Below the Radar

On this episode of Below the Radar, our host Am Johal sits down with John Walker, an award-winning Canadian filmmaker widely known for his documentary films, such as Québec My Country Mon Pays (2016) and Arctic Defenders (2013). He is also one of the co-founders of the Documentary Organization of Canada. In this conversation, John talks about his latest film, Assholes: A Theory. The film is based on the work of Aaron James, author of a book of the same name. Together, they investigate “asshole culture”, and the conditions of our contemporary culture that allows assholes to thrive.

Full episode details: https://www.sfu.ca/vancity-office-community-engagement/below-the-radar-podcast/episodes/40-john-walker.html

Read the transcript: https://www.sfu.ca/vancity-office-community-engagement/below-the-radar-podcast/transcripts/40-john-walker.html

Here you can find upcoming screenings of Assholes: A Theory:

https://www.assholesatheory.com/upcoming-screenings/

And here is the link to the film on the National FIlm Board of Canada:

https://www.nfb.ca/film/assholes-a-theory/

Bio:

John Walker is one of Canada’s most well-known documentary filmmakers. His films are personal, lyrical and express a deep understanding of the human condition. He has received over 60 Canadian and international nominations and awards. In 2018, he was honoured with a Hot Docs Festival Retrospective.

Cite this episode:

Chicago Style

Johal, Am. “Investigating Asshole Culture — with John Walker.” Below the Radar, SFU’s Vancity Office of Community Engagement. Podcast audio, March 3, 2020. https://www.sfu.ca/vancity-office-community-engagement/below-the-radar-podcast/episodes/40-john-walker.html.

On this episode of Below the Radar, our host Am Johal sits down with Svitlana Matviyenko, an Assistant Professor of Critical Media Analysis at SFU’s School of Communication. Her work and research focuses around topics such as political economy of information, digital militarism, social and mobile media, infrastructure studies, history of science, cybernetics and psychoanalysis. In this conversation, Svitlana talks about digital militarism on a global scale, the impacts of cyberwar on users today, and what is in store for the future of cyberwar.

Full episode details: https://www.sfu.ca/vancity-office-community-engagement/below-the-radar-podcast/episodes/39-svitlana-matviyenko.html

Read the transcript: https://www.sfu.ca/vancity-office-community-engagement/below-the-radar-podcast/transcripts/39-svitlana-matviyenko.html

Svitlana Matviyenko is the co-author of "Cyber-War and Revolution: Digital Subterfuge in Global Capitalism," which was awarded the 2019 STAIR Book Award. Learn more about the book here:

https://www.upress.umn.edu/book-division/books/cyberwar-and-revolution

You can find out more about the award here: https://www.isanet.org/Programs/Awards/STAIR-Book-Award

And you can read more about Svitlana's teaching:

http://www.sfu.ca/communication/team/faculty/svitlana-matviyenko.html

Bio:

Svitlana Matviyenko is an Assistant Professor of Critical Media Analysis in the School of Communication of Simon Fraser University.

Her research and teaching are focused on political economy of information, digital militarism, social and mobile media, infrastructure studies, history of science, cybernetics and psychoanalysis. She writes about the networking drive and user complicity; practices of resistance and mobilization; legacies of the Soviet techno-politics, including the Chernobyl catastrophe; information and cyberwar. Her publications include two co-edited collections, with Paul D. Miller, The Imaginary App (MIT, 2014) and, with Judith Roof, Lacan and the Posthuman (Palgrave Macmillan, 2018). With Nick Dyer-Witheford, she is a co-author of Cyberwar and Revolution (Minnesota UP, 2019).

Cite this episode:

Chicago Style

Johal, Am. “Cyberwar and Revolution — with Svitlana Matviyenko.” Below the Radar, SFU’s Vancity Office of Community Engagement. Podcast audio, February 18, 2020. https://www.sfu.ca/vancity-office-community-engagement/below-the-radar-podcast/episodes/39-svitlana-matviyenko.html.

On this episode of Below the Radar, Am Johal sits down with Ebony Magnus, the head of the Belzberg Library at SFU Vancouver. Ebony came into the role during SFU Vancouver’s 30th Anniversary and has a focus on community involvement for this branch, both within the university and with the wider community. Together, they discuss some core questions related to libraries, including equal access to technologies, value distinctions between different types of archives, and continued community engagement.

