Work of Arts Re: Risky Business, Fall ’11 I feel really inspired by Caroline’s story. As a graduate of the Romance Languages Department at the U of A, I also have had a career that has taken its own route because of some wonderfully serendipitous events. Caroline Jenner’s bold moves from Edmonton to Brussels I think that the ability to be flexible and open-minded, as well as Digital Designer courageous, speaks well of Arts Farzad Varahramyan stays ahead of the game. Again. graduates in general. And I love the idea of “no plan”! The plan only takes shape in retrospect. - Sally Rehorick ’69 BA, Russian Language & Literature

Re: A Digital World through His Eyes, Fall ’11 Great read. Love reading about the Appy mob. - Rob Bird Wonderful article, Farzad. Loved reading about your early years and your family. - Karen Burns

Arts salon Featuring creative works by readers

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Dear Readers, As Dean Cormack discusses in her Dean’s Message on page four, budgetary constraints have meant some tough choices for the Faculty of Arts. I’m saddened to tell you that this will be the last issue of WOA.

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I hope that you have enjoyed reading our magazine as much as the Faculty of Arts Communications Team has enjoyed putting it together. The people we have met and the stories we have had the honour of sharing have been nothing short of inspirational. Although you won’t receive the magazine anymore, you haven’t heard the last from us! Please make sure your alumni record includes an updated email address so that we can keep you informed about our stories and happenings. You can update your alumni record by emailing alumrec@ualberta.ca. You can also follow us on Facebook at www.facebook.com/UofAArts or Twitter (Username @uofa_arts).

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WOA web exclusives! Make sure to check out the WOA website at www.arts.ualberta.ca/woa for our web exclusives! Read extra content, view videos and much more! Scan this QR code on your smart phone to go to our magazine website.

We want to hear from you!

I hope you will continue to be inspired by the amazing Arts stories all around us and in the news every day. But most of all, I hope you will continue to change the world, the way only Arts alumni, faculty, staff and students can.

Please send your comments to woa@ualberta.ca or University of Alberta, Faculty of Arts 6-33 Humanities Centre Edmonton, Alberta T6G 2E5

Melissa Boisvert EDITOR

Attention: WOA Magazine

woa | SPRING ’12

Coffee Break

ten minutes with...

Stephen Slemon

“

There is a huge world of wilderness out there in the Rockies. I could climb for several lifetimes and not even begin to scratch the surface of what’s out there.

woa | SPRING ’12

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Photos by Stephen Slemon

Coffee Break

STEPHEN SLEMON HAS BEEN A PROFESSOR in the Department of English & Film Studies since 1988. His research and teaching interests include mountaineering literature and culture. He is actively involved with the U of A’s recently-launched Canadian Mountain Studies Initiative, which brings together researchers from four Faculties: Arts; Agriculture, Life & Environmental Sciences; Physical Education & Recreation; and Science. Q: How did your interest in mountains start? A: For me it began with being a student of postcolonial literatures, and especially of literatures of the Indian subcontinent. I got pretty interested in some of the mountaineering narratives, for example, that would talk about the great imperial climbing expeditions, and in the representation of Sherpa communities. The way I got into mountaineering actually came out of teaching a course in Commonwealth literature years ago, and it was a student that got me into it. I did what I now realize is a very easy rock climb with him. The first step that we took after we climbed up was over a ridge and onto a wall, and it was 1,000 feet down. I looked down, and I looked up, and I thought “this is thrilling.” I was hooked after that. That’s when I started to ask around and discovered that in Edmonton, climbers are everywhere. Q: Where do you climb? A: There is a huge world of wilderness out there in the Rockies. We are so lucky to live so close to such fabulous mountains. I could climb for several lifetimes and not even begin to scratch the surface of what’s out there.

Q: How did the Canadian Mountain Studies Initiative come about? A: In the early part of 2009, we started to put out feelers as to who was doing mountain studies and we quickly amassed about 20 professors. We put them in a room and discovered that the university already amassed a worldclass cadre of scholars in mountain studies, but we were actually witnessing the birth of a new discipline in the moment of this happening. We really wanted students to be involved in this, and we really thought that this had to take place in conjunction with community partners. We think that mountain studies could be as central a part of this university’s understanding of itself as anything else. Our vision is that you could do an undergraduate degree, a BSc or a BA, in mountain studies, and it would be radically interdisciplinary. This is really different, and it’s a thrilling change to be witnessing. Q: Why are people so drawn to the mountains? A: One of the reasons is a very negative reason: they are among the last of the real places of wilderness. There are not many places now where you can be absolutely away from that human

imprint. At the same time, they’re under threat. Climate change is a real issue. More than that, there are people who live in the mountains and then people who go to the mountains, and there’s a very interesting human history that’s caught up within that. Beyond that, the “wow” factor of mountains just doesn’t go away. There’s something about getting up and moving in mountains that really wakes you up and you think “I’ve never been so alive. I just want to do this as much as I can. I never want to not do this.” That’s how I feel. ■

woa | SPRING ’12

Panorama

Panorama is a look at events, news and achievements in the Faculty of Arts

Snapshots

Not your average puppeteer

Arti stic expression

Captivating her audience

CCTC Noon Hour Chat - Canadian Centre for Theatre Creation (CCTC) director Kim McCaw (right) interviewed internationally renowned puppeteer and theatre creator Ronnie Burkett at a public noon hour presentation.

2 Consumed Art Show -

The Consumed art show, curated by Elena Siemens (Modern Languages & Cultural Studies), along with graduate students Andriko Lozowy (Sociology) & Jim Morrow (Sociology), featured contributions from several Arts departments and included a short performance directed by Piet Defraeye (Drama). Photo by Elena Siemens

3 Deep Freeze Festival - Storyteller Natalie Kononenko (Department of Modern Languages & Cultural Studies, Kule Chair of Ukrainian Ethnography) kept audience members riveted to their seats as they listened to Ukrainian children’s stories at the Alberta Avenue Deep Freeze Festival in January.

Taking on global issues

4 2012 High School Model United Nations Conference (HSMUN) - High school students attended the weekend event, where they each took on the role of a UN delegate. Committees worked to draft resolutions to various international issues before presenting these resolutions at a plenary session. To read more about the HSMUN, check out our web exclusives at www.arts.ualberta.ca/woa.

5 The REDress Project - Red dresses hung around the University in March, as a visual representation of the more than 600 Aboriginal women that have been murdered or gone missing in Canada over the last 20 years. The installation was the inspiration of Métis artist Jaime Black, who wanted to draw attention to violent crimes against Aboriginal women. It was sponsored by the Faculties of Arts, Native Studies and Law. 8

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Rai sing awareness

Panorama

Milestones 10th Anniversary of the Humanities Computing Program (HuCo)

Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies (CIUS) moves into the Faculty of Arts

The Humanities Computing Program recently celebrated 10 years of research, teaching and learning in the Faculty of Arts. Established to meet the growing demand for technologically‑enhanced teaching and research in the humanities and social sciences, the master’s program — the first such program in North America — admitted its first cohort in September 2001. Since then, faculty and students in HuCo have gone on to lead national and international research projects in the liberal arts.

Founded in 1976, the Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies is now a leading centre of Ukrainian studies outside Ukraine. It was under the jurisdiction of the office of the VicePresident (Research) until last year, when it moved into the Faculty of Arts. Through research, publishing, conferences and lectures, and by offering grants to scholars and scholarships to students, CIUS supports Ukrainian and Ukrainian-Canadian studies. It also fosters international links of mutual benefit to Canada and the world, especially with Ukraine. In addition to its main office at the U of A, CIUS maintains a branch Launching new CIUS Press publications (L-R): Frank Sysyn, office at the University of Toronto.

45th Anniversary of the Population Research Laboratory (PRL) In 2011, the Population Research Laboratory in the Department of Sociology celebrated 45 years as a centre for social science research at the U of A. From its humble beginnings as a demographic research unit, the PRL has evolved into the largest academic-based survey centre in Western Canada, with a 30-station computer-assisted telephone interviewing facility, web survey capacity, and innovative survey and census enumeration methods. Countless numbers of PRL staff, students, faculty members and sponsors have collaborated in more than 700 survey and population research projects. The annual Alberta Survey (1987-present) is an important collection of public opinion surveys that began as the Edmonton Area Study, and then expanded to include an Alberta-wide telephone sample.

50th Anniversary of the Department of Sociology In 1961, six sociologists and one anthropologist, the founding members of the Sociology Department, were teaching and conducting research about population, health, social inequality, race and ethnicity, family, crime, and urban society, among other topics. The department awarded its first MA degree in 1961 (about fluoridation of city water), followed by its first PhD in 1968 (about social change in Hutterite colonies).

The Department of Sociology celebrated its 50th anniversary with a lecture by distinguished Arts alumnus John Hagan (’71 MA; ’74 PhD)

Today the department has 28 full-time equivalent faculty positions, registers nearly 7,300 students annually and is home to about 85 graduate students, including 60 PhD students. Besides the more traditional sociological topics being addressed 50 years ago, faculty and students specialize in areas such as gender, globalization, socio-legal studies, cultural studies, aging, immigration and life course studies.

Serhii Plokhii & Zenon Kohut

30th Anniversary of the Department of East Asian Studies For 30 years the Department of East Asian Studies has been teaching the languages and cultures of China, Japan and Korea to Alberta students. Founded in 1981 as the Department of East Asian Languages & Literatures, the department grew out of the efforts of professors to teach Chinese and Japanese, starting with the first teaching of Chinese on campus in 1961-62. The U of A was the first Canadian institution between Toronto and Vancouver to offer East Asian language classes, and it is now one of the largest and fastestgrowing East Asian programs in Canada. Photo by Longlu Qin

Graduate student Qian Tang performs a small bell dance at the Department of East Asian Studies’ anniversary celebration

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Panorama

Achievements The Faculty of Arts would like to congratulate the following faculty members and students for their outstanding achievements.

Faculty Members Ingo Brigandt (Philosophy) won a Martha Cook Piper Research Prize, which recognizes faculty members at early stages in their careers who show outstanding promise as researchers. Photo by Kai Brigandt

Robert Nichols (Political Science) was awarded a 2011-2012 Canadian Fulbright Scholar Award, which supports residential academic exchange between the U.S. and Canada. Onookome Okome (English & Film Studies) earned a lifetime membership award in the Society of Nigeria Theatre Artists (SONTA).

Ingo Brigandt

Debra Cairns (Music) was awarded the Richard S. Eaton Award by the Alberta Choral Federation, in recognition of exemplary service to choral music in Alberta. Angela Chow (Psychology) and Dale Spencer (Sociology) were awarded Banting Postdoctoral Fellowships through the Government of Canada, intended to attract top-tier postdoctoral talent. Mark Dickens (Religious Studies) and Silvia Pasquetti (Sociology) won Izaak Walton Killam Memorial Postdoctoral Fellowships, which are presented to outstanding PhD graduates. Dickens also received the Dorothy J. Killam Memorial Postdoctoral Fellow Prize, recognizing the outstanding Killam Postdoctoral Fellowship recipient. Kevin Haggerty (Sociology) and Robert Smith (History & Classics) were awarded Killam Annual Professorships, recognizing outstanding academics at the U of A. Fred Judson (Professor Emeritus, Political Science) took home a gold medal from the World Masters Athletic Championships, where he competed in the decathlon. (see “Where are they now?” on page 33 to read more) Daniel Laforest (Modern Languages & Cultural Studies) won the 2011 Jean-Éthier-Blais Award from La Fondation LionelGroulx. This scholarship is awarded annually to the author of the best work of literary criticism, written in French, published in Quebec last year, and on the topic of a writer or a work of literature in French Quebec. Beverly Lemire (History & Classics; H.M. Tory Chair) was awarded the J. Gordin Kaplan Award for Excellence in Research — the most prestigious U of A research award. Photo by Giorgio Riello

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Photo by Epic Photography Inc. (Ian Jackson)

Connie Varnhagen

Derek Walcott (Distinguished Scholar-in-Residence) was awarded the Premio Librex-Montale by the Fondazione Librex Montale. The prize acknowledges poets who characterize contemporary poetry in an original way.

