Reporting back to the communities was a condition of receiving IPY research funding in 2007, and after three years ecologist and political scientist Gabrielle Slowey were ready to deliver. When the two arrived by bush plane, citizens in Fort Simpson and Inuvik crowded into local meeting halls to hear them. Some had helped do the research, all were curious to hear the results.

Right: Dawn Bazely in a plane back to Yellowknife from Fort Simpson

“They were never going to read a report. They need to hear things orally,” says Bazely, director of 91ŃÇɫ’s Institute for Research & Innovation in Sustainability.

Bazely led the Canadian component of an IPY project called (GAPS), investigating the effect of oil and gas development on northern communities. She oversaw teams of natural and social scientists investigating invasive plant species, housing security and homelessness, mental health services and the advantages of self-governance in indigenous communities in the Yukon and Northwest Territories.

"What was really unique about our program was no other had natural and social scientists working so closely in tandem from the beginning," said Slowey. Oil and gas was the context, human security or the well-being of these communities was the framework. The collaboration worked really well and achieved real results, she said.

Above: Gabrielle Slowey in front of the igloo church, Our Lady of Victory, an Inuvik landmark

Normally, denizens of these northern communities pay little heed as scientists from the south come and go, and never return to share their findings, says Bazely. This time they were all ears. The research offers them a glimpse of what is in store for them and ways they can deal with change. “It’s empowering,” she says.

Slowey agrees. “We’re not just taking knowledge away, we’re giving it back and helping them.” She also presented her findings in Whitehorse.

For the past three years, Slowey has been comparing the ability of self-governing versus non-self-governing indigenous communities to cope with change wrought by oil and gas development and exploration. After surveying residents, community leaders and industry  officials, she found self-governing communities, such as Old Crow, have more control over what happens to them. They can make their own decisions and negotiate directly with the territorial government over oil and gas development. Non-self-governing communities such as Tuktoyaktuk must deal with multiple levels of government to get anything done. “Self-government removes all those layers and gives more local empowerment.”

Left: Gabrielle Slowey

After her presentations in Whitehorse and Inuvik, people in communities such as Pelee Crossing, Yukon, and Sachs Harbour, Northwest Territories (NWT), sought Slowey's advice on how to proceed given mining exploration or oil exploration occurring in their area. "I highlighted not just onshore but offshore oil and gas development. It’s going to be huge."

Folks in the NWT were also curious about the potential impact of devolution (downloading of jurisdiction from Ottawa to the territories) on their self-government agreements and future development. It's a hot topic in the North and Slowey has pointed out in newspaper editorials how Ottawa bureaucrats are ill-prepared to make decisions about the North because they have no understanding of what life is like for the people who live there.

Moreover, she says, “we tend to think of people in the North as victims of policy instead of agents of change. I’m telling them they’re on the right track by pursuing self-government.” Do it now, she’s saying, before the territorial government embraces devolution. Yet it's not so easy, as local indigenous leaders scramble to keep up as Ottawa keeps changing the rules of the game.

Over the past three years, Bazely and her students have looked for evidence of invasive plant species in settlements from Fort Simpson, gateway to the Nahanni and home of the caribou, north to Norman Wells, Fort Good Hope and Inuvik. Oil and gas exploration and development has brought outsiders to the area and with them a foreign fungus that has infected the grass that caribou eat. Not good news for people whose diet depends on caribou meat. Bazely advised communities to revegetate the ground along the pipelines and roads with local seeds, not imported seeds. Doing so could lead to local – and sustainable – business opportunities, she told in Fort Simpson.

Above: The frozen Mackenzie River

The will be published in peer-reviewed academic journals, presented at conferences and spawn graduate theses, says Bazely. But the best value, she believes, comes from sharing it directly with local policy-makers and citizens.

By March, IPY research will be completed and next year the results will be shared at a Montreal conference, .

Bazely is editing a book, Environmental Change and Human Security in the Arctic, to which Slowey is contributing a chapter. By this fall, Slowey expects to finish editing a book, Rethinking Public Policy in the Northwest Territories, highlighting each of the Canadian GAPS subprojects.

The biologist and political scientist have embraced the IPY imperative to report back to the communities. They plan to share their IPY research findings with indigenous groups in northern Ontario and local groups in Pennsylvania, who are faced with shale-gas development.

By Martha Tancock, YFile contributor

Republished courtesy of YFile – 91ŃÇɫ’s daily e-bulletin.

