Canadian Studies Announcements

In This Issue:

Upcoming Events

• Conference on Proto-Algonquian
• Come from Away: Newfoundland and Labrador’s Food Security Dilemma

News from Canada

• Opinion: “Foreign Policy and the Next Election” by Jeremy Kinsman

Academic Opportunities

• Call for papers: Florence Piron Day: Bridging Open Science and Local Knowledge

External Events

• Seeing It All: Changing the World One Photo at a Time
• Critical Understanding of Canada in the World: Breaking Through
• Reconciling Our Built Heritage: The Decolonization of 100 Wellington

UPCOMING EVENTS

Saturday, March 2 | 9:30 am – 4:00 pm | 223 Philosophy Hall | RSVP

The Canadian Studies Program invites you to a one-day conference honoring the late David Pentland on the occasion of the posthumous publication of his Proto-Algonquian Dictionary. The conference will bring together scholars from across the United States and Canada to celebrate this significant milestone in Algonquian scholarship, and to celebrate Dr. Pentland’s life and career as a prominent scholar in the field of Algonquian studies.

Ever since Leonard Bloomfield published his groundbreaking 1946 sketch outlining the sound system and basic morphology of Proto-Algonquian, refinements of the details of sound change and the reconstruction of Proto-Algonquian has been a central part of Algonquian linguistics. But the close similarities among most of the languages has led to a plethora of proposed reconstructions that are often not fully consistent with one another. Pentland’s dictionary has been a long-awaited step forward, bringing a new level of rigor and consistency to the field. It will also be a springboard to a range of new questions about methodology, classification, and borrowing. And we cannot discount the window on Algonquian culture such a comprehensive work provides. Speakers at the conference will address these questions and more.

Details about the conference, including the speaker schedule, are available on our website. The conference is at no cost, but attendees must register by emailing canada@berkeley.edu.

Come from Away: Newfoundland and Labrador’s Food Security Dilemma

Tues., March 12 | 12:30 pm | 223 Philosophy Hall | RSVP

This presentation illuminates past and current complexities of Newfoundland and Labrador’s unique food system. Following confederation with Canada in 1949, the province’s once-abundant fisheries fed North America to the point of over-exploitation, creating both cultural and food system disruption. Currently, most food is imported into the province and transported by ferry, including produce from California’s Central Valley. Though hunting is prevalent in rural communities, high priced, pre-packaged, and processed food, rather than fish, are the dietary mainstay. Recent efforts to expand agricultural production within the province would improve local control over the food system. This would ostensibly be more expensive than most imported foods, given the province’s short growing season and relatively small, diffusely located population. Yet financially supporting such endeavors might be justifiable to facilitate a basic human right to access and produce food.

Note: The speaker will also share Newfoundland and Labrador artwork and handicrafts at the in-person presentation.

About the Speaker

Dr. Catherine Keske is a professor of management of complex systems in the School of Engineering at UC Merced. She is an agricultural economist and social scientist who studies sustainable food, energy, and waste systems. Prior to joining UC Merced in 2017, she was associate professor of environmental studies (economics) in the School of Science and the Environment at Memorial University of Newfoundland. Her research on food security and Newfoundland and Labrador includes an edited book, Food Futures: Growing a Sustainable Food System for Newfoundland and Labrador, and “Economic feasibility of biochar and agriculture coproduction from Canadian black spruce forest” published in Food and Energy Security.

This event is cosponsored by the Berkeley Food Institute.

If you require an accommodation to fully participate in an event, please let us know at least 7 days in advance.

NEWS FROM CANADA

Opinion: “Foreign Policy and the Next Election”, by Jeremy Kinsman

Foreign policy is unlikely to be a significant issue in the next Canadian election, with affordability topping the polls for most Canadian voters by a wide margin. But Canada’s retreat from global leadership has not only hurt its own international standing, but deprived the world of a voice of moderation. Canada must rebuild its influence if it wants to preserve a rules-based international order.

