Canadian Studies Announcements
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In this issue:
- Special message from Director Bloemraad: What your support means to us
- Next week: Hildebrand Graduate Research Showcase
- Applications close Friday for summer research funding
- Upcoming event: “Future Imaginaries of Abundant Intelligences: Indigenous Perspectives on Artificial Intelligence and its Discontents”
- External event: “Canada and the United States in the New Quantum Tech Era”
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Dear friends,
This Thursday is Big Give, Berkeley’ annual fundraising marathon. This year’s drive coincides with a historic milestone for Canadian Studies, marking our 40th anniversary on campus. As I sat down to write this note, I reflected on the significance of this history. In 1982, a group of determined friends of Canada led by Professor Thomas G. Barnes scraped together funding for a center that no one was sure would succeed. Though we’ve been tested many times in the decades since, our program has always emerged stronger. What, I wondered, is the source of that strength? What has helped such an unlikely program thrive through the ups-and-downs of four decades? The answer, I think, always comes back to our friends and alumni. Your philanthropy is the foundation of our program, from graduate research fellowships and public colloquia to community gatherings like our annual Canadian Thanksgiving. And your steadfast commitment to our vision has given us a crucial independence at a time when campus funding is constantly at risk. Last year, your support allowed us to achieve 100% donor-funding for the first time ever.
This Thursday, make an investment in the next 40 years of Canadian Studies at Berkeley. Donate if you believe that both Americans and Canadians benefit from a strong mutual understanding and close ties. We thank you in advance for your support, and hope to see you in the fall for a special anniversary celebration!
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Irene Bloemraad
Program Director
Thomas G. Barnes Chair in Canadian Studies
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Read this before you give: you can help us win big prizes!
Throughout Big Give, units can win special prizes by completing timed Challenges. Your gift of any size can help us win bonus money if your name is randomly selected during the contest period. Just see which group you fall into, and make your gift during the stated time. It’s that easy!
- Berkeley Alumni: Donate between 6 and 7 pm PT ($750)
- Non-alumni: Donate between 9 and 11 am PT ($750)
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NEXT WEEK – See how Canadian Studies supports students!
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Hildebrand Graduate Research Showcase
Tuesday, March 15 | 12:30 pm PT | 223 Moses Hall | RSVP hereLearn about the research Canadian Studies funds through our Edward Hildebrand Graduate Research Fellowships, as recipients present short overviews of their projects. This panel will have a special focus on the environment, development, and Indigenous resource sovereignty. This event will be held in-person as well as broadcast via Zoom.
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“New Agricultural Frontiers: Land, Labor and Sovereignty in the Northwest Territories, Canada”
Mindy Price, Ph.D. candidate, Environmental Science, Policy, and Management
Now more than 1º Celsius warmer than a century ago and warming at three times the global average, the Arctic and Subarctic are being reimagined as a new frontier for food production. Despite a growing body of evidence that climate change will enable new possibilities for agriculture in the North, much research remains agnostic about how northern agricultural development will affect communities and landscapes and the relations between them. Mindy uses archival research and ethnography in three extended case studies to examine the implications of agriculture development on the social relations of production and consumption in the Northwest Territories, Canada.
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“Kinship Infrastructures: Indigenous Energy Autonomy and Regulatory Sea Change in Beecher Bay”
Aaron Gregory, Ph.D. student, City and Regional Planning
Aaron’s research explores the social, technical, and regulatory impacts of a renewable energy system developed by the Scia’new First Nation in Beecher Bay, British Columbia. He examines this project as an emergent approach to Indigenous environmental governance, an infrastructural solution responding to the problem of Indigenous energy sovereignty, and a regulatory provocation designed to challenge a provincial monopoly on energy production and distribution.
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Applications for summer research funding close this Friday
Deadline: Friday, March 11, 2022
The Canadian Studies Program is currently accepting applications for the Edward Hildebrand Graduate Research Fellowship for Summer 2022 and AY 2022-23. The application is open to any UC Berkeley graduate student whose work focuses primarily or comparatively on Canada. This fellowship is meant to cover direct research costs. The deadline for summer applications is this Friday, March 11; applications for AY 22-23 must be submitted by May 6. Please visit our website for more information and full eligibility criteria, and help us share this information with your friends and networks!
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Your donations help make free events like the following possible:
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Future Imaginaries of Abundant Intelligences: Indigenous Perspectives on Artificial Intelligence and its Discontents
Thursday, April 7 | 12:30 pm PT | 223 Moses | RSVP hereThe artificial intelligence (A.I.) industry-academic complex does not have an ethics problem. It has an epistemology problem. The persistent failures with computationally-enabled and -amplified bias are symptoms of a blind allegiance to knowledge frameworks that define the “knower” as a post-Enlightenment individual motivated by selfish utilitarianism while subordinating or erasing ways of understanding the world that imagine people differently. How do we expand the operational definitions of intelligence to account for different epistemologies? In particular, how might we take inspiration from Indigenous knowledge frameworks that situate knowing within a web of relationships amongst humans and non-humans? And how might we consider integrating advanced computational practices, such as A.I., into traditional knowledge frameworks to the benefit of Indigenous communities?
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Jason Edward Lewis is the University Research Chair in Computational Media and the Indigenous Future Imaginary as well professor of computation arts at Concordia University in Montreal. His research explores computation as a creative material, and seeks to understand how our technologies are constituted through explicit and implicit cultural knowledge practices. He is lead author of the award-winning “Making Kin with the Machines” essay and editor of the Indigenous Protocol and Artificial Intelligence Position Paper. Lewis directs the Initiative for Indigenous Futures Partnership, and co-directs the Indigenous Futures Research Centre and the Aboriginal Territories in Cyberspace research network.
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Canada and the United States in the New Quantum Tech Era
Wednesday, March 9 | 10:00 am PT | Online | RSVP hereJoin the Wilson Center’s Canada Institute for a discussion on the emerging revolution in quantum technologies and how the governments of Canada and the United States are approaching the opportunities and challenges it presents.
Emerging quantum technologies will have significant economic and national security ramifications, setting off a global race for leadership in this field. Quantum computers hold the promise of infinitely greater processing power and the ability to crack today’s digital security protocols. They will transform industries from finance to pharmaceuticals to logistics. Quantum sensors and quantum imaging will change fields from mining to warfare. Moreover, a quantum internet, with ultra-high speeds and security is under development. This session will explore what the U.S. and Canada are doing in the quantum field and how they are thinking about closer collaboration in the years ahead.
This event will feature an expert panel drawn from top levels of government, science, and industry, and will be hosted by Canada Institute director and Berkeley Canadian Studies board member Chris Sands. This event is being hosted in partnership with the Embassy of Canada.
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Canadian Studies Program
213 Moses Hall #2308
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Royal Canadian Legion, US Branch #25 