The post Professors report back to Arctic communities on International Polar Year Research appeared first on Research & Innovation.

The PRE-PAID project, funded by the and , targets groups at high risk for diabetes and uses a community-based approach to engage them in the physical activities they enjoy. The 91ŃÇÉ« study has been operational since November 2009, and several diverse ethnic neighbourhoods in the Toronto area have participated. The Sault College project will involve individuals of First Nations descent.

"The PRE-PAID team is very excited to partner with Sault College for this important initiative,” states Chip Rowan, Researcher and Certified Exercise Physiologist at 91ŃÇÉ«. “Through this partnership, we hope to extend our program to a community that has a well documented risk for developing type 2 diabetes. Through the provision of free screening and targeting individuals with pre-diabetes, we hope that our physical activity intervention program will prevent or delay the development of type 2 diabetes for as many people as possible."

Canadian Diabetes Association Regional Branch Co-ordinator, Janie Bringleson, says the statistics involving those with diabetes are alarming. Nearly 1 in 4 Canadians either has diabetes or pre-diabetes and more than 20 people are diagnosed with the disease every hour of every day. The Health Council of Canada states that diabetes is much more common, and growing more quickly, among First Nations adults, who are two to eight times more likely to have diabetes than the overall Canadian population, depending on age group. Researchers hope to show participants the benefits of engaging in no cost, enjoyable physical activities. Second, it is hoped that the project will demonstrate the importance of investing in exercise to prevent diabetes. Through these interventions they expect to reduce diabetes by 60%.

The complete article is available on . More information about the is available through the Research website archives.

Posted by Elizabeth Monier-Williams, research communications officer, with files courtesy of YFile – 91ŃÇɫ’s daily e-bulletin.

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Right: The poem "My Countryman" by José Salvador Cavero is written in Quechua in the book Lira Huamanguina, published in Ayacucho (Peru) in 1950

It is his interest in how Quechua has been reinvented throughout history, the country’s evolving language policy and the current state of bilingualism in Peru – a concept Canada also struggles with – that has earned Durston the , worth $25,000 in research funding. The prize is awarded annually to an outstanding new researcher. This is in addition to the three-year standard SSHRC research grant he received last year worth $60,000 for his project, “The Social History of Quechua Letters: Modern Peru, 1900-1975”.

Quechua’s written history dates back to the 16th century, when Spanish conquerors introduced the Roman alphabet and sought to convert the population to Christianity using indigenous language texts. “However, it is not until the start of the 20th century that we find written Quechua being used for a wide range of purposes,” says Durston. Intellectuals started writing plays, poetry, political propaganda, speeches, medical texts and newspaper and journal articles in Quechua to fuel national identity and nation-building by reaching a broader section of the population.

“Suddenly, we have this boom. New kinds of texts that haven’t appeared before start appearing,” says Durston. As Latin American countries moved away from Western influence, the rising middle class turned toward indigenous cultural traditions and developed an interest in the country’s indigenous language. “This was a high point of Latin American nationalism.” It’s also a period that has attracted little scholarly attention. “People today aren’t aware of the diversity and richness of what’s available.” Much of the material is housed in one library and is mostly forgotten.

Left: Alan Durston

One of the barriers preventing Quechua from becoming a more mainstream written language is its perceived association with the Incas. People think they have to write Quechua the way the Incas would have spoken it, but that’s absurd, says Durston. “Quechua is not just this fossil, this relic of the Incas; it’s a living language. You can write it the way people speak today.”

Quechua continues to be spoken by people not only in Peru, but Colombia, Ecuador, Bolivia and Argentina, and by many who wouldn’t consider themselves indigenous. In some parts of Peru it is spoken universally. But since the 1950s, production of literary material in Quechua has dropped significantly. Most people writing in Quechua today have little training in it as there is such a dearth of available written material to read, says Durston.

Although Quechua was given official language status in the 1970s, it wasn’t promoted, he says. Unlike in Canada where all road signs, food items, government forms, documents and the like are in both official languages, Quechua doesn’t appear next to Spanish anywhere. “It hasn’t really succeeded as a written language in politics or law.”

He hopes his research, however, will increase interest in the current stock of written Quechua material and in producing more. “I do think my research has the potential to help Quechua in Peru,” says Durston.