Students Kat Danser (Music) won in the Best Roots & Blues Album of the Year category at the Blues Underground Network. She was also nominated for New Blues Artist of the Year at the Maple Blues Awards and the Blues Recording of the Year at the 2011 K at Danser Western Canadian Music Awards. Danser was also awarded a Margaret Brine Scholarship in 2011, which recognizes women who embody the values of the Canadian Federation of University Women, and who have demonstrated academic excellence. Photo by Jen Shaw

Joshua Freistadt (Sociology), Megan Highet (Anthropology) and Maya Seshia (Political Science) each won an Izaak Walton Killam Memorial Scholar award, recognizing outstanding doctoral students. Highet also won a Dorothy J. Killam Memorial Graduate Prize, which is awarded to outstanding Killam Memorial Scholarship recipients. Temitope Oriola (Sociology) won the Governor General’s Academic Medal (Gold), which is awarded to the student who graduates with the highest average in his or her institution.

Beverly Lemire

Greg MacArthur (Drama, Playwright-in-Residence) was selected as a finalist for the BMO Financial Group’s 2011 Siminovitch Prize in Theatre, which recognizes excellence in direction, playwriting and design. 10

Connie Varnhagen (Psychology) won a 3M Teaching Fellowship, Canada’s highest award for undergraduate university teaching excellence and educational leadership, sponsored by 3M Canada and the Society for Teaching and Learning in Higher Education.

Programs The U of A Graduate Program in Choral Conducting, supervised and coordinated by Debra Cairns (Music) and Len Ratzlaff (Music), won the Patricia Cook Memorial Award from the Alberta Choral Federation, which recognizes exemplary service to advocacy in arts education.

Alberta Land Sett Infrastructure Pro lement ject (ALSIP) Project receives Cana

Panorama

da Foundation for In novation grant

Farm life Achievements Continued... The next time you touch down at Edmonton International Airport, think about Maria Ann Bell-Heath, as you are landing on her homestead. In 1892 she arrived from Ontario, and for a $10 fee filed on 160 acres northwest of Leduc. She was legally separated from her husband and her two children were with her. She had three years to earn her patent by cultivating and living on her land. However, when Maria applied for her patent in 1895, federal Dominion Lands officials declared she was not eligible, as she was not a “sole head of family,” as stipulated in the legislation. It seemed that her deed of separation did not divest her husband, wherever he was, from his duties as a parent, whether he was fulfilling these duties or not. Instead of receiving a patent for the original $10 filing fee, as her neighbours did, Maria was forced to purchase her land for the price of one dollar per acre. She ended up paying $160 more than her neighbours. Maria’s story and thousands of others are contained in the homestead files that chart Alberta’s settlement by Canadians, Americans and Europeans. First Nations were excluded from homesteading under the Indian Act, but the records shed light on the history of Métis land in this province. Until now these records — a rich trove of sources for economic, social and genealogical history — have been available only on microfilm at the Provincial Archives of Alberta. The Alberta Land Settlement Infrastructure Project (ALSIP) is in the process of digitizing some 225,000 of these files, and they will be publically accessible on the Internet. From these images, the ALSIP will construct a machine-readable database, also to be available on the Internet, from the numerous forms homesteaders had to fill out that included information on their background, their families and the improvements they made on their land. If they abandoned their homesteads, a paper trail still exists since they had to fill out a declaration of abandonment. The database will be linked to the nominal records of the 1911 federal census of Alberta. The settlement patterns will be overlaid with climate and other maps using geographical information system methodologies. The digitized images will become part of the U of A library collections.

The three-year project recently received almost $1 million of funding: $394,000 from the Canada Foundation for Innovation (CFI); $394,000 from the Government of Alberta; and $197,000 from the U of A, of which $150,000 came from the library. Arts researchers often have difficulty obtaining CFI awards, in part because of a perception that large infrastructure is not needed by those researchers. This perception is gradually changing. ALSIP is a perfect example of how collaborative research projects that draw on a number of methodologies from various disciplines are increasingly being developed within the Arts community. The project also points to the importance and value of broadly sharing research data. Peter Baskerville (History & Classics and Humanities Computing; Chair of Modern Western Canadian History) is leading the project with the assistance of Sarah Carter (History & Classics and Native Studies; H.M. Tory Chair) and Sean Gouglas (Interdisciplinary Studies and History & Classics). Baskerville aims to uncover the social and economic characteristics and persistence rates of Alberta’s homesteaders and to assess the success of perhaps the largest public policy venture in Canada’s history. Carter’s research focuses on the gendered and racialized order that Canada’s Dominion Lands policy tried to create, making it very difficult for women and impossible for First Nations to acquire homesteads. Gouglas’s research focuses on Canadian agricultural history and he brings expertise with Geographical Information Systems to the project. Students from History & Classics, Humanities Computing, Archaeology and Native Studies are at work on the ALSIP, under the direction of Richard Fletcher, an adjunct faculty member in Humanities Computing and History & Classics, and Silvia Russell, a graduate student in Humanities Computing. In the words of MA student Nathan Carlson (Interdisciplinary Studies), the ALSIP will tell the story of “how, through the homesteading era, the Province of Alberta, and even Canada as a nation, came into being and evolved into what it is today. Even though the settlement era came to pass in ways difficult and painful at times, it was ultimately the courage and determination of all the people and families, aboriginal and immigrant, speaking many different languages, working to survive and prosper, that left the greatest legacy on this era of Alberta’s history.” ■

Photos by J. H. Gano Image courtesy of Peel’s Prairie Provinces, a digital initiative of the University of Alberta Libraries. peel.library.ualberta.ca

Steer hitched to buggy, Wainwright, Alberta

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THE MAVERICK MUSICIAN Using puppets, planes and the Twitterverse, Timothy Shantz is taking choral music to a whole new audience

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Words by J U D Y MO N C HU K Photography by P HI L C RO Z I E R

ON A FALL EVENING IN 2010, Timothy Shantz (’99 MMus, Choral Conducting) prepared for his biggest musical gamble. He looked around at musicians with ancient instruments, international soloists and Calgary’s own Spiritus Chamber Choir lining the balconies of Knox United Church. With a deep breath, the awardwinning choral conductor began a celebration of 400-year-old sacred music, and the ethereal merger of voice and Baroque-era instruments reverberated through the building and into city streets. The sold-out audience of 750 loved the performance of Monteverdi’s Vespers of 1610, a monumental work of religious music. Shantz says the enthusiastic reception suggested audiences were open to traditional music in unexpected presentations. “We got people interested because it was ancient music,” says Shantz, artistic director of the award-winning amateur Spiritus choir and chorus master of the Calgary Philharmonic Chorus, which is part of the Calgary Philharmonic Orchestra (CPO). “Our box office people were going crazy, having to turn people away. We didn’t ever think that was possible.”

Check out our web exclusives to watch Spiritus Chamber Choir in action! www.arts.ualberta.ca/woa

Shantz, 39, is boldly taking choral music in new directions and is finding audiences are embracing the challenge. Traditionally, classical performances attract a small niche of enthusiasts, compared to rock concerts and sporting events.

But Shantz, with his wide-ranging repertoire, is seeking to expand that audience. He cites the Vespers recital as the “aha” moment that proved he was making a mark on his adopted city. After bringing international artists to collaborate with the Spiritus singers, the result was a financial and artistic success: an exciting outcome after naysayers suggested Calgary would never support such an unusual concert.

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I think Calgarians embrace any art form if it’s done with confidence. That’s very much part of the Calgary spirit.

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- TIMOTHY SHANTZ

Shantz suggests they are filling a need. “The audience craves that kind of confident programming,” says Shantz, who arrived in Calgary in 2009 after spending time as chorus master for the Windsor Symphony Orchestra and apprentice conductor for the National Youth Choir of Canada. He quickly set about looking for ways to expand the reach of his new choirs. “We’ve been successful on so many unique ideas. I think Calgarians embrace any art form if it’s done with confidence. That’s very much part of the Calgary spirit.”

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The human voice is the most important instrument in the world: it’s closest to the heart.

Shantz’s willingness to embrace innovation and push forward syncs nicely with Calgary’s self-proclaimed maverick image. He takes choral music to places that would traditionally be considered strange new worlds, whether it means working with puppets, performing in the presence of war planes or traversing the Twitterverse. Being open to collaboration and pop culture has paid big dividends for his classical choirs. Audiences apparently like what’s happening. Numbers are up and that’s rewarding to Shantz.

December with a compilation of Twitter tips to stay warm, set to opera. A YouTube video quickly attracted tens of thousands of hits, and its reach continued to expand as enthusiastic viewers shared the clip in posts, blogs and tweets, attracting interest as far away as Australia and the Netherlands. CNN and Discovery Channel’s Daily Planet did features on the lighthearted performance, which included warming tips such as “clothes in dryer, set the timer,” “try hot yoga” and the oh so-Canadian “gravy action on my cheese.”

“You have to be willing to forge a path,” he says. “I find that very inspiring. And a lot of fun.”

Shantz laughs at the mainstream celebrity that came with the project. It began when Tourism Calgary suggested collecting Twitter feeds and utilizing the talents of the CPO chorus to create an unusual showcase for the city and the province. The tweets were set to the music of Orff’s Carmina Burana and video was shot at the end of a regular chorus rehearsal. In just five takes, they captured that elusive lightning in a bottle.

To those who may suggest Calgary’s culture is more at ease with cowboys, Shantz counters that the southern Alberta city’s performing arts scene has a well-deserved reputation for innovation and originality. Take the Alberta Ballet’s original works with Elton John and Sarah McLachlan, renowned avantgarde theatre company One Yellow Rabbit, and Old Trout Puppet Workshop’s production of The Erotic Anguish of Don Juan, which showcased the talents of Shantz’s own Spiritus choir. “All these groups try to be leaders, not only in Calgary but internationally,” says Shantz. “Thinking outside the box is how we engage our audience.” In the 21st century, that includes social media. Shantz’s Calgary Philharmonic Chorus became a viral sensation last 14

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“It’s exciting that the CPO and Tourism Calgary have partnered on various projects and that Tourism Calgary is keen to present Calgary as a place for great classical music and culture,” says Shantz. “Who would have thought this would have such success? Create a YouTube clip that would reach the world.” The willingness to explore new performance avenues is part of a long-term vision that began when Shantz was looking to expand his musical education in the mid ’90s. “I wanted to raise

- TIMOTHY SHANTZ

”

the level of choral music in Canada,” says the native of Kitchener, Ont. Shantz sought out the U of A’s music program, drawn by the collaborative reputation of Leonard Ratzlaff, who oversees the largest choral conducting program in Canada. “I felt this was someone who I could really learn from and study with. Partly because of the way he works with people: he allowed his students to gain confidence through experience.” As part of the U of A’s lauded Madrigal Singers, Shantz met his wife, Kathleen Warke (’99 MA, Ethnomusicology). The couple continues to make music together, as she is part of the amateur Spiritus choir. They even celebrated their 11th anniversary in Paris while on tour with Spiritus last spring. Shantz’s love affair with music goes beyond conducting. An accomplished tenor soloist, his chorus master schedule allows him to sing every July at the Carmel Bach Festival in California, where artists gather from around the world and rehearse for a short time before performing over a 15-day period. “The human voice is the most important instrument in the world: it’s closest to the heart,” says Shantz. “The romantic version of what I do is I coax out sounds with my arms and my hands. My job is to help people perform better than they can imagine and make beautiful things. It’s a fun and interesting profession, creating beauty.”