Full episode details: https://www.sfu.ca/vancity-office-community-engagement/below-the-radar-podcast/episodes/38-ebony-magnus.html

Read the transcript: https://www.sfu.ca/vancity-office-community-engagement/below-the-radar-podcast/transcripts/38-ebony-magnus.html

To read more about Ebony, check out our website for her bio: https://www.sfu.ca/sfuwoodwards/community-engagement/Below-the-Radar.html

To learn more about the Belzberg Library and the other SFU library branches, as well as the different events and programming that goes on, you can visit their website: https://www.lib.sfu.ca/

Bio:

Ebony Magnus is Head of the Samuel and Frances Belzberg Library at Simon Fraser University's Vancouver campus.

Prior to joining SFU, she worked as an assessment & user experience librarian at Southern Alberta Institute of Technology in Calgary, AB and at Michigan State University in East Lansing, MI. She holds a Masters of Library and Information Science (University of British Columbia, 2013) and a Master of Arts in English Literature (Carleton University, 2009) with a specialization in Caribbean diasporic literature. Her current area of research is critical library assessment, exploring intersections of power and positionality in library assessment and considering how assessment practitioners can incorporate feminist ideology, indigenous research methods, and critical data studies to challenge the status quo and achieve more just and equitable practice. She tweets infrequently @ebonymagnus.

Cite this episode:

Chicago Style

Johal, Am. “Connecting Communities and Libraries — with Ebony Magnus.” Below the Radar, SFU’s Vancity Office of Community Engagement. Podcast audio, February 4, 2020. https://www.sfu.ca/vancity-office-community-engagement/below-the-radar-podcast/episodes/38-ebony-magnus.html.

Glen Coulthard is Yellowknives Dene and is an associate professor in the First Nations and Indigenous Studies Program and the Department of Political Science at the University of British Columbia. He is also the author of the acclaimed book Red Skin, White Masks: Rejecting the Colonial Politics of Recognition from University of Minnesota Press. On this special episode live from the Vancouver Podcast Festival, host Am Johal sits down with Glen to talk about who and what influences his work and research, the different projects he’s been involved in over the years, and what continues to inspire him to do the work he does.

Full episode details: https://www.sfu.ca/vancity-office-community-engagement/below-the-radar-podcast/episodes/37-glen-coulthard.html

Read the transcript: https://www.sfu.ca/vancity-office-community-engagement/below-the-radar-podcast/transcripts/37-glen-coulthard.html

Read more about Red Skin, White Masks: Rejecting the Colonial Politics of Recognition here: www.upress.umn.edu/book-division/b…kin-white-masks

Read more about The Fourth World here: www.upress.umn.edu/book-division/b…he-fourth-world

You can read more about Glen Coulthard on our blog post: http://sfuwce.org/glen-coulthard/

This episode was recorded live at the 2019 Vancouver Podcast Festival, and we’re grateful to them for their invitation to be part of their programming at the Vancouver Public Library. To learn more about the Vancouver Podcast Festival, please visit their website: www.vanpodfest.ca/

Bio:

Glen Coulthard is Yellowknives Dene and an associate professor in the First Nations and Indigenous Studies Program and the Departments of Political Science at the University of British Columbia.

He is the author of Red Skin, White Masks: Rejecting the Colonial Politics of Recognition (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2014), winner of the 2016 Caribbean Philosophical Association’s Frantz Fanon Award for Outstanding Book, the Canadian Political Science Association’s CB Macpherson Award for Best Book in Political Theory, published in English or French, in 2014/2015, and the Rik Davidson Studies in Political Economy Award for Best Book in 2016. He is also a co-founder of Dechinta Centre for Research and Learning, a decolonial, Indigenous land-based post-secondary program operating on his traditional territories in Denendeh(Northwest Territories).

Cite this episode:

Chicago Style

Johal, Am. “Rejecting the Colonial Politics of Recognition — with Glen Coulthard.” Below the Radar, SFU’s Vancity Office of Community Engagement. Podcast audio, January 21, 2020. https://www.sfu.ca/vancity-office-community-engagement/below-the-radar-podcast/episodes/37-glen-coulthard.html.

In Vancouver, discussions surrounding arts and culture are imperative, especially in relation to continued efforts towards decolonization. Indigenous Arts and Culture Planner for the City of Vancouver Kamala Todd tackles this topic with her work, including her contributions to the new cultural plan: Culture | Shift: Blanketing the city in arts and culture. Kamala previously worked as the Aboriginal Social Planner with the City of Vancouver, and continues her work as a cultural advisor and filmmaker. In this episode, Kamala shares what steps the city has taken, and what more needs to be done, to combat the ever-present consequences of colonization.