As part of his project, he plans to write a book in both Spanish and English about his research and develop an online archive of written Quechua material that will be available to anyone. He is the author of , which looks at the world of colonial Quechua culture through language.

By Sandra McLean, YFile writer

Republished courtesy of YFile– 91ŃÇɫ’s daily e-bulletin

The post Professor Alan Durston receives SSHRC's Aurora Prize for research on indigenous language appeared first on Research & Innovation.

Podruchny’s talk, “Tough Bodies, Fast Dogs, Well-Dressed Wives: Measures of Manhood Among French-Canadian Voyageurs in the North American Fur Trade”, will take place tomorrow, from 2:30 to 4pm, at 010 Vanier College, Vanier Senior Common Room, Keele campus.

She will discuss French Canadian and MĂ©tis voyageurs working in the fur trade. In the 18th and 19th centuries, the voyageurs developed a range of masculine ideals that worked together to promote a particular trope of manhood among this workforce. Men were expected to perform near miraculous feats of labour by paddling continuously for weeks on end, barely stopping to sleep and eat, carrying impossibly heavy packs across slippery and steep portages, and shooting through dangerous rapids, says Podruchny.

They challenged each other to develop bodies that were as tough as possible through games of speed, endurance and strength. They distinguished categories within the workforce. Pork eaters were denigrated as lesser men; North men were considered to be tougher; Athabasca men the toughest, she says.

Tough man ideals included taking risks, being jovial and stoic in the face of hardship, and standing up to the dangers of the wild. Voyageurs also idealized largess, spending money on luxury goods, such as decorating their possessions, feasting and drinking, and wooing women with extravagant gifts. The range of these ideals created distinct values in fur trade and Métis communities that stood out sharply from their bosses, missionaries, and later white settlers who began to intrude in the northwest starting in the 1870s.

Podruchny work focuses on the history of French and indigenous contact in early Canada. She is the author of and co-editor of .

The 2010-2011 Canada: Like You’ve Never Heard It Before Speakers' Series features public lectures by prominent 91ŃÇÉ« Canadianists. Co-sponsored by the Canadian Studies Program and the Canadian Studies club, this interdisciplinary series demonstrates the breadth and depth of both Canadianist research at 91ŃÇÉ« and the work of outside authors.

This series is co-sponsored by Vanier College, Winters College, New College, Stong College, Calumet College and Founders College, as well as the Office of the Dean of the Faculty of Liberal Arts & Professional Studies.

Republished courtesy of YFile– 91ŃÇɫ’s daily e-bulletin

The post Professor Carolyn Podruchny: What it took to be a real man in the 18th and 19th centuries appeared first on Research & Innovation.

The event, hosted by the Aamjiwnaang First Nations Health and Environment Committee, in partnership with 91ŃÇÉ«, is a follow-up to a 2008 health symposium held in Sarnia to share research findings with members of the scientific community, environmental groups, the media and government.

“The idea came about a year ago after [Aamjiwnaang community member] Ada Lockridge mentioned the idea of doing a follow up symposium,” said Sarah Wiebe, project coordinator for the Community Forum on Pollution and Action, and research assistant to , environmental law professor at 91ŃÇɫ’s Osgoode Hall Law School [and executive director of the ], who has worked closely with Lockridge and the Aamjiwnaang community to investigate the links between pollution and health.

. . .

The one-day forum will include a series of workshops exploring the relationship between the Aamjiwnaang First Nation and Sarnia's Chemical Valley, to deliver "collective and creative legal education," said Wiebe.

Participants will be invited to familiarize themselves with using the Environmental Registry and accessing PollutionWatch data. A session will also be held exploring how money collected from environmental offences is distributed to affected communities.

"We're trying to look at legal remedies, so when fines are charged to local facilities, one option could be to reallocate that money to those who maybe have a health concern," said Wiebe. "We also want people to have a better understanding of how to provide input when new facilities and projects come up."

Another component of the forum, "Raising Voices," will invite area youth to share their thoughts and concerns on the environment, including a group of First Nations youth who have been working on an ongoing photography assignment since the summer.

"We've asked them to document the good, bad and the ugly in their context; what gives them hope and what gives them concern," said Wiebe. "We're planning to showcase some of their images."

Community members will also receive an update on the ongoing Lambton Community Health Study, as well as updates from researchers investigating cancer, child development and endocrine disruption on the reserve.