Ensuring those creations reach new ears means looking for unusual partnerships. Under Shantz’s direction, Spiritus collaborated with Toronto-based Banjo Puppets for a family friendly performance of The Reluctant Dragon last fall, aimed at showcasing choral music to children. Building on positive feedback, Shantz wants to explore getting his choirs into Calgary schools and becoming a part of the Calgary International Children’s Festival. It also means reaching beyond the city limits. “In Calgary, there’s an appetite, but the audience is not just based here,” says Shantz. That means taking choral music to those who may never consider stepping inside a concert hall. Last fall, Spiritus sang surrounded by historic aircraft at the Bomber Command Centre in Nanton, Alta. The choir has also tried streaming performances on the Internet.

Once that group is established, Shantz wants to use it as the base for a classical music festival similar to the Carmel Bach, albeit smaller. Musicians would perform in unique venues of varying sizes, possibly across central Alberta to expand the audience network. While he concedes the vision is pie in the sky, he is certain that a demand can be created for choral music at an elevated, international standard.

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You have to be willing to forge a path. I find that very inspiring. And a lot of fun.

”

- TIMOTHY SHANTZ

“We want our music making to be recognized locally but also internationally. If your standards are set there, it’s harder, but it can lead to many other opportunities and open up doors,” he says. “This is a vision I’ve had for a long time. I find building from the ground up very exciting and invigorating. It’s scary but thrilling.” ■

“Creating that live moment is what I do,” says Shantz. “But also what we do as musicians is record music, create these YouTube videos. It broadens your brand. It catches more people and brings more people in. The hope is those people will still be interested in attending Handel’s Messiah, or people watching that video will want to see Carmina Burana at the Jack Singer [concert hall in downtown Calgary].” Going forward, Shantz wants to start a professional, paid choir based in Calgary, drawing from singers across Alberta. The group would gather together for short periods and plan two or three projects a year, with each project performed in several locations across central and southern Alberta. It’s an ambitious venture. But with Calgary dubbed one of the Cultural Capitals of Canada for 2012, Shantz believes the timing is right. “Over the next 18 months there will be a lot of exciting, interesting projects that will encourage our community in various art forms,” he says. “It seems like the right time to start a group. I feel I’ve put down a few roots and I want this to be my signature on the Calgary scene.”

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Student View

Fine arts students on…

Why the arts are important to our COMMUNITIES

Q: What role do the arts play in our cities and communities? Jay: Music is a language that operates between all types of different people. We can go to concerts here with touring acts from all over the world – they don’t speak our language, they don’t sing in our language, they don’t play instruments we’re familiar with. But still we go to that concert and it brings us joy, or it brings us sadness, or it brings us some kind of idea that out there in the world there are people just like us. Music is also an emotional history. You listen to compositions or listen to performers as far back as we have recordings, and it gives us a sense to put ourselves in the shoes of the people of the past. Everything that we live with, all the stuff we do, is surrounded by people who make art or make music or practice drama. It’s so incredibly pervasive, and maybe it’s because it’s so obvious and it’s always there, we take it for granted. There’s never an opportunity for us to not have it in front of us. What do you think? Leave a comment at our online magazine at www.arts.ualberta.ca/woa. 16

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Davis: I’m interested in the use of design for social innovation and pushing our understanding of how we interact with each other in the world. To understand design from a social aspect, you have to look at it not as a material object per se, or simply graphic materials, but as a way of thinking. There are a lot of ideas about design being a form of problem solving. In different fields, we’re applying these design methodologies and processes – how you approach a problem and how you work through that problem – to tackle and understand problems that have been looked at through older models, like business models. With socially-driven design, the client is so critical in the process – it’s the idea of co-creating and co-designing an end solution, or helping at least to identify the problem. Where business models look at past statistics and see recurring trends, design thinking attempts to predict the future. It’s usually a lot more culturally sensitive, and then in the long run much more effective because the solution comes from the people using it, rather than it being given to them.

Students from left to right: Jay Lind (Music), Davis Levine (Art & Design), Harrison Campbell (Drama)

Harrison: Theatre explores issues that you might not always be comfortable with. I’ve worked with at-risk youth, getting them to write about their experiences. They develop their own sense of community through working with people who’ve been in similar situations as them, and topics come up in the actual construction of plays that might not come up in everyday conversation. And they’re allowed to have fun with it – it still addresses the seriousness of the issue but in a way that is creative and inventive. We were in a play that was exploring gender issues and race issues and class stratification. By using theatre to open people up to these issues, it can help people who are struggling with identifying themselves in certain ways or trying to find who they are. It gets the word out that it’s okay to be different. You can come together in a creative space and just express your opinions. That’s how people grow and how communities and cities and societies will flourish. That’s the hope and the dream. ■

Photography of students by U OF A MARKETING AND COMMUNI CATIONS (RI CHARD SIEMENS)

As I See It...

Alumnus Opinion Column

The importance of ENGAGING YOUNG PEOPLE Words by C HRI S TI N E CA U SIN G

WHEN I MOVED BACK to Edmonton in 2004, I felt it was important to reconnect and give back to the city that I grew up in. And as a young person who decided to move back, I wanted to share my experience of living in another city, to help shape Edmonton’s future. It did not take me very long.

you listen to and implement the ideas of young people, you are empowering them to become leaders in the community and positive agents of change.

people are more likely to be interested in attending a consultation if the venue is different. For example, when NextGen held consultations with the public, one was held in a local brewery. Another was held in an artist-run centre where studios were used as discussion rooms. Participants were given the opportunity to see artwork from local artists and meet them in their studios.

Creating a culture of civic and community engagement begins with young people. I’ve learned that successful efforts to engage young people will ensure that they will be invested in shaping their city. What are you doing to engage young people in your city? ■

There was a call for people to participate on a civic project created by City Council called the NextGen Task Force, which aimed at finding ways to attract and retain young people in the city. A year later, the City of Edmonton made NextGen a permanent program to continue engaging young people to be leaders in their community and to give them opportunities to voice and implement their ideas.

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Young people are valuable contributors to our community. They have creative and fresh ideas and are willing to join important conversations when given the opportunity. - CHRISTINE CAUSING

I quickly realized that organizations find it a challenge to connect with young people, and sometimes they don’t realize the importance of consulting with them. Organizations must realize that young people are valuable contributors to our community. They have creative and fresh ideas and are willing to join important conversations when given the opportunity. Over the years, I have learned some creative approaches to effectively engage young people that I would like to offer to community organizations. Find interesting and different spaces besides the boardroom that will inspire dialogue. Hosting a consultation in a boardroom is “old school.” Young

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Host events specifically for young people. The volunteers I work with on NextGen came up with a unique event called Candi(date) that encouraged young people to vote in the municipal election. The event was a speed-dating style format where people had 10-minute rounds or “speed dates” with City Council candidates. The turnout was a success. Actively listen to opinions of young people and take the risk to implement them. Often, organizations will share information with young people with an agenda in mind and, in some cases, only when they want their endorsement of the project or plan. Instead, give young people the opportunity to be involved in the decision making. This builds ownership. When

Christine Causing Christine Causing (’97 BA, Anthropology) is the coordinator of the NextGen Initiative at the City of Edmonton. After earning her BA from the U of A, she went on to achieve a Master’s degree in Environmental Studies from the University of Waterloo. At NextGen, Christine works with next generation leaders and volunteers on community and civic projects that focus on making Edmonton a vibrant city. She was also selected as one of Avenue Edmonton’s “Top 40 Under 40” for 2011, which recognizes the top young business leaders in our city. What do you think? Leave a comment at our online magazine at www.arts.ualberta.ca/woa.

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HELPING THE WHOLE PERSON Three Arts alumni use very different counselling methods to treat their clients Words by MI F I P U RV I S ( ’ 9 3 B A , E N GL I S H) Illustration by TAN YA L AM Photography of Joel Kroeker and Tom Foster by GRE G GE I P E L Photography of Aspen Gowers by E P I C P HO TO GRA P HY I N C . ( I AN J AC K SO N ) 18

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Joel Kroeker (’01 MA, Music)

oel Kroeker (’01 MA, Music) had quite a year in 2007. It was the year he released his acclaimed album, Closer to the Flame. Cam Fuller, music writer for Saskatoon’s Star Phoenix, put him squarely in the pantheon of notable male singer-songwriters, alongside Ron Sexsmith and Hawksley Workman. It was also the year he visited a village built on a trash heap in Cambodia in search of another musician, a trip that would rock his world and drive the lesson home that, beyond entertainment, music helps heal people. Travelling with the Mennonite Central Committee in Asia as part of a group working on water-related relief projects, Kroeker was in the village that day searching for Master Kong Nay. Elderly and blind, Kong Nay is a virtuoso of the chapei dong veng, a traditional Khmer stringed instrument. During Pol Pot’s regime, the Khmer Rouge murdered millions of Cambodians, targeting artists and intellectuals with especial brutality; Kroeker learned that the musicians of the village were vital to its inhabitants. But that day, in the village on the trash heap, he found Kong Nay was away, touring with Peter Gabriel, no less. But Kroeker’s disappointment was short-lived. He was introduced to another musician and maker of Khmer musical instruments. Kroeker sat down to play music with the man and his young son. All the barriers dropped. “Music there is not about any of the things it is in the West,” he says. “There are no record meetings or strategy sessions about how to get songs on the radio.” Kroeker was grounded in lessons of world music from his days studying ethnomusicology at the U of A. He knew that the art of these Khmer musicians was as intrinsic to the health of the community as the community was to them.

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It takes some of the social pressure off the client. We can put our attention on playing the drum, rather than facing each other directly.

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- JOEL KROEKER

It was the deep connection between music and holistic health that stuck with Kroeker on his return home to Vancouver and led him to become a registered clinical counselor, specializing in music therapy. “Ethnomusicology is the perfect backdrop,” he says. “Music can be a very effective way to cross boundaries.” Today, Kroeker uses instruments, drums and a portable recording studio, working closely with patients to come up with a plan that considers each person’s circumstance. “I have a wide range of instruments – a few dozen – available for each session,” he says. “The client chooses which instrument they prefer to work with.”

With youth clients, Kroeker might use recording software to write songs together about issues in the client’s life, or simply improvise together, which, he says, “is a kind of non-verbal social negotiation filled with all the elements of social interaction.” Some clients who are seniors have benefitted from writing “life review” songs, that help them process difficult, sometimes long-ago, life experiences. As a bonus, these songs can become a legacy for remaining family members. Kroeker blends musical work with psychotherapeutic “talk therapy” where appropriate. “I find that blending the two approaches can be quite effective.”

An instrument can be both an icebreaker and a means to initiate communication. Kroeker says that, when he works with children on the autism spectrum, the instrument becomes a transitional object and a way to communicate. “It takes some of the social pressure off the client. We can put our attention on playing the drum, rather than facing each other directly.”

