Simon Fraser University Vancity Office of Community Engagement

Genevieve LeBaron is a new Professor and Director of the School of Public Policy at Simon Fraser University, and the Principle Investigator of the ReStructure Lab. In this episode, Am and Genevieve discuss her research work on forced labour and the global market forces which incentivize those practices. They also discuss the new role for public policy in solving real-world solutions as well as the unique context of the School of Public Policy at SFU and its broader impact.

William Lindsay worked as an educator at Simon Fraser University, the University of British Columbia, and Concordia University. In this episode, Am and William discuss the writing process for his latest book, “Rez Dog Blues & The Haiku: A Savage Life in Bits and Pieces,” and its focus on music and movies, horror and hope, and the honest depiction of Indigneous life, in the 60s and 70s, on reserve and then in the Downtown Eastside of Vancouver.

Content Warning:The stories in this series deal with difficult and sometimes traumatic topics. Please practice self care, stop listening and seek support if you need to. Help is available!

Mental Health Support:

Crisis Centre BC: crisiscentre.bc.ca/

Indian Residential School Survivors Society: www.irsss.ca/services

KUU-US Crisis Line: www.kuu-uscrisisline.com/

WAVAW Rape Crisis Centre: www.wavaw.ca/

BC Mental Health and Substance Use Services: www.bcmhsus.ca/

David Lester is the author and graphic designer of Prophet Against Slavery, Benjamin Lay: A Graphic Novel and he is the illustrator of 1919: A Graphic History of the Winnipeg General Strike. David is also the guitarist for the bands, Mecca Normal and Horde of Two. This episode explores the subject of the book, Benjamin Lay, the radical Quaker who used guerrilla theatre to shame slave owners and traders, as well as the intersection of political activism and art in David’s personal and professional history.This episode features the song “Malachi” by the band Mecca Normal.

The episode ends with a look at David’s future projects and the legacy of racism and how it continues to haunt contemporary America.

Shauna Sylvester is the former Executive Director of the SFU Morris J. Wosk Centre for Dialogue and is moving on to be the Executive Director of the Urban Sustainability Directors’ Network. Shauna has also been involved in various organizations, such as the Social Planning and Research Council of B.C., the Institute for Media, Policy and Civil Society, Canada’s World, among others. This episode explores the impacts and changes made through these organizations, as well as how Shauna developed an interest for promoting community dialogue.

Am and Shauna also discuss Shauna’s concerns with Canada’s changing place in the world, her focus on getting cities to 100% renewable energy, and her 2018 mayoral run in the City of Vancouver.

In this episode of Below the Radar, host Am Johal is joined by Magda Goemans, manager of Community Campus Engage Canada. Together, they discuss her almost decade-long journey in the field of community engagement, the priorities of their practice, and plans they hold for the future. 

Magda describes Community Campus Engage Canada as a network or "community of practice" for individuals and organizations interested in campus-community partnership, that prioritizes community-driven work, such as making space and uplifting the voices of their community partners. Magda also discusses some of the key issues in community engagement today, such as the current societal polarizations brought forth by the pandemic, as well as the specifics of community engagement in Canada—its history, the definitions it's had over the years, and priorities around language and active decolonization. 

Settler Memory: The Disavowal of Indigeneity in the Political Life of Race in the United States (University of North Carolina Press 2021) is about the displacement of Indigeneity in the discourse around race in American political theory. It specifically touches on settler memory and acknowledging the history of Indigenous peoples in colonialism, and then disavowing the active presence of settler colonialism and Indigenous politics in the present.

Am and Kevin discuss how Black theorists, like James Baldwin, discuss indigeneity in their politics, and how tensions can arise between different conceptions of land, history, and identity. Kevin’s overall project is to link antiracism with anticolonialism, which shows through in the conversation.

The Community Engaged Scholarship Institute, situated at the University of Guelph, brings together community and campus skills and resources in order to advance community-identified research goals. This episode describes various projects, such as the Community Engaged Teaching and Learning (CETL) Program, the Research Shop, and the Guelph Lab.

Am and Liz discuss the role of the Institute and how community engaged research can be used to provide a foundation for policy development and in widening imaginations and creating possibilities on the ground. Liz also describes her life trajectory that brought her to this work and led her to Critical Community Engaged Scholarship.

In 1983, the province of British Columbia saw the rise of a social movement like no other since — uniting activists, community organizations and trade unionists in protest. This time on Below the Radar, host Am Johal speaks to David Spaner, an author, cultural critic, and organizer who has written a compelling history of the Solidarity resistance movement.

Released in December of 2021 by Ronsdale Press, Solidarity: Canada's Unknown Revolution of 1983 is David’s chronicling of the organizing efforts by the Solidarity movement and its ongoing implications for worker justice in BC. He and Am go behind the scenes of the book, as David recalls experiences from being on the ground as a reporter and activist during that time.

SFU's School for the Contemporary Arts Assistant Professor Eldritch Priest joins this episode Below the Radar to discuss the potential in nonsense and failure,  the phenomenon of the earworm, and his journey from musicianship to employing theory.

In this episode, Eldritch explores his beginnings as a jazz guitarist,  the practices that guide his work and his teachings, and the path that led him to composition and beyond. He dives into the legitimacy and aesthetic possibilities of failure and nonsense, and the potentials of daydreaming and a resting mind — in defiance of prevailing positivist neoliberal discourse. 

Eldritch also talks about the phenomenon of the earworm, which is a focus in his new book, Earworm and Event. The earworm, to him, is a prime example of studying music less as an artform, but more as a technology, using the imagination to shape not just one's feelings, but one’s thoughts as well.

This episode of Below the Radar is a special live event recording from “A Conversation About Urban Choreography,” presented in-person at SFU’s Vancouver campus on November 9, 2021.

Taking gesture as a point of entry, Justine A. Chambers and Alana Gerecke extend their collaborative exploration of the everyday choreographies that are built into an urban experience. Combining artistic and academic research, they index the various bodily orientations cultivated by the built and social structures that shape everyday spaces. By tracking an archive of everyday gestures that are prompted by various components of built and social space, they insist on the lasting and vital information contained within those specific organizations of moving bodies. They emphasize the significance of embodied knowledge—even, or especially, as it lives in invisibilized daily gestures. 

In this discussion, Chambers and Gerecke are joined by architect Annabel Vaughan. Together, the panelists explore the accumulation of living archival gestures generated by the interactions between moving bodies and built space, an evolving assembly of lost gestures. This public conversation was presented with the aim of sharing evolving research by inviting those present to engage in a consideration of the embodied details of urban circulation.