Posted by Elizabeth Monier-Williams, research communications officer, with files courtesy of YFile– 91ŃÇɫ’s daily e-bulletin

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, released this week by University of Ottawa Press, calls for a shift in the debate surrounding climate change.

“I wanted to move the discussion away from the debates we’re constantly hearing in the news – the validity of climate science and the economic validity of a response,” says author °ŐŸ±łŸŽÇłÙłóČâÌęłą±đ»ćłÜłŠ, professor in 91ŃÇɫ’s Faculty of Environmental Studies.

“There is today an abundance of scientific research and policy options to develop climate change responses, but I believe what we are lacking is a spirited sense of our situation and the willpower to make significant cultural change. This is what these dialogues with Inuit allowed me to consider,” he says.

“Much of the current debate focuses on how to continue extracting all the resources we can while limiting the harm to the environment. These storylines reflect our cultural tendency to economize. It’s not that economizing in itself is wrong – but it holds too much power. As soon as any scientific research, cultural understanding or religious worldview conflicts with this perspective, it becomes marginalized from the corridors of power,” says Leduc.

Accordingly, Leduc believes all parties concerned must be part of the discussion. With this in mind, he created an Inuktitut companion to the book that presents the central ideas of Climate, Culture, Change for the Inuit who have been instrumental to this project. It is available to , free of charge.

“It’s important to note that I did not ‘give voice’ to Inuit, for their perspectives have been well represented in climate change research and policy circles by hunters, elders, groups like the Inuit Circumpolar Council and activists like Sheila Watt-Cloutier,” he says. “However, I feel this book has allowed me to open space for us to consider some alternative ways of thinking about climate change.”

Leduc notes that while it’s impossible to predict exactly how we’ll be affected in the future, the coinciding impact of climate shifts, environmental degradation and the end of oil will make that future significantly different than what we know today.

Left: Timothy Leduc

“Either we are proactive in envisioning a radical change of those cultural beliefs and practices that underlie our failed response to climate change, or we continue to deny our situation and thus lurch from crisis to crisis,” Leduc says. “Every step in that direction brings us closer to a future where we have less time and space to develop a humane, just and wise response.”

Leduc holds a PhD in Environmental Studies from 91ŃÇÉ«, and has worked for a number of years in northern indigenous communities.

91ŃÇɫ’s Faculty of Environmental Studies is the first of its kind in Canada, and one of the first worldwide. It is one of the broadest interdisciplinary programs in the country, offering students an abundance of faculty interests and courses, allowing them to focus on a particular subject area while acquiring a breadth of knowledge.

Visit the  blog for more information on the book.

Republished courtesy of YFile– 91ŃÇɫ’s daily e-bulletin.

The post Professor Timothy Leduc: Include Inuit experience of climate change in Western debate appeared first on Research & Innovation.

Not much had been written about that part of the GaspĂ© Peninsula and northern New Brunswick, the seventh district of the Mi’gmaw Grand Council, until Metallic turned his eye to it, but that didn’t explain the feeling he had.

Above: Alfred Metallic, centre, defending his dissertation

It wasn’t until after he had written his comprehensive exams and was back in his community that he realized what was missing was the Mi’gmaw language – its connection to the spirit of the people, their ways of life and the land – and the way stories are presented back to the people, his people. Metallic’s dissertation was his story, and he needed to tell it using the oral traditions of his people in the Mi’gmaw language of his community and district, to share the knowledge and learning he’d accumulated, but also to help preserve his native language, which is at risk of disappearing.

“Our language, it’s how we maintain our relations and how we understand where we come from. It gives you access to your place in the world,” says Metallic. In the Mi’gmaw language, the action comes first, then the person. It’s the opposite with the English language.

Above: From left, Anders Sandberg, supervisor, Faculty of Environmental Studies (FES); Ravi de Costa, dean's representative, FES; Diane Mitchell, master's of environmental studies Mi'gmaw student in FES; Deborah Barndt, committee member, FES; Alfred Metallic, PhD candidate, FES; Ian Martin, internal examiner of the Department of English at Glendon.

91ŃÇÉ« environmental studies Professor Anders Sandberg, Metallic’s PhD supervisor, helped put the process in place with the support of Professor Barbara Rahder, dean of the Faculty of Environmental Studies (FES) and FES Professors Robin Cavanagh, Mora Campbell, Stefan Kipfer and Peter Cole, among others. 91ŃÇÉ« became the first Canadian postsecondary institution to officially sanction the use of a language other than English or French in graduate work, and Metallic the first PhD candidate at 91ŃÇÉ« to defend his thesis in an Aboriginal language – it was written and spoken in the Mi’gmaw language.