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spen Gowers’ (’04 BA, Psychology; ’07 MEd) journey to clinical psychology was more straightforward than Kroeker’s. She knew in her undergrad years that she wanted to counsel people in a way that considered each first as a whole person, rather than a collection of health needs. In her early 20s at the time, an internship at Centerpoint young offender program at Alberta Hospital gave her some needed experience. Today, Gowers calls herself a “depth psychologist.” She works with clients to address the deeper reasons for their outward symptoms, and to help them create long-term change. She fosters an awareness of the mindbody connection to help clients establish the internal resources required to live a healthy life. And she has picked up some rare skills on the road to that goal.

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In sandplay therapy, Gowers’ clients invent a world for themselves using a tray of wet or dry sand and a selection of figurines, chosen from the dozens that line shelves in her office. This kind of narrative process and threedimensional construction allows each client to express and manage his or her anxieties, emotions and experiences in a constructive and safe environment. The figures and scenes are a threedimensional representation of aspects of a patient’s inner world, one that he or she might have trouble expressing in other ways. Conflicts and threats take a concrete, physical form. “Each finished

Each finished tray is like a fingerprint. I’ve never seen two the same. - ASPEN GOWERS

Aspen Gowers (’04 BA, Psychology; ’07 MEd)

After receiving her master’s degree, Gowers did another internship in play therapy. That’s when it all clicked; she has since added art therapy and is now on her way to accreditation in sandplay therapy. “Sandplay therapy lets people access their unconscious to discover things about themselves that might otherwise be inaccessible,” she says.

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tray is like a fingerprint,” Gowers says. “I’ve never seen two the same.” The sandplay therapy and art therapy she employs (Gowers’ patients may create mixed-media mandalas to express themselves) are based in Jungian methods that encourage clients to use symbols to express their inner selves. “It explains the world in a way that makes sense,” she says of Jungian methodology. “Archetypes and symbols can access deep levels of people’s unconscious.” And both sandplay and art therapy provide a means to achieving resolution and a springboard for healing to occur. Gowers has opted to bring these vehicles for healing – and the search for a deeper narrative for the whole patient – into her private practice as a member of Aurora Counselling Services in Leduc, Alta.

Tom Foster (’77 BA, Religious Studies)

ometimes treating the whole patient means assessing one’s own priorities. At least that’s what Tom Foster (’77 BA, Religious Studies) found when he recently moved from a management position at Vancouver Coastal Health region to concentrate on developing his own private clinical practice.

Foster’s decision comes after 30 years of hard work. He has counselled addicts in Vancouver and in Canadian Forces Base Lahr (Germany) at the Alcoholism Rehabilitation Centre, violent sex offenders in jail, and selfdescribed sex addicts in Canada and the United States. He is an accredited sex therapist and it’s this aspect of his expertise to which he has decided to devote his private clinical practice. “Treating clients for sexual compulsivity involves helping them come to a new perspective. They have a very difficult time letting go of their self-judgments,” Foster says. “I help them look at their attitudes, beliefs, experiences and upbringing. Rather than being at odds with it, I help them see their behaviour from a more neutral standpoint, as an adaptation to a particular set of life circumstances.” He says that the need for treatment for sexual compulsivity is burgeoning, and he believes that technology contributes to the growth of the problem. Where once a person might need to get through the workday before he could satisfy his sexual cravings, now that person can surf pornography in a moment of downtime at work, feeding and fuelling the compulsive behaviour. Foster’s therapy for sexually compulsive clients starts, he says, where most therapy should: from a place of nonjudgment and respect. “They are not sleazy marauders,” he says of his clients. “I try to help people past the point of selfloathing to uncover the human story.” He has found that broken attachments are at the root of many of his clients’ problems. Foster provides his clients a safe place

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I try to help people past the point of self-loathing to uncover the human story. - TOM FOSTER

to talk about their often secret back story. He says that it’s that back story that created the conditions for the expression of sexually compulsive behaviour. He looks at the evolution of a person’s sexuality over time. “The background informs the behaviour and therapy,” he says. “Clients learn to see how they got to where they are.” Understanding root causes helps his clients create change.

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Kroeker, Gowers and Foster all start from the viewpoint that effective therapy is founded on respect. “To reclaim their lives,” Foster says, “patients should start in an environment of respect. They should feel safe.” While each has a different approach to psychological counselling, each looks deeper than the collection of symptoms and behaviours to treat the whole person. ■

Check out our web exclusives at www.arts.ualberta.ca/woa! Hear some of Joel Kroeker’s recordings, watch a video of Aspen Gowers’ sandplay therapy and read Tom Foster’s tips to make your relationship last.

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Research Highlights

Words by B E N J AMI N F RE E L AN D ( ’ 9 8 B A , HISTO RY)

Preserving Ukrainian Heritage At the turn of the 20th century, a wave of Ukrainian migrants left their homeland in search of a better life. Some fled eastward, settling the steppes of Central Asia in what is now the Republic of Kazakhstan. Others went westward, crossing the Atlantic and ultimately settling in the similarly flat and fertile prairies of Western Canada. Separated by half a globe and a century of history, these communities beg the question: do they still share a deep-seated cultural pride and impermeable sense of identity? The culture and folklore of the Ukrainian Diaspora is the focal point of the work of Natalie Kononenko, professor in the Department of Modern Languages & Cultural Studies. Born in a displaced persons camp in postwar Germany and raised in New Jersey, Kononenko’s lifelong fascination with her ancestral homeland drove her to pursue Slavic and Near Eastern Studies at Harvard University at a time when studying the then-Soviet Bloc nations was virtually impossible. “There were no field work options at the time,” she explains. “Even archival material wasn’t available until 1987.”

The fall of the Iron Curtain opened the door to research opportunities in the new nation states that came into being when the USSR fell apart, and Kononenko wasted no time. Starting in Ukraine, her research led her to the Canadian Diaspora and then to its counterpart in former Soviet Central Asia. Her recent travels in Kazakhstan revealed remarkable parallels with Canada’s Ukrainian communities. New rituals are formed even as old songs are preserved. Farming practices are similar and, when Khrushchev’s attempts to turn the steppes of Kazakhstan into wheat fields failed and caused soil erosion, it was Canadian prairie grass that came to the rescue — seeds and grass stabilized the soil enough that the erosion halted. Since 2004, Kononenko has held the position of Kule Chair of Ukrainian Ethnography at the U of A. She, along with John-Paul Himka (History & Classics, Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies) and Frances Swyripa (History & Classics), are the principles on the Sanctuary project, documenting the sacral art, architecture and rituals of Ukrainians and other Slavic peoples

in the Prairie provinces. Kononenko is active in promoting cultural exchange between Ukrainian-Canadians and their counterparts in Ukraine and Central Asia. She also finds time to delve handson into her culture, leading workshops to teach people how to make motanky (cloth folk dolls) and pysanky (Ukrainian Easter eggs). ■

Anna Kozakova, a resident of Orlovka, Kazakhstan, shows Kononenko the garden and medicinal plants of Kazakhstan (2011) Photo by Alevtina Cvetkova

Kononenko talks with Pavlo Suprun, a blind minstrel in Kyiv, Ukraine, with whom she has worked since 1987 (2009) Photo by Oleksandr Romaniuk

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Egg photos by Peter Holloway

Research Highlights

“The Right Kind of People” “Democracy was never intended for degenerates.” These words were spoken by United Farm Women of Alberta president Margaret Gunn in 1924, in support of a province-wide campaign of forced sterilization of the mentally ill, presaging the passing of the Sexual Sterilization Act of Alberta in 1928. This act would remain in effect until 1972 and would lead to the forced sterilization of more than 2,800 individuals in one of the darkest and most littleknown chapters of Alberta’s history.

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U of A professor since 2000, Wilson’s interest in the practice of eugenics in Alberta was triggered by a chance encounter. “I was teaching material on eugenics in the U.S. and Nazi Germany and I had two students who had relatives who had been sterilized right here in Alberta,” he explains. “Before that I had no idea that eugenics had been practiced here.” For the last three years, Wilson has devoted himself to raising awareness of this hidden history. He is currently

Most people are shocked to hear about this. It’s a story of institutionalization and mistreatment.

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- ROB WILSON

The under-studied history of eugenics in Alberta is a focal point of the research of philosophy professor Rob Wilson. A graduate of Cornell University and a

working to create the Living Archives on Eugenics in Western Canada, an online repository of archival material and oral accounts of survivors. The

project is partially funded by a grant from the Community-University Research Alliance program at the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC). “Most people are shocked to hear about this,” he notes, adding that in some cases children who were sterilized were also used to test psychotropic drugs in institutions. “It’s a story of institutionalization and mistreatment.” In addition, Wilson has a long-standing interest in teaching philosophy to children in his role as director for Philosophy for Children Alberta. He also leads the What Sorts Network, an international community of thinkers dedicated to grappling with the question of “What sorts of people should there be?” Wilson explains, “It’s about informing social policy in ways that will create more inclusive communities.” ■

Politically Connected Had Stephen Harper consulted with political scientist and voter behaviour expert Lori Thorlakson beforehand, he probably would have thought twice before wading into the 2011 Ontario election on behalf of PC leader Tim Hudak. As it happened, his comments about a Conservative “grand slam” in Ontario (referring to What’s himself, Hudak and Toronto mayor Rob that’s Ford) created an instant backlash and helped push the scale in favour of Dalton McGuinty’s Liberals.

“

Political competition in multilevel settings with a specialization on the European Union is the focal point of Thorlakson’s work. A graduate of the London School of Economics and an expert on European Union politics, her commentary on European political affairs has been sought after by the BBC, the Globe & Mail and other news media.

Her primary area of expertise is voter and political party behaviour within the European context, where, in addition to the sub-national and national political arenas we have in Canada, there exists a third stratum in the form of the EU parliament in Brussels. Thorlakson notes that, while Canadians tend to

by a lack of solidarity among member states,” she explains. “What’s needed in Europe is political architecture that’s conducive to greater solidarity. The advantage of the disconnected competition we see in Canada is that it can generate more responsiveness at different levels of government.”

needed in Europe is political architecture conducive to greater solidarity. - LORI THORLAKSON

vote differently at the national and provincial levels, Europeans as a whole tend to vote for ideologically analogous candidates at all levels, with national interests tending to trump the interests of the European Union. This lack of a European voter consciousness, she contends, is the crux of the EU’s current problems. “The economic crisis was brought on by a political crisis, which was caused

At home, Thorlakson is involved in the Wirth Institute for Austrian and Central European Studies and, since 2008, has been recruiting students for EU study tours. She is also involved in a nationwide voter behaviour study aimed at understanding, for example, why a province as politically impassioned as Alberta regularly produces the country’s lowest voter turnout rates. “There’s a strong interest in politics here,” she notes. “It’s just not translating into election turnout. We’re trying to figure out where that disconnect is.” ■

”

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Ask the Expert

Women’s religious or cultural face coverings in courtrooms

What do you think? Leave a comment at our online magazine at www.arts.ualberta.ca/woa.

Editor’s Note: When we asked readers to send in questions about this topic, we received a number of excellent questions. Many were similar, so rather than printing several repetitive questions, we summarized the inquiries with the following questions. Q1: When we allow women to remain veiled during a court case, we are not allowing the court to view all demeanour evidence, which includes the appearance, attitude, behavior and disposition of witnesses. How accurate and useful is this type of evidence?

Q2: If we require that veil-wearing Muslim women uncover themselves during court testimony, won’t this deter women who are experiencing abuse from coming forward, and instead force them to remain silent and suffering?

Q3: How can we balance the rights of an accused to face his/her accuser with the right to religious freedom and a woman’s right to freedom and safety?