To learn more about the Culture | Shift: Blanketing the city in arts and culture plan on their website:

https://vancouver.ca/parks-recreation-culture/culture-shift.aspx

Full episode details: https://www.sfu.ca/vancity-office-community-engagement/below-the-radar-podcast/episodes/36-kamala-todd.html

Read the transcript: https://www.sfu.ca/vancity-office-community-engagement/below-the-radar-podcast/transcripts/36-kamala-todd.html

Bio:

Kamala Todd is a Metis-Cree mother, community planner, filmmaker, curator, and educator born and raised in the beautiful lands of the hən̓q̓əmin̓əm̓ and Skwxwú7mesh-speaking people, AKA Vancouver. She has a Masters degree in Geography (UBC) and is the City of Vancouver’s first Indigenous Arts and Culture Planner. Kamala’s film credits include Indigenous Plant Diva, Cedar and Bamboo, RELAW: Living Indigenous Laws, and Sharing our Stories: the Vancouver Dialogues Project. She is the author of “This Many-storied Land”, in In This Together: Fifteen Stories of Truth and Reconciliation (2016), and Truth-Telling: Indigenous perspectives on working with Municipal Governments (2017) for Vancouver Park Board.

Cite this episode:

Chicago Style

Johal, Am. “Blanketing the City in Arts and Culture — with Kamala Todd.” Below the Radar, SFU’s Vancity Office of Community Engagement. Podcast audio, January 7, 2020. https://www.sfu.ca/vancity-office-community-engagement/below-the-radar-podcast/episodes/36-kamala-todd.html.

When it comes to making decisions about how things happen in our cities, who has the power to make those decisions? Tiffany Muller Myrdahl, a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Gender, Sexuality, and Women’s Studies and the Urban Studies Program, asks this question along with a host of others in her work and research. From her work with Women Transforming Cities to teaching in the classroom, Tiffany spends a lot of time navigating the inequalities that exist and looking for ways to make spaces and cities more inclusive, particularly for LGBTQ2S people and women. In this episode, Am and Tiffany talk about why this work is necessary and the ways in which Tiffany challenges her students who do this work as well.

You can learn more about Women in Cities International, where Tiffany is a board member, by checking out https://femmesetvilles.org/.

Additionally, you can read and download the Metropolis report, "Safety and Public Space: Mapping Metropolitan Gender Policies", here: https://www.metropolis.org/sites/default/files/resources/Mapping_metropolitan_gender_policies_0.pdf

Full episode details: https://www.sfu.ca/vancity-office-community-engagement/below-the-radar-podcast/episodes/35-tiffany-muller-myrdahl.html

Read the transcript: https://www.sfu.ca/vancity-office-community-engagement/below-the-radar-podcast/transcripts/35-tiffany-muller-myrdahl.html

Bio:

Tiffany Muller Myrdahl is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Gender, Sexuality, and Women’s Studies and the Urban Studies Program at Simon Fraser University on unceded Skwxwú7mesh Úxwumixw, Tsleil-Waututh (səl̓ilwətaɁɬ), xʷməθkʷəy̓əm territory, Vancouver, Canada. She completed a master’s in public policy, followed by a doctorate in geography with a certificate in feminist studies from the University of Minnesota. Her research examines urban inequalities and inclusion strategies, especially those targeting LGBTQ2S people and women. She serves on the board of Women in Cities International, a Montreal-based NGO focused on enabling all self-identified women and girls to lead in the creation of safe, inclusive, and equitable cities and communities.

Cite this episode:

Chicago Style

Johal, Am. “Making Our Cities More Inclusive — with Tiffany Muller Myrdahl.” Below the Radar, SFU’s Vancity Office of Community Engagement. Podcast audio, December 17, 2019. https://www.sfu.ca/vancity-office-community-engagement/below-the-radar-podcast/episodes/35-tiffany-muller-myrdahl.html.

The question of ethics should always be front and centre when it comes to doing research of any kind. For Scott Neufeld and Nicolas Crier, they aim to take this question even further. In collaboration with other folks in the Downtown Eastside and Hives for Humanity, they co-authored Research 101: A Manifesto for Ethical Research in the Downtown Eastside to help facilitate a wider conversation on ethics in cultural production, such as research, media, and artmaking. On this episode of Below the Radar, host Am Johal talks to Scott and Nicolas about how this project came to be, the profound impact it has had for the community, and what’s at stake for ethical research in the Downtown Eastside.