“There’s a circle that needed to be expanded a bit by including others for a more holistic circle,” says Metallic. He says both Aboriginal and academic representatives needed to come together to form the circle. “That circle wouldn’t be complete until that story is defended in a way that includes all the knowledge-holders. We needed to expand the usual paradigm on how that knowledge is transferred and how that knowledge could be preserved. We needed to anchor it closer to where the people live, and that would give it added value.”

Left: Members of the Listuguj community join with members of the academic community at Alfred Metallic's PhD dissertation defence

It’s very hard to miscommunicate in the Mi’gmaw language, unlike English, he says. “One purpose of the circle is to reinstate the value of the relationships to make that circle tighter and stronger, so the people’s voices become clearer.”

And so in October, some 1,300 kilometres from Toronto, Metallic orally defended his dissertation in a ceremony that included a sweetgrass smudging, singing, a feast, a give away and the inclusion of the Aboriginal community as well as the academic one.

The external examiner Stephen Augustine, a Mi’gmaw and curator at the Museum of Civilization, was joined by Katherine Sorby, an elder from Listuguj; Keira Ladner, a Cree scholar and constitutional expert from the University of Manitoba; Leanne Simpson, an Nishnaabeg scholar from Trent University; Ian Martin, 91ŃÇÉ« internal examiner and language expert; Ravi de Costa, the dean’s representative and FES professor of Indigenous Peoples & Globalization; FES Professor Deborah Barndt; Sandberg and many members of the Mi’gmaw community.

Right: Community members, young and old, came to the dissertation defence

The community is still talking about it. “The idea was to strengthen the relationship between Aboriginals and the academic community,” says Metallic. “It is possible to co-exist, to have an environment where those different ways can co-exist without having to compete for voice.” For him the coming together of the people was just as important as the dissertation. “A lot of people at the table had an interest in how this would go.”

It is necessary, says Metallic, if bigger issues such as treaty rights and residential schools are to be resolved, that the First Nation’s more collaborative way of coming to an understanding be preserved. In addition, it is his belief that the Mi’gmaw need to tell a different story than the one of impact.

“Our history goes way back before the Europeans arrived.” There is a different story to tell and to do that “we have to trust our own people,” says Metallic. “Communities can work together; we can participate in these stories through the dissertation.”

By Sandra McLean, YFile writer. Republished courtesy of YFile– 91ŃÇɫ’s daily e-bulletin

The post PhD student defends thesis in Mi'gmaw language, a 91ŃÇÉ« first appeared first on Research & Innovation.

The Ontario Ministry of the Environment has known for a long time that its air pollution regulation fails miserably when it is applied to several large, high-emitting facilities clustered together. That regulation allows the Minister to hand out Certificates of Approval (CofAs) or "pollution permits" to individual facilities without taking into account the background, or "ambient," levels of pollution already present. For pollution hotspots like Sarnia, the regime is completely inadequate to protect the health of residents downwind, and the Ministry acknowledges this.

The mantra of the environmental justice movement that “some of us live more downstream than others” is a stark and obvious truth in the Chemical Valley. This area houses one of Canada’s largest concentrations of industry, including several large petrochemical, polymer and chemical industrial plants, as well as coal-fired utilities on both sides of the border. Talfourd Creek gathers its waters in an industrial corridor home to more than 40% of Canada's chemical production before it winds its way through the Aamjiwnaang reserve and empties into the St. Clair River.

. . .

When we consider this pollution and its effects on the health of residents in the context of their status as First Nations people on the reserve, then the violation of their constitutional rights comes into sharp relief.

The First Nation is tied to the land, confined to a small portion of their traditional territory. To this legacy of colonialism, they add the legacy of a century of petrochemical production. That they should be expected to endure these threats to their well-being, perpetuated by the ministry’s failure to enact an effective, health-protective air pollution regime, is unconscionable. That they should be forced to choose between subjecting themselves and their families to these risks or leaving the reserve at great social, economic and cultural cost, demonstrates that their equality rights are clearly infringed.

Posted by Elizabeth Monier-Williams, with files courtesy of YFile– 91ŃÇɫ’s daily e-bulletin

The post Professor Dayna Nadine Scott: Chemical Valley compromises First Nation people's rights appeared first on Research & Innovation.