A: The bodies of Muslim women who choose to wear the niqab have become sites of cultural anxiety in the post 9-11 world. In N.S. v. the Queen, et al., currently awaiting decision by the Supreme Court of Canada, a niqabwearing sexual complainant [N.S.] was ordered to remove her veil by a preliminary inquiry judge. This case raises important questions about religious freedom, equality rights and the right to a fair trial.

was “part of [her].” There can be little doubt that requiring her to remove her veil would have been subjectively experienced as disrobing. Courtrooms already require women to relive their traumatic experiences of sexual assault. Having to endure this without the comfort and security of one’s usual clothing would be perverse. The objection to the complainant’s niqab must be seen in the context of long-standing defence tactics used to undermine the credibility of complainants. The removal of the niqab in this context needs to be understood as an attempt to humiliate and intimidate the complainant. Such intimidation can force a complainant to withdraw from participating at trial, likely putting an end to the prosecution. Sexual assault is the least reported of all violent crimes; only one in 10 sexual assaults are reported to the police. A legal requirement compelling veiled women to uncover their faces as the price of access to the justice system would have the effect of discouraging them from reporting their assaults in the first place.

Appeal emphasized that the truth-seeking function of the criminal trial may be subverted by requiring N.S. to testify without her niqab, given the unreliability of her demeanour when stripped of her niqab in public. By contrast, N.S.’s Charter rights to religious freedom and equality would be seriously compromised by such an order, with consequences for all niqab-wearing women. Excluding niqab-wearing women from access to justice stigmatizes an already marginalized social group. ■

At the heart of legal arguments in favour of compelling N.S. to remove her niqab is the claim that evaluating witness credibility requires judges and juries to assess demeanour evidence. Yet reliance on demeanour evidence is increasingly discredited in the legal and social science literature. Even the Canadian Judicial Council recognizes the unreliability of demeanour evidence. As the Council’s approved model jury instructions caution, “Looks can be deceiving.” This may be particularly the case in sexual assault trials, where complainants have been judged against highly stereotypical views about how “real” rape victims act. At the preliminary inquiry in N.S., the complainant testified that her niqab 24

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It is not at all clear that the Charter right to a fair trial includes full access to demeanour evidence. In fact, in its judgment in this case, the Ontario Court of

Lise Gotell Professor Lise Gotell is the chair of the U of A’s Women’s Studies Program. She is an expert on gender and the law in Canada. She has written extensively on the rights of complainants in sexual assault trials.

Faculty Bookshelf

The importance of

performance spaces

Other recent titles Dual Language Development & Disorders (Second Edition) By Johanne Paradis (Linguistics), Fred Genesee and Martha B. Crago Paul H. Brookes Publishing Co., Inc., 2011

Elena Siemens’ (Modern Languages & Cultural Studies) Theatre in Passing: A Moscow Photo-Diary (Intellect Ltd., 2011) takes the reader on a tour of Moscow’s performance art spaces, and demonstrates how theatrical architecture and geography affect the audience’s perception of a show. “I wanted to show a different side of Russia’s capital, that which remains unaccounted for in news reports,” says Siemens, a native of Moscow. Siemens was inspired by the many exceptional artists who live and work in Moscow, and wanted to encourage discussion about performance spaces — something she feels is largely overlooked in theatre studies. Theatre in Passing combines outstanding original photography, theoretical discussions, cultural and historical information, and Siemens’ personal view on Moscow and its spaces of performance. When asked what she hopes readers will take from the book, she says, “A fresh view of Moscow. And a fresh view of the art of theatre, which – contrary to some reports — still remains vibrant and necessary.” Siemens is now working on a sequel to Theatre in Passing, which addresses spaces of performance around the world. Again combining text and original photography, it will include some of Edmonton’s theatrical landmarks, as well as the Edmonton International Fringe Theatre Festival. ■

This comprehensive, student-friendly text takes the popular first edition to the next level, enriching it with six years of new research and the latest guidance on best practices. Dispelling the many myths about dual language development, the expert authors arm future professionals with the information they need to support young bilingual children and their families, all while meeting Head Start’s guidelines on cultural and linguistic responsiveness. Why the Middle Ages Matter: Medieval Light on Modern Injustice Edited by Celia Chazelle, Simon Doubleday, Felice Lifshitz (Women’s Studies) and Amy G. Remensnyder Routledge, 2012 The word “medieval” is often used in a negative way when talking about contemporary issues. Why the Middle Ages Matter refreshes our thinking about this historical era, and our own, by looking at some pressing concerns from today’s world. It asks how these issues were handled in the medieval period, and shows why the past matters now. The contributors to this book cover topics such as torture, marriage, sexuality, imprisonment, refugees, poverty, work, the status of women, disability, race, political leadership and end‑of‑life care. They focus on a variety of regions, from North Africa and the Middle East, through Western and Central Europe, to the British Isles.

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THE 2011 CÉCILE E. MACTAGGART TRAVEL AWARD FOR NARRATIVE WRITING 26

The Cécile E. Mactaggart Travel Award for Narrative Writing Established in 1999 by Cécile Mactaggart, the Cécile E. Mactaggart Travel Award for Narrative Writing (formerly known as the Mactaggart Writing Award) is an annual competition that alternates between students and faculty members in the Faculty of Arts. The winner receives up to $12,000 to fund travel that will provide a stimulating educational and cultural experience.

horsey Words by THO MAS W HARTO N

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This week’s gathering of the Spruce Grove Nestcocks is at Tony’s house. Tony’s son Sam is three months younger than Michael and can talk circles around him. At the last get-together of the at-home dads, Robbie brought cupcakes that Kath had made. Sam wanted a cupcake and Tony told him to say, May I have a cupcake please? And the

kid said it. May I hab a cuhcake peez. When Michael asked for a cupcake, all he said was cupcake. He formed the word nearly perfectly, but still. Michael never says or does any more than the minimum needed. And man he’s got me trained. If he says banana, I jump up and get him one. If he says juice, I jump up and get him some. And he watches me while I do it. Michael watches Robbie a lot. Not nervously, or with awe. Just watching. Just curious. As if there’s no difference between Robbie and dead stuff in the gutter. As if one of these days Michael might look at Robbie and say Whatsat?

“

Our kids will make a new system,” Geoff says. “One we won’t fit into. In fact it’s happening already. We’re becoming obsolete.

”

Tony was an administrator at the college until they slashed a bunch of jobs. He was the one who came up with the idea for the at-home dad’s club, and the term nestcock. He found it on a website for at-home dads and thought it was funny. Robbie is uncomfortable with the word. He looked it up on the internet and one of the definitions was an effeminate husband who stays much at home. But the other dads liked it. Maybe because it sounds faintly rude and offensive, like an antique dirty word. Today Tony is holding forth about the oilsands. Of all the dads in the group he’s the most outward-looking. The most informed about what’s going on in the world beyond poopy diapers and juice boxes and Sesame Street. Tony’s been to Fort McMurray. He’s seen the moonscape out there. He’s actually read the reports on habitat loss and water contamination. “I mean, what kind of world are we leaving our kids?” Tony asks. “We want the best for them, we want them to succeed, sure, but what does success really mean in a system this dysfunctional? Does it make any of us happy?” “You bet it does,” Jack says. “Long as I’ve got my barbecue and my beer.” Everyone laughs, even Tony. Jack is a bit of a redneck, but it’s hard to be angry with the guy. He’s staying home while his wife works (her job at the plant pays better than his did at the hardware store) because their son Trey is autistic. Trey is standing by Jack’s chair, watching the other kids play with their toys on the living room carpet. Robbie studies the little boy’s pale, homely

THE 2011 CÉCILE E. MACTAGGART TRAVEL AWARD FOR NARRATIVE WRITING

obbie and his son Michael are walking together. Robbie is in a hurry, which surprises him when he thinks about it. He’s really started looking forward to these afternoon get-togethers with the other dads. It’s difficult to hurry when you’re walking with a two-and-a-half-year-old. Robbie has to wait often while Michael stops to look at things. Right now Michael is hunkered down at the edge of the sidewalk, his gaze fixed on something in the gutter. Aren’t kids his age supposed to have the attention span of a squirrel? Not Michael. Robbie nurses a smoldering nugget of self-pity. It’s hot and this is their fourth unscheduled stop on a two-block walk so that Michael can look at things. Robbie swallows the urge to shout come on, dammit, and joins his son at the edge of the sidewalk. “What is it, champ?” he says. Michael points into the gutter. “Whatsat?” he says. It’s his most-used phrase. At two and a half he’s not much of a talker yet but he’s very curious about the world. He has to investigate everything. Ask about everything. Kath says that means he’s deep. He’s got a deep soul, she says. Unlike me is what she means. But she’s got a point. He’s a quiet, serious kid. Hardly ever throws a tantrum. Sometimes Robbie thinks his son might already be more mature than he is. Robbie follows Michael’s pointing finger. “Oh gross,” he says. “Come on, buddy, let’s go.” But Michael isn’t budging. “Whatsat?” he asks again. Robbie looks at the bloodied wing, then at his son. “It’s part of a bird. Something killed it.” Michael looks at Robbie for a moment, then at the wing. He reaches for it. “Sorry, boss,” Robbie says, and picks Michael up in his arms. Enough dawdling. Michael submits without protest. If there’s one thing he likes more than discovering the world, it’s being carried. I’m a means of transport, Robbie thinks glumly. I live to serve.

face and he’s reminded of the way Michael will stare blankly like this longer than you’d think a kid his age should. Is it possible…? Robbie thinks, not for the first time. No, he reassures himself once again, the doctor checked Michael out just fine, if a little behind the curve on the language acquisition track. “Our kids will make a new system,” Geoff says. “One we won’t fit into. In fact it’s happening already. We’re becoming obsolete.” Geoff’s son JD is busy whacking a plastic hammer at one of the legs of Robbie’s chair. Geoff doesn’t seem to notice. He’s the newest member of the group and the one Robbie hasn’t figured out yet. He’s at home by choice, not necessity. Apparently the guy’s a computing wiz but he’s taking a year off to work on a novel. It’s set in the future is all he’ll say about it, in an undertone as if it’s some big secret. And there’s his habit of making these vague pronouncements, like he knows things about the world that the rest of them don’t. It gets on Robbie’s nerves. He considers asking Geoff what he’s talking about, but the familiar wind of hopelessness sweeps over him. Obsolete. The video store Robbie managed went under last year and nothing suitable has turned up since. Kath works as a hygienist in a dentist’s office and makes a decent wage but decent doesn’t seem to cut it anymore. The only reason they have a house of their own is because Kath’s father, the Lawyer, gave them the down payment as a wedding gift. “So what’s this new system going to be?” Tony asks Geoff, who shrugs. “No one knows yet. It’ll be something untried.” “You mean our wives will let us make the decisions,” Jack mutters, and everyone laughs, a little too loudly. The kids all turn at this outburst and regard their fathers, then they return to their play. It’s been a month since Robbie discovered he wasn’t the only stay-home dad in the neighbourhood. He and Kath had nabbed a good second-hand sofa for a steal and were struggling to get it out of the back of their van and onto the sidewalk when this Asian guy appeared from nowhere and offered to help. He lived just down the street. His name was Tony. And the next day Tony introduced Robbie to Dan. And Dan knew another athome dad a few doors down, Jack. They all met for coffee one afternoon at Tim Horton’s, and it was a nice break from the usual, and a few days later Tony group-emailed to suggest they make it a regular thing.