That’s the argument former diplomat Jeremy Kinsman makes in a new op-ed published in Policy Magazine. Kinsman, who has spoken to the Canadian Studies Program several times, argues that Canadians have become “spectators” to important world affairs. Apart from a few issues relevant to specific diaspora groups, Canadians retain a distinctly parochial outlook and have abdicated leadership to other countries. Canada has too long acquiesced to following US foreign policy, even to the country’s occasional detriment. Meanwhile, the ineffectiveness of an atrophied diplomatic corps has demolished Canada’s influence in key countries like China and India. But with the prospect of a second Trump term looming, Canada could be face with a more isolationist neighbor, and policies that conflict with Canadian values. If Canada is to protect its interests in coming years, Kinsman concludes, the next government must re-establish Canada as a trusted and independent presence on the global stage.

ACADEMIC OPPORTUNITIES

Submission deadline: March 15, 2024

Nukskahtowin at the Athabasca University, in partnership with the Association science et bien commun and the UNESCO Decade for Indigenous Languages, invites paper submissions to celebrate the 3rd annual “Florence Piron Day” on April 26.

This interdisciplinary conference will examine the intellectual and scientific heritage of Florence Piron (1966-2021) between question of (i) ethics, (ii) Open Science and Open Access, (iii) participative research and collaboration with local communities, (iv) critical pedagogy, (v) local knowledge and their potential to contribute to local sustainable development, (vi) cognitive justice, (vii) the métissage of knowledge, democracy, decolonial studies, citizen science and participatory research, etc.

Submissions should include an abstract of no more than 500 words and a 100-word biography identifying key institutional affiliations and key scholarly contributions. For the conference terms of reference and to make a submission, please click here.

EXTERNAL EVENTS

Seeing It All: Changing the World One Photo at a Time

Wed., Feb. 28 | 5:30 pm | San Francisco | Buy tickets

The Commonwealth Club invites you to join three Canadian women for a conversation on the power of images to change how we see the world, raise awareness about the most urgent environmental issues, and spark action. Seeing It All: Women Photographers Expose Our Planet is the latest publication from BigPicture and the California Academy of Sciences. Featuring more than 125 photos by female BigPicture award recipients and jurors, these incredible images present new perspectives of rarely seen animals, places, and conservation around the world.

Written by Canadian Studies board member Rhonda Rubinstein (Co-founder, BigPicture Natural World Photography; Creative Director, California Academy of Sciences), Seeing It All illustrates the extraordinary complexity of the natural world and exposes how we – humans, animals, and nature – are living together now. Panelists will also include Toronto-based photojournalist Jo-Anne McArthur (Founder, We Animals Media) and neuroscientist Dr. Indre Viskontas (UCSF/San Francisco Conservatory of Music.) Tickets are available to attend both in-person and online; books will be available for purchase and signing.

Tuesday, March 5 | 11:30 am PT | Online | RSVP

Brock University (Ontario) is hosting a free online panel discussing Canada’s contemporary foreign policy. Speakers will include Aaron Ettinger (Carleton University), on “Diversity, Pedagogy, Canadian Foreign Policy”‘; Breanna Kubat (Carleton University), on “Pearsonian Nostalgia: Rethinking the Rhetoric of Canadian Internationalism Under the Trudeau Liberals”; and Rebekah K. Pullen (McMaster University), “Do you Hear What I Hear? Considering the Dissonance of Canada’s Silence on Nuclear Disarmament and its Character on the World Stage”. The panel will be moderated by Liam Midzain-Gobin (Brock University).

Reconciling Our Built Heritage: The Decolonization of 100 Wellington

Tuesday, February 27 | 12:00 pm PT | Online | RSVP

This case study tackles the controversial “gifting” of the former United States Embassy in Ottawa to the National Indigenous Organizations. The main issue with this “gift” is that the current settler-colonial heritage conservation regulations place strict limitations on interventions that would decolonize this building. The research is based on critical discourse analysis of multiple sources and an emphasis on Indigenous literature. Indigenous research methods, such as storytelling, visiting, and self-reflexivity, are a means to ground this research from a decolonizing framework. The speaker, Christopher DesRivieres, is an architectural professional based in Ottawa, with a background in Indigenous studies and heritage conservation.

This talk is part of the speaker series “Populations Rendered ‘Surplus’ in Canada”, sponsored by the Center for Canadian-American Studies at Western Washington University, Fairhaven College of Interdisciplinary Studies, the Ray Wolpow Institute, and the Foundation for WWU & Alumni.

Canadian Studies Program

213 Philosophy Hall #2308

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