Nor is it enough to set up a supposed green company in the Global South to offset the spewing emissions of companies in the Global North. Without a substantial system change, an alternative way of living, climate change will continue unabated, says Anders Sandberg. “I don’t see any change, frankly. Carbon emissions are still increasing dramatically.”

When carbon emissions are traded or bought for offsets, such as planting trees, they are done so at the end of the carbon change cycle, rather than at the beginning. A lot of money continues to go into the development of more carbon sources. “From my perspective it’s not very positive,” says Sandberg. Much of the offset purchasing is by large multinationals in the Global South, where they set up green companies to offset pollution in the United States, but by doing so they displace many of the local people and their economic livelihoods.

In the book, the Sandbergs write, “The concept of climate change itself can be an oppressive force
hiding the historical connections of the carbon economy to colonialism, capitalism and rampant and exploitive resource extractions."

“We’re asking people to look at the climate change issues from a broader perspective, which could bring forth more ideas,” says Sandberg.

In , the third volume in the Our Schools/Our Selves book series, 2010, published by the , the Sandbergs look at who is most affected by climate change and the need for systemic change beyond capping and trading carbon emissions.

They don't believe that free markets, new green technologies and international agreements are enough to alleviate climate change. Despite green technologies, levels of consumption will likely remain high. Even if all the cars are electric, there will still be suburbs, roads and gridlock, potentially leading to an increase in the amount of electricity used and the building of more hydroelectric dams, which then affects the environment and the people who use it. “I think we need to look at and imagine other ways of living,” says Anders Sandberg.

Left: Anders Sandberg

Although climate change is a global issue, the solutions are not. What’s needed is a closer look at the origins of climate change and the areas it most impacts, he says. Areas such as the Tar Sands of Alberta, the Gulf of Guinea in West Africa, the Canadian north, the coastal regions of Bangladesh and the island states of the Pacific.

“We have to look at the people on the ground who are harmed by this. What we are trying to do is turn the prism from the global to the local. But we’re not just looking at the horror stories; we’re also looking at the hope and resiliency of these communities and whether they might have some answers to the climate change problem.” For one thing, it’s important to understand the vulnerabilities that have built up in these communities, explore their origins, call for reparations from those who are responsible and build on the resiliencies that remain.

One of the contributors to the book, 91ŃÇÉ« environmental studies master's student Jelena Vesic (BES Spec. Hon. '08), points to the polar bear as a symbol and a victim of climate change. There is now a threat to First Nations who harvest them because they are considered endangered, yet a closer look reveals that in some regions the polar bear is holding its own. Banning their harvest would affect First Nations communities that have hunted polar bears as part of their culture for centuries. The ban would also affect the local economy and the resiliency that’s built into the particular relationship between the Inuit and the polar bear.

Right: Tor Sandberg

Climate Change – Who’s Carrying the Burden? contains a collection of papers from prominent people such as Stephen Lewis, Canada's former ambassador to the United Nations, who looks at the health impact of global climate change; author and journalist Naomi Klein, who talks about paying the climate debt; and scholar and activist Vandana Shiva on the G8/20 summit and climate change. Green Party of Canada leader Elizabeth May explores shrinking ecological footprints and expanding political ones, while visiting Fulbright scholar at 91ŃÇÉ« Professor NoĂ«l Sturgeon challenges the family values and environmental practices that are tied to the carbon economy.

The majority of articles, however, are written by junior scholars and graduate students in 91ŃÇɫ’s Faculty of Environmental Studies who are passionate about climate justice. They write on a range of topics, including the recent climate-focused conferences in Copenhagen and Cochabamba, climate change-induced migration, Hurricane Katrina, the Niger Delta, the First Nations youth adoption of hip hop music to fight HIV/AIDS. the largest squatter settlement in Europe (the free town of Christiania in Copenhagen) and food policy in the Greater Toronto Area.

The Sandbergs discuss what they see as the dominant story – cap and trade and offsets –and the alternative story that calls for systemic change and climate justice, which emerged at the 15th United Nations conference on climate change they attended last December in Copenhagen.

Anders Sandberg is currently using Climate Change – Who’s Carrying the Burden? in his course – Environmental Studies 1200, Taking Action, Engaging People and the Environment.