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THE 2011 CÉCILE E. MACTAGGART TRAVEL AWARD FOR NARRATIVE WRITING 28

Robbie wasn’t sure at first. It made his at-home status that much more official, while he didn’t see it as a permanent thing. But Kath loved the idea and after coming to a couple of the get-togethers, Robbie decided it was better than being cooped up at home all day with a quiet two-year-old for a conversational partner. And today he realizes with a pang that when he goes back to work or the club disbands he’s going to miss these guys. Dan is here today with his daughter Kaylee. She’s the oldest of the kids and they all tend to follow her lead. Get used to it, boys, Robbie thinks, as Kaylee lines up a bunch of plastic animals and confidently names them for the others. It’s only when Michael looks at Kaylee that Robbie sees something like awe in his eyes. She holds up an elephant. “Elephant,” she says to Michael. “Elephant,” Michael says, calmly and perfectly as always, but no more than that. He reaches a hand for the toy and Kaylee pulls it away. She’s not giving him the elephant. Michael turns and looks at Robbie, who discovers he’s gritting his teeth. Come on kid. Tell her you want the elephant. Say, give me the goddamned elephant. “Don’t forget to share,” Dan says in a sing-song voice to Kaylee, and then he laughs. Dan laughs a lot and it’s a real, infectious laugh. He’s just been laid off from the mill, and he’s still the cheeriest guy in the room. Probably he’ll be back to work in the winter. Hard to say, eh? Laughter. A simple soul, that’s Dan. If civilization collapses, Robbie thinks, guys like Dan will be good to have around. They’ll be the same as they are now, even when they’re hiding in a culvert from the roving cannibal gangs. Kaylee finally hands over the elephant and tromps to the other side of the living room and sticks out her lower lip. Dan laughs, gets down off his chair and onto all fours. Come on, pardner, he says to Kaylee. After holding her pout a little longer for full effect, she comes over and climbs eagerly onto Dan’s back. “She’d do this for hours if my bad knee didn’t give out,” Dan says as he crawls around the room making clip-clop noises with Kaylee hanging onto his shirt collar and beaming. Michael watches them intently, then turns to Robbie and lifts his arms. “Ride,” he says. Robbie’s never given Michael a horsey ride, as far as he can remember. It just never occurred to him, as if Michael had already passed the age for such games. But of course

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he hasn’t. Robbie takes a deep breath and gets down on his hands and knees. Later Tony hands out some chocolate chip cookies he baked himself. The kids sit eating them from little plastic plates on the carpet. Michael brings his plate over to Robbie and plunks himself down near him. He breaks a piece off his cookie and hands it to Robbie. Michael always does this. Feeds Robbie from his own plate. Kath thinks it’s wonderful. She says it shows Michael has a generous heart. But Robbie isn’t so sure. He’d like to believe that, but he also can’t help feeling that he’s being fed, like a pet. Once they’re back home from the gettogether, all Michael wants is horsey rides. He even demanded a ride on the walk back from Tony’s house, and when Robbie told him no, Michael stopped and sat down on the sidewalk and wouldn’t budge. A tactic learned from Kaylee, no doubt. Robbie had to carry him and for once Michael protested: he squirmed and whined for a horsey ride the rest of the way home. Their house is a bungalow and Robbie is able to make a nice long circuit: crawling from the living room into the kitchen and then down the hall to the bedrooms and back into the living room. Michael holds on to the back of his shirt the whole time without slipping or wanting to get off. And without saying anything, though he giggles delightedly every time Robbie puts on a burst of speed or makes a neighing sound. To Robbie’s surprise, he discovers he’s enjoying himself, too. He felt foolish doing this in front of the other dads, but now, down on all fours, close to the hardwood, he sees his house in a new way. The light down here on the floorboards is different, richer somehow. He can see all the scratches and the little dustballs. The curled wrapper from a plastic bandage. A dry pink dot beside the sofa that must be a drop of wine. Last night after they put Michael to bed, Robbie and Kath got cuddly and silly over a glass of cheap California merlot. Kath demanded to see hard evidence that he was a nestcock and Robbie crowed like a rooster and his wineglass tipped. Here on the floor Robbie feels close to the house in a way he never has before. It’s an intimate, tender feeling that reminds him how his heart opened when he watched his son being born. They don’t live in a North Van mansion with a sea view like the Lawyer. Hell, they probably have less square

footage than his garage. But this is their home. A real home. The balls of lint, the cracker crumbs, the sand tracked in from the playground… this evidence of their life together as a family moves Robbie so much he feels tears well up. When Michael has finally had enough horsey and is playing with his blocks, Robbie sweeps the floor. It’s one of the athome chores he always puts off but today he does it eagerly, thoroughly. It’s coming from that tenderness, he thinks. He should be looking after the place better, for Kath, for all of them. Then he realizes he’s also looking forward to the next horsey ride and doesn’t want crumbs sticking to his hands. Sure enough, after he’s played with his blocks for a while Michael asks for another ride and Robbie eagerly obliges. He hasn’t been working out in ages and his back and his knees hurt like hell, but Michael is laughing again, and Robbie is smiling, too. This time Michael gives directions. With single word commands he tells Robbie which room to visit next, when to stop, when to go again. Robbie catches sight of a book under the coffee table: the bestseller Kath brought home from the library two weeks ago but hasn’t had a chance to read because she’s usually so tired after work. Robbie makes a mental note to retrieve the book later. He’ll present it to her after dinner, run her a bubble bath and tell her to enjoy herself. When Kath gets home, Robbie and Michael are still playing horsey. She looks stressed but her face brightens when she sees them coming toward her across the kitchen floor that’s gleaming because Robbie actually washed it after he swept. Michael lifts his arms and Kath picks him up from Robbie’s back. Robbie stays on all fours, looking up at his wife and son. “Is Daddy a good horsey?” Kath asks. Michael nods solemnly. They play horsey all that week. Horsey, Michael simply says when it’s time, and Robbie can’t tell if it’s a request or a salutation. One day he goes to the hardware store and buys a pair of those foam kneepads that plumbers use. The rides become longer, more like real journeys than games. Robbie

“

I fear for our kids,” Tony

says. “But then I think, they’ve got us. That’s got to be worth something, doesn’t it?

”

Sometimes Michael will have Robbie stop in odd places, like the middle of the hallway or at the top of the basement stairs, and they will just stay there for a while, and Michael will be perfectly still, like a rider on the open prairie listening for the sound of hoofbeats. And Robbie is fine with these quiet, peaceful stops. If there was grass underfoot, he thinks contentedly, I’d be grazing. After a week Robbie notices he’s speaking less often, and he feels happier. He has a real purpose now. He also notices he’s starting to feel uncomfortable not when he’s crawling around but when he stands back up on two legs. Like a circus animal performing a trick. At the next meeting of the Nestcocks, at Dan’s house, Robbie spends most of the time on all fours. The other kids see Michael getting horsey rides and they ask their own dads for rides, and soon Dan’s living room looks like a dude ranch. The kids are laughing and the dads are laughing, bumping into one another as they mill around the room. Even Trey, perched stiffly on Jack’s back, is smiling. When the rides are over and the kids are plunked in front of a cartoon on TV so the dads can get back to their talk, Robbie lingers on the floor the longest. Tony’s already started in on the global economic situation, and Robbie doesn’t want to go there. Down here on all fours, he’s absolved of having to worry about things like that. He’s a mere beast of burden, with no adult responsibilities. He’s free. “It’s all coming apart,” Tony says. “The corporate elite is terrified but no one’s admitting how bad it really is.” Dan laughs. “We already know,” he says. “We had the Great War, and then the Great Depression,” Geoff says in his usual oracular way. “Then World War Two came

along and made the great war look like a schoolyard scrap.” “I get you,” Jack says. “What we’ve got coming will make your grandpa’s depression look like the good old days. Anyone started digging a bunker yet?” No one follows up on that sobering image. Robbie joins them at the table but he feels no need or desire to speak. We talk and talk, Robbie thinks. As if talking changes anything. Sooner or later we figure out what our role really is. “I fear for our kids,” Tony says at last. “But then I think, they’ve got us. They’ve got their fathers in their lives. Not like our generation, when our fathers were hardly there. That’s got to be worth something, doesn’t it?” The next afternoon Robbie and Michael are going at a slow easy amble through the front room when Robbie’s cell warbles from the kitchen countertop. “Ride’s over, pardner,” Robbie says. “Daddy’s got to get the phone.” Robbie halfheartedly dropped a resume off at the grocery store the other day. The call might be from the manager. A few hours a week would really help with the bills. Or it might be Kath. She calls sometimes from work to see how they’re doing. She loves Robbie’s “breaking news” on the latest cute thing Michael has said or done. “Come on, Michael,” Robbie says on the third ring. Michael usually climbs down without complaint when Robbie asks, but not this time. He’s just sitting there quietly like he often does, as if listening or waiting for something. A signal. A call of his own. “That’s it, champ,” Robbie says as the phone continues to ring, but he no longer

About the Author: Thomas

THE 2011 CÉCILE E. MACTAGGART TRAVEL AWARD FOR NARRATIVE WRITING

shows Michael how to pull his shirt collar left or right to tell him which way to turn, and how to nudge him with his heels in the ribs when he wants Robbie to go faster. He peels carrots for Michael to feed to him at the end of the ride. Robbie even prepares the route by placing surprises ahead of time: a cookie and a glass of milk, or one of Michael’s favourite stuffies. “Oh look, Barnaby Bear’s come to meet us!”

means it. This day was always coming. He knows that now. He feels Michael’s heels dig into his ribs and he starts into a walk without protest. This is how it is. Michael steers him by the shirt collar into the living room and toward the front entry. The phone is no longer ringing. The screen door has been loose for months and Robbie is able to open it with a nudge of his head. They’re out on the front walk now in the sunshine. Another dig from Michael’s heels and Robbie picks up the pace. They turn right and they’re trotting down the sidewalk, and Robbie keeps his eyes mostly down, to watch for pebbles and uneven spots that might trip him up. The destination is not up to him anymore, if it ever was. Michael doesn’t stop along the way for bird wings in the gutter or anything else. He doesn’t ask Whatsat? and Robbie understands that part of his childhood is over. They really do grow up so fast. As they’re crossing the street at the end of the block Robbie sees Tony up ahead, coming down his own front walk on all fours with Sam on his back. Robbie and Tony catch each other’s eye but there’s no need to say anything. And further down the street there’s Dan coming to meet them with Kaylee sitting tall and regal. She’ll be leading the party, of course, and Robbie also knows that Jack and Geoff will be joining them soon with Trey and JD, and there will be no need to say anything, no reason to talk at all. They have a job to do. The rest is not up to them. The children know where they’re going and it is not a place Robbie or the other fathers have ever been or will even recognize, and that is how it should be. ■

Wharton

Thomas Wharton is an associate professor in the department of English & Film Studies. He was born in Grande Prairie, Alberta. His first novel, Icefields (1995), won the Commonwealth Writer’s Prize for Best First Book, Canada/Caribbean division. His second novel, Salamander (2001), was shortlisted for the Governor General’s Literary Award and the Roger’s Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize. A collection of short fiction, The Logogryph, was published in 2004 by Gaspereau Press, and won the Howard O’Hagan Award for Short Fiction at the 2005 Alberta Book Awards. It was also shortlisted for the IMPAC-Dublin Prize. His most recent publication is The Fathomless Fire, second of a trilogy of fantasy novels for younger readers called The Perilous Realm. With the award he plans to take his wife, Sharon, and his children to Greece. Photograph of Thomas Wharton by Mike Burrows

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THE 2011 CÉCILE E. MACTAGGART TRAVEL AWARD FOR NARRATIVE WRITING 30

Catching up with a previous winner Russell Cobb (Assistant Professor, Modern Languages & Cultural Studies), winner of the 2009 Cécile E. Mactaggart Travel Award for Narrative Writing (formerly the Mactaggart Travel Award), spent a month travelling around South America with his wife and two-year-old son.

5 1

1. A temporary art installation in downtown Buenos Aires, Argentina is this structure of thousands of books in different languages, called, appropriately enough, the Tower of Babel.

4. Papallacta Hot Springs are heated by active volcanoes, only an hour by car from the bustling city of Quito, Ecuador.

French-style apartment in the oh-so-trendy neighbourhood of Palermo. The beautifully decadent façades often hide luxurious apartments.

5. The municipal city market in Lima, Peru isn’t exactly a tourist attraction, but a new culinary walking tour of the city includes it as a destination. It is a must for those interested in one of the world’s most sophisticated and delicious cuisines: Peruvian food.

6. Pablo Neruda’s house in Santiago, Chile (La Chascona)

2. A great option for lodging in Buenos Aires is to rent a

After decades of neglect, Quito’s Old Town is now bustling with new restaurants, museums and street life.

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has been restored to the way it was when he lived there.

Class Notes

’60s ’64 Dieter K. Buse (BA, History), Professor Emeritus at Laurentian University, writes to say: “During May my new book, co-authored with colleague Graeme S. Mount, appeared: Come on Over: Northeastern Ontario, A-Z (details and excerpts at www.scrivenerpress.com). It presents one of Canada’s historically richest areas (or do you know where the Group of Seven painted; where all the voyageurs and explorers from Champlain to Radisson, from Brule to MacKenzie went; where five times as much gold has been mined than the Klondike; where Winnie the Pooh and Shania Twain hail from; what towns had Canada’s first female and first black mayors?). We have had very positive reviews and the book is in its second printing.” Michael Behiels (’67 BA; ’69 MA, History) and Rishma Dunlop (’82 BA) are newly elected fellows of the Royal Society of Canada, which is the highest honour a scholar can achieve in the arts, humanities and sciences in Canada. Michael is a leading authority on Canadian politics at the University of Ottawa and Rishma is an award-winning poet at York University. ’68 Arlene Wasylynchuk (BA; ’70 BEd; ’91 BFA, Art & Design) has been working full time as an artist in Edmonton since 1991 and worked on an installation referencing the forests that are being affected by the mountain pine beetle (MPB), which opened at the Art Gallery of Alberta in October. Arlene writes to say: “With the help of Alberta Sustainable Resources, I gathered debris from areas that have been affected by the MPB and have used this debris as tools to paint and create a forest. While I creat[ed] this installation as a work of art, underlying the aesthetic considerations [was] the awareness and information of the MPB and its effect on our forest environments.” ’69 Jeffrey Dvorkin (BA, History) is now a lecturer and the director of the Journalism Program at the University of Toronto Scarborough Campus.

’70s ’71 W. Douglas Eaton (BA) was recently appointed Technical Advisor of Wolverine Minerals Corporation. He is CEO and president of Strategic Metals Limited and Silver Range Resources Limited. ’74 Pamela Wight’s (Mathewson) (MA, Geography) geography degrees brought a strong conservation orientation to much of her work in the private and not-for-profit sectors, government, academia and voluntary life. She has published extensively on sustain-

able tourism, and built her own consultancy in ecotourism, parks and protected areas planning, and sustainable livelihoods. Clients were all levels of government including the UN and international conservancies, which involved work in over 30 countries from the Arctic to the Tropics. She was on the board of the International Ecotourism Society, and rapporteur at the Quebec UN Summit on Ecotourism. She is inaugural executive director of the Edmonton and Area Land Trust, a nature conservancy (www.ealt.ca), the only conservancy to focus entirely on the Capital Region. She created a Culture-Conservation Connection, linking photography, art and literature to conservation, and she plans to add more cultural links to help inspire citizens to support conservation. ’76 Following his graduation in 1990, Dennis Stanley Ryan (Woloshyn) (BA; ’82 BEd; ’90 LLB; also MEd from University of Ottawa) practised forestry and mining law in Vancouver, ending his 16-year career in Canada as a partner with the international law firm, Fasken Martineau DuMoulin LLP. In 1997, he joined Conyers Dill & Pearman in the Cayman Islands as a corporate finance attorney. In 2009, Dennis relocated to Conyers’ Dubai office where he continues to provide offshore legal advice in the areas of corporate finance and restructuring to clients in the MENA Region (Middle East/ North Africa). He is ranked as a leading offshore lawyer by Chambers Global. ’78 Diana Anderson (BA, Art History) was hired by the newly-formed Red Deer Arts Council as their coordinator in September 2010. She works with a board of directors to fulfill their mandate to promote the visual, literary and performing arts in Red Deer.

’80s ’81 Darlene (Orkusz) Bayley (BA, Russian) is now manager of Quilter’s Dream, an Edmonton-based Fibre Arts and Quilting Store. As well, she teaches Fibre Arts classes and sells her own work privately. She is also involved in the Focus on Fibre Arts Board, promoting Fibre Art throughout Alberta. Co-Producers/Directors Kenda Gee (’82 BA) and Tom Radford (’66 BA) of Lost Years Productions Inc. attended the Guangzhou International Documentary Film Festival in China in December 2011. Their feature-length documentary, Lost Years, which premiered across Canada in February 2012 on CBC TV, won the award for Best Documentary (History & Culture), from among the 670+ entries to the festival. Lost Years is an epic documentary miniseries that covers more than 150 years of history of the Chinese in Canada and abroad.

’83 John Lowe (BA, History) was recently appointed president of AltaGas Utility Group Inc. ’84 Eric Kramer (BFA, Drama) can been seen on the Disney Channel television sitcom Good Luck Charlie, although he is, perhaps, better known for his role as Little John in Robin Hood: Men in Tights or as Thor in the television movie The Incredible Hulk Returns. ’87 Richard Price (BA, Political Science) is a professor of political science, and for 2011-2013 is Senior Advisor to the President at UBC. ’89 Melanie Buffel (BA, Psychology) writes to say: “I have spent the past 20 years leading grassroots programs that help people overcome financial crisis and build their personal assets. Stemming from my personal experience, I became determined to decode the money game and win! I am currently a Money Coach with Money Coaches Canada in Vancouver, BC, and a Financial Literacy Trainer at the Canadian Centre for Financial Literacy. As a Money Coach I offer holistic support and unbiased advice for my clients to take charge of their finances. As a Financial Literacy Trainer I support community organizations across Canada to offer basic financial education to members of their community. I completed postgraduate work at Simon Fraser University in Community Economic Development and am currently pursuing a Masters of Business in Community Economic Development through Cape Breton University. In 2008, I received a ‘Passion for Financial Literacy Award’ from SEDI, a national leader in the field of financial literacy.”

’90s ’90 Shaun Johnston (BFA, Acting) received the 2011 David Billington Award, presented by the Alberta Media Production Industries Association, in recognition of his invaluable contribution to Alberta’s TV and film production community. ’91 Craig O’Connor (BA, Geography; ’03 MBA) has recently joined Tyco Thermal Controls in Edmonton as their Recruitment Supervisor. ’93 Todd Cherniawsky (BFA, Art & Design) is currently working as a supervising art director on the Disney movie Oz: The Great and Powerful.

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Class Notes ’95 Todd Babiak (BA, Political Science) left his job as columnist at the Edmonton Journal late in 2011 and co-founded Story Engine, a company based in Edmonton and Vancouver that uses story-based strategic planning to make organizations better: more focused, more cohesive, more attractive, more influential. His latest book, Toby: A Man, was shortlisted for the Stephen Leacock Medal for Humour and won the Georges Bugnet Prize for best Alberta novel. His next novel, The South of France, will be published by HarperCollins in October 2012.

Avenue Edmonton’s Top 40 Under 40

’95 Noel Ratch (MA) was appointed by the Province of Alberta as the Director of Reynolds-Alberta Museum in Wetaskiwin in December 2011. ’97 Leela Gilday (BMus) won the 2011 Aboriginal Female Entertainer of the Year award at the sixth annual Aboriginal Peoples Choice Music Awards in Winnipeg in November. The year before, she won Best Folk/Acoustic CD for her Calling All Warriors album.

’00s ’02 Pascale Hutton (BFA, Acting) is now starring as Krista Ivarson, a hotshot pilot, on the new CBC series Arctic Air.

Congratulations to the 12 Arts alumni who were included in Avenue Edmonton’s “Top 40 Under 40” list for 2011, which recognizes the top young business leaders in our city: •

Todd Babiak (’95 BA, Political Science), Writer

•

Christine Causing (’97 BA, Anthropology), Coordinator for Edmonton’s NextGen Initiative (see “As I See It” on page 17 for an opinion column by Christine)

•

Diana Davidson (’98 BA, English; ’99 MA, English & Film Studies), Director of Public Library Service Branch, Municipal Affairs

•

Tannis Davidson (’96 BA[CdnSt]), President of My Filosophy clothing boutiques

•

Fiona Farrell (’03 BDes), Creative Director at Donovan Creative

•

Jennifer Fisk (’94 BA, Political Science; ’95 MA, Political Science), Founder of Freestone Communications

•

Jason Golinowski (’95 BA, Ukrainian Folklore; ’99 MA, Modern Languages & Cultural Studies), Senior Communications Advisor at Natural Resources Canada

•

Kristy Harcourt (’96 BA, English), Training And Rural Development Coordinator for the Canadian Red Cross RespectEd Program

•

Jeff Johnston (’01 BDes), Industrial Designer

•

Kyle Kasawski (’97 BA, Geography) President of Provident Solar

•

Logan Mardhani-Bayne (’06 BA, History), Managing Director at Health Technology Assessment International (HTAi)

•

Ryan McCourt (’97 BFA, Art & Design; ’99 MFA, Sculpture), Sculptor and Owner of Common Sense Gallery

’06 Erin Ross (BFA, Art & Design) is the cochair of artsScene Edmonton, a volunteer network of young business professionals who support the arts in Edmonton. ’06 Meera Varghese (BMus, Voice Performance; ’08 MA, Ethnomusicology) After graduating from the U of A, Meera received the Johann Strauss Foundation Scholarship, which supported music training in Salzburg and Baden bei Wien, Austria. A recipient of the Golden Key Graduate Scholar Award, Meera has since been studying at the Hochschule für Musik und Tanz Köln in Germany, where she completed her Graduate Diploma in Voice in 2010, and will receive her Master of Music in Opera Performance in 2012. During her studies, Meera has participated in master classes with renowned artists such as Barbara Bonney, Edda Moser and Elly Ameling. Currently based in Cologne, Meera is an active opera singer and performs in local and touring productions with companies across Germany. Her recent opera credits include “La Fée” in Massenet’s Cendrillon, “Clorinda” in Rossini’s La Cenerentola, “Cupidon” in Offenbach’s Orphée aux enfers, “Emily” in Menotti’s Help, Help, the Globolinks, and “Nachtigall” in Hilsberg’s Die chinesische Nachtigall. Meera is also an accomplished performer, choreographer and teacher of Bharatanatyam (Classical Indian Dance) and continues to give performances and teach dance workshops. Meera’s studies have been supported by the Alberta Foundation for the Arts, the Arts Graduate Scholarship, the Winspear Fund Scholarship, the Flore Shaw Graduate Scholarship in Music and the CFUW Elizabeth Massey Award. Headshot photo by Stefano Triulzi 32

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Class Notes & In Memoriam

Where are they now?