The book will be officially launched by 91ŃÇɫ’s (the Sandbergs were part of the institute's delegation to the climate change conference in Copenhagen) on Wednesday, Oct. 20, from 3 to 4:30pm at 305 91ŃÇÉ« Lanes, Keele campus.

The themes of the book will also be featured in a session titled “Climate Change, Climate Justice and Human Rights” during 91ŃÇɫ’s Inclusion Day – Dialoguing Across Differences tomorrow.

For more information on the book, visit the website.

By Sandra McLean, YFile writer

Republished courtesy of YFile– 91ŃÇɫ’s daily e-bulletin

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“SSHRC’s investment in humanities and social sciences research allows our scholars to substantially contribute to Canada’s knowledge base, to culture and to quality of life,” said Stan Shapson (right), 91ŃÇɫ’s vice-president research & innovation. “This basic research helps us to better understand the world while responding to the pressing social issues of our time.”

Forty-seven 91ŃÇÉ« faculty members received $4.4 million to fund their research projects through ’s Standard Research Grants program. 91ŃÇÉ« also received over $560,000 to support 17 projects funded through the:

• Research Development Initiatives competition
• Image, Text, Sound and Technology competition
• International Opportunities Fund
• Aid to Research Workshop competition

Graduate students and doctoral fellows also benefited from the announcements: 148 91ŃÇÉ« master’s and doctoral students have won over $5 million in scholarships and fellowships. More than 2,000 graduate and postdoctoral projects across Canada received funding.

Reflecting knowledge mobilization’s status as a core SSHRC priority, the competition also included special calls for Public Outreach Grants that support existing and ongoing projects that mobilize research results to a range of audiences beyond academia. Nine 91ŃÇÉ« projects were funded, securing over $1 million for the University.

In this category, 91ŃÇÉ« researchers enjoyed a 67 per cent success rate; in comparison, 2009 SSHRC applicants averaged a success rate of 33 per cent across all categories.

Through the Public Outreach Grants, 91ŃÇÉ« researchers will:

• Make literary research available to a broader community of researchers, students, teachers and educators, and policy makers in a sustainable way through the (ORION).
• Empower young mothers by exploring what they need to achieve economic, social, familial and personal wellness and prosperity.
• Share research conducted with marginalized youth with educators, community organizations and other stakeholders to help them understand the alienation and disengagement new migrants and ethno-racial minority youth experience as their families move from Toronto’s inner city and inner-suburban neighbourhoods to the outer suburbs, such as Peel, Brampton, Vaughan, Markham, Ajax and Pickering.
• Enhance microcredit program success for economic development through social performance ratings by making the information accessible and designing program evaluation instruments.
• Share new scholarship on the immigration of African American refugees from slavery to Canada with educators, community groups, libraries and government agencies, among others.
• Mobilize knowledge on the political economy of women’s rights—specifically, connections among macroeconomic policy, public policies that impact the paid and unpaid work of women, and women’s access to human rights—to local human rights organizations that focus on women.
• Provide experts in performance making, theatre design and green technology with a three-day opportunity to share practices, approaches and technological innovations.
• Mobilize the Aboriginal peoples of Canada’s disparate experiences with and knowledge of conservation by bringing together Aboriginal community representatives, academics, policy-makers, and conservation practitioners.
• Inform climate change policy and practice by making climate change research and evidence available to policy partners in four GTA municipalities (, , and ), and the .

“These awards also build upon 91ŃÇɫ’s amazing success earlier this year in SSHRC’s large-scale collaborative competitions,” said Shapson. “91ŃÇÉ« received $6 million through SSHRC’s Major Collaborative Research Initiatives (MCRI) and Community-University Research Alliances (CURA) programs. Professors Roger Keil, Pat Armstrong and Carla Lipsig-Mumme are already collaborating with their international research teams to study global suburbanisms, long-term residential healthcare, and work in a warming world.”

“Their work, coupled with the projects funded through this announcement, addresses key social issues facing Canadian society while demonstrating our leadership in creating and sharing new knowledge across the social sciences and humanities.”

“Our government continues to invest in world-class research to improve Canadians’ quality of life and increase the supply of highly qualified graduates that Canada needs to be successful,” said the Honourable Tony Clement, Minister of Industry. “The social sciences and humanities show us how to harness and interpret innovation from a human perspective, which translates into benefits for society.”

has posted a complete list of funded projects on their website.

By Elizabeth Monier-Williams, research communications officer.

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