In Memoriam

Catching up with our retired professors

The Faculty of Arts notes with sorrow the passing of the following friends:

Fred Judson was a professor in the Department of Political Science from 1986 to 2011, and served as chair of the department from 2003 to 2006. His research interests included Latin American revolutionary movements, Canadian/international political economy, comparative politics of the “Global South” and critical international relations theory. Throughout his career, Judson was an active distance runner, and joining Edmonton Masters Athletics in 1994 led him to compete in his first decathlon. This past July, I was finally (it had been since 2003) able to compete at the world level once more in decathlon. I was competing in the Men 65-69 age category, with 11 other athletes from the U.S., France, Germany, Canada, Switzerland and Japan. I’d been hoping merely to complete the event, held in Sacramento’s rather fierce summer weather (over 40 C by 11 a.m. on the track both days), but solid performances in jumps and throws (second to fourth) kept me in the running that first day. And the 400 meter run turned out to be a good one for me, beating the field and finding myself in third place after the first day. At the end of nine events the second day, I was surprised to be in second place, with good discus and javelin throws, a better-than-expected showing in the hurdles, and some passable body-flinging in the pole vault. As we started what virtually no one likes, the 1500 meter run, I was thinking “if you don’t blow it, you could have a medal out of this.” It turned out my Swiss friend Herbert, in first place since early the first day, being a lot bigger man and not very happy in the heat, had a pretty slow 1500, close to eight minutes. My time, just above six minutes, won the 1500 and put me over 100 points ahead of Herbert. I was astonished to win the decathlon, never imagining that at 65 I would lay claim to being a world champion. There are plenty of other dimensions to life as a retired professor, but maybe track and field is where I’m really able to put something extra into “acting my age.” It’s called geezer power. Photo by Maryon McClary

To read more about Fred Judson’s journey from the classroom to the starting blocks, check out our web exclusives at www.arts.ualberta.ca/woa.

ARTS ALUMNI ’36 BA, Ruth Sommers (Reikie) of El Dorado, CA, in July 2010 ’36 BA, ’46 BSc, Robert O’Brien in October 2011 ’39 BA, ’40 Dipl(Ed), Laura Lipinski of Edmonton, AB, in December 2011 ’39 BA, ’45 BEd, Catherine Dunlap of Edmonton, AB, in December 2011 ’44 BA, ’69 BEd, Kay Stelck of Edmonton, AB, in September 2011 ’47 BA, ’47 Dip(Nu), Mary Mortimer (Robertson) of Ottawa, ON, in May 2011 ’48 BA, Mavis Munday (Strong) of Victoria, BC, in July 2011 ’48 BA, ’49 LLB, John Ballachey of Calgary, AB, in January 2012 ’48 BA, ’56 MA, Eunice Hanna of Calgary, AB, in October 2011 ’50 BA, Frances Daurel Sutherland of Calgary, AB, in December 2011 ’52 BA, Arthur Bolle of Beaumont, AB, in October 2011 ’53 BA, ’71 MEd, Charles Bailey of Westerose, AB, in December 2011 ’61 BA, ’62 LLB, Thomas Maccagno of Lac La Biche, AB, in January 2012 ’61 BA, ’66 MA, Joanne Chalmers of Edmonton, AB, in November 2010 ’65 BA, ’68 LLB, Stanley Fowler of Edmonton, AB, in January 2012 ’66 BA, Lorne Ellingson of Toronto, ON, in January 2012 ’66 BA, Rick Hyndman of Edmonton, AB, in October 2011 ’66 BA, ’74 MEd, ’84 MEd, ’94 EdD, Douglas Fleming of Westlock, AB, in January 2012 ’67 BA, Victor Strembitsky of Edmonton, AB, in January 2012 ’67 BA, ’69 BEd, ’88 Dipl(Ed), ’92 MEd, Audrey Demchuk of Vegreville, AB, in December 2011 ’69 BA, Janusz Malinowski of Calgary, AB, in October 2011 ’70 MA, Samuel Trevor McCartney of Belfast, Northern Ireland, in July 2008 ’71 BA, John Cormack of Edmonton, AB, in December 2011 ’71 BA, Leo Wiberg of Camrose, AB, in October 2011 ’71 BA, Stephania Yurkiwsky of Edmonton, AB, in September 2011 ’72 BDes, ’73 LLB, David Rode of Edmonton, AB, in September 2011 ’73 MA, Rodney Gietz in February 2011 ’74 BA, ’78 LLB, Brian Peterson of Edmonton, AB, in January 2012 ’75 BA, Nettie Enns of Calgary, AB, in September 2011 ’75 BA, ’77 BA(Cert), Vera Brown of Edmonton, AB, in October 2011 ’75 BA, ’81 Dipl(Ed), Susanne Tracey (Melnyk) of Sherwood Park, AB, in January 2012 ’79 BA, ’85 MA, Margaret Ogrodnick of Winnipeg, MB, in October 2011 ’82 BA, Robert Matthews of Edmonton, AB, in November 2011 ’83 BA, Christina Scott of Cape Town, South Africa in October 2011 ’83 BFA, Esther Kristine Freeman of Sherwood Park, AB, in November 2011 ’88 BA, ’91 LLB, Roy Everest of Jasper, AB, in September 2011 ’88 BFA, Tim Chipman of Edmonton, AB, in July 2011 ’88 BFA, ’92 BA, ’93 MA, Deborah Your of Edmonton, AB, in November 2011 ’90 BA(Crim), Karen Glover of Rosanna, VIC, Australia in January 2011 ’91 BA, ’98 MPH, Donna Neufeld of Edmonton, AB, in October 2011 ’93 BA, ’95 Dipl(Ed), Marlene Kottke (Friedrich) of Edmonton, AB, in January 2012 ’98 BA, Susan Rundans of Victoria, BC, in September 2011 ’98 BA, ’00 BEd, Wendy Konoza of Edmonton, AB, in September 2011 ’03 BA, ’06 BEd, Kristy Elhard of Spruce Grove, AB, in November 2011

STUDENTS Tristan (Tian) Mi, Undergraduate Student, Drama, in January 2012

FACULTY & STAFF (CURRENT & FORMER) Jeremy Dix-Hart, Professor Emeritus, Drama, in July 2011 Frank Glenfield, Studio Theatre Business Manager/Acting APO, Drama, in December 2011 Leslie C. Green, O.C., Professor Emeritus, Political Science, in November 2011 Gordon Hirabayashi, Professor Emeritus, Sociology, January 2012 Charles (Chuck) W. Hobart, Professor Emeritus, Sociology, November 2011 Karl Kao, Professor, East Asian Studies, in October 2011 Lyle Larson, Professor Emeritus, Sociology, in September 2011

Did we miss someone? Please let us know by e-mailing woa@ualberta.ca or calling 780.492.6580

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Flashback

CJSR: The little radio station that could The early history of CJSR is really the early history of CKUA. Two professors from the Department of Extension realized they could reach more people using radio and so, the University purchased a small Edmonton radio station. Students built a transmitter and antenna near Pembina Hall, and several studios in the Power Plant. In 1927, CKUA (UA standing for “University of Alberta”) went on the air, marking the birth of campus radio in Western Canada.

small broadcast studio using an army hut that had been erected on campus during the war years. It was known as “Hut H” and relayed campus programming to the CKUA studios downtown. In 1953, two students, Jim Redmond (’53 BA; ’54 LLB) and Dave McDonald (’53 BA; ’85 LLD [Hon]), made a small bit of history when they became the Radio Society’s first DJs on CKUA with their program “All the Best,” a 90-minute program of popular music.

Arts students were involved early on. The first time students were involved in production or hosting was when a group of Arts students formed the Varsity Radio Players in 1942, which was responsible for a weekly 15-minute CKUA program called “Varsity Varieties.”

In the early ’50s, a new Students’ Union Building (now University Hall) was built, and the Radio Society moved its tiny studios into the new building. By 1960, CKUA was shedding the last of its University ties, so the Radio Society started broadcasting to University buildings with a closed-circuit PA system. When the next Students’ Union Building was completed in 1968, the Radio Society moved its studio once again. The Society installed a transmitter on top of SUB and broadcast a weak AM signal over the airwaves for the first time. In 1970, the Radio Society made an application to the CRTC and became CKSR (CK from CKUA, and SR for “student radio”).

CKUA continued to be owned and operated by the U of A until 1944, when the Alberta government bought out its license and moved the station to the Provincial Building in downtown Edmonton. You could take the radio station out of campus, but you couldn’t take the campus out of the radio station. A newlyformed U of A radio club (later to be called the Radio Society) used leftover and donated equipment from CKUA to build a

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04), adapted from Mick Sleeper. nd: The Story of CJSR (1946–20 Summarized from Watch this Sou site at University of Alberta Centenary web The full article can be found on the p?article_id=1036 le.ph artic eat_ lay_f /disp cles in/feature_arti www.ualbertacentennial.ca/cgi-b of the University of Alberta archives. All photos and material courtesy

Flashback For most of the 1960s, the Radio Society’s programming had been patterned after the CBC and BBC. It consisted mostly of droll observations on campus life, news, Shakespeare plays and light music. But by the ’70s the people at CKSR were starting to have fun; slowly but surely, music supplanted the radio plays and current affairs programs. The idea of CKSR being an “alternative” radio station started to take shape among its staff and volunteers. The pride in playing music that other radio stations wouldn’t touch became a focal point for everyone. Around this time, FM radio began to emerge. And so, in early 1974, an application was made to the CRTC to turn CKSR into an FM station, but it was rejected. As if that wasn’t bad enough, the Students’ Union faced a budget crisis that year. CKSR’s musical programming was seen as cause for concern, as the SU felt that campus news, sports broadcasts and student group communication should be the station’s main focus. So as the school year ended, CKSR closed its doors. CKSR’s Program Director, Gordon Turtle (’77 BA; ’91 MA, History), became a persistent voice on campus to get the station back in action and others were determined to do the same. In 1976, through limited funding from the SU, CKSR went back on the air.

In the winter of 1980, a small group of staff and volunteers decided to find out what it would take for CJSR to finally become an FM station. Two CJSR stalwarts, Steve Cumming and Gary McGowan (’80 BA), spearheaded the endeavour. The SU bankrolled a fact-finding mission that saw McGowan and another long-time CJSR volunteer, Randy Talbot, visiting campus radio stations across Canada. In January 1981, station director Steve Cumming put together a passionate and detailed proposal for the University, which pointed out, among other things, that the University community was underrepresented in Edmonton; he surmised that an FM station “could have a profound impact on the community’s perception of the University.” At the end of March 1981, the U of A gave CJSR the green light to become an FM station, but it would be up to CJSR to raise the necessary $200,000. Through SU funding, Friends of CJSR fundraisers, donations and grants, CJSR’s piggy bank grew. The license was approved by the CRTC in 1983, and the station was assigned the 88.5 frequency — as far left as you can get on the FM dial. This would become an unofficial slogan for the station in years to come. After the installation of a weak transmitter on top of SUB, The first FM broadcast took place on Saturday, January 7, 1984. CJSR was on the air! ■

In 1978, CKSR found itself faced with an unexpected dilemma. A TV station in British Columbia was starting an FM station, and wanted the CKSR call letters. As CKSR was still considered a “small potatoes” station at the time by the CRTC, it was told that it would have to change its call letters. CKSR staff reasoned that “J” sounded just like “K”, so CKSR became CJSR.

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Students Sylvia Mak and Nanyen Lau perform at the 2012 Chinese Lantern Festival, celebrating the 30th Anniversary of the Department of East Asian Studies and the 50th anniversary of the first year Chinese was taught at the U of A. 36 woa | SPRING â&#x20AC;&#x2122;11 WWW.ARTS.UALBERTA.CA/WOA

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