You can access a digital copy of Research 101: A Manifesto for Ethical Research in the Downtown Eastside here: http://bit.ly/R101Manifesto

You can read more about the processes of developing the manifesto on our blog: http://sfuwce.org/empowering-informed-consent-community-ethics-in-cultural-production/

Full episode details: https://www.sfu.ca/vancity-office-community-engagement/below-the-radar-podcast/episodes/34-scott-neufeld-nicolas-crier.html

Read the transcript: https://www.sfu.ca/vancity-office-community-engagement/below-the-radar-podcast/transcripts/34-scott-neufeld-nicolas-crier.html

Bio:

Scott Neufeld is a white settler who grew up on the unceded territory of the Kwantlen people (Langley, BC) and now lives and works in East Vancouver on the unceded territories of the Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh peoples. He is a husband and father to two beautiful little boys and feels so privileged to be involved in the Community Ethics in Cultural Production project with folks in the Downtown Eastside. He has an MA in Social Psychology from Simon Fraser University (SFU) and is currently completing a PhD in Social Psychology at SFU and the BC Centre on Substance Use, with a focus on representations of people who use drugs in anti-stigma campaigns. Scott’s work has been published in the Journal of Theoretical and Philosophical Psychology, Political Psychology, the Journal of Social Issues and the Journal of Social and Political Psychology. Other research interests include social identity theory, social representations, collective resistance, NIMBYism, and decolonization.

Nicolas Crier is an adoptee of Cree heritage. At 40 years old, he has spent approximately half his life surviving in the streets and more than a decade in the Downtown Eastside. It never occurred to him that being a drug user would ever be useful, but he has parlayed his street smarts and community connections into a successful career in a variety of peer capacities: overdose response and rescue, outreach worker, freelance writer, actor, coordinator and facilitator for the Speakers Bureau at Megaphone Magazine, and he also sits as Secretary on the Executive Board of Directors for Pivot Legal Society and the advisory committee of the UBC Transformative Health and Justice Research cluster, and is a co-author of Research 101/A Mainfesto for Ethical Research in the DTES and proud and grateful to play a small role in the up and coming Downtown Eastside Community Research Ethics Workshop, a community effort to bring one word to the People: reciprocity.

Cite this episode:

Chicago Style

Johal, Am. “An Ethical Approach to Research — with Scott Neufeld and Nicolas Crier.” Below the Radar, SFU’s Vancity Office of Community Engagement. Podcast audio, December 10, 2019. https://www.sfu.ca/vancity-office-community-engagement/below-the-radar-podcast/episodes/34-scott-neufeld-nicolas-crier.html.

How well do you know the local music scene in Vancouver? On this episode of Below the Radar, we sit down with Jarrett Martineau, a figure who is very well acquainted with the music scene both locally and abroad. On a local level, Jarrett works as the Music Planner for the City of Vancouver, where he works hard to support the Vancouver music scene and all aspects within that. He is also the host of Reclaimed, which is a weekly series on CBC Music that explores the many worlds of contemporary Indigenous music. In this conversation, we talk to Jarrett about how affordability affects available venues, the diverse array of music being created within the city, and the power of providing the platform of radio to early career musicians.

To learn more about CBC’s Reclaimed, you can visit their website here: https://www.cbc.ca/mediacentre/program/reclaimed. You can also learn more about the Culture|Shift Plan for the City of Vancouver here: https://vancouver.ca/parks-recreation-culture/culture-shift.aspx.

Back in October, we collaborated with Jarrett on an events at SFU Woodward’s called “Songs of the Land: Tracing Global Pathways in Indigenous Music”. You can listen to the audio for that talk here: https://soundcloud.com/sfu_voce/songs-of-the-land

Full episode details: https://www.sfu.ca/vancity-office-community-engagement/below-the-radar-podcast/episodes/33-jarrett-martineau.html

Read the transcript: https://www.sfu.ca/vancity-office-community-engagement/below-the-radar-podcast/transcripts/33-jarrett-martineau.html

Bio:

Jarrett Martineau is a leading voice in Indigenous media and cultural production. He works extensively at the intersections of music art, media, technology, and social movements and holds an M.A. and a Ph.D. in Indigenous Governance from the University of Victoria. He has been a Fulbright Visiting Scholar at Columbia University and CUNY's Center for Place, Culture and Politics in New York and his academic research explores the role of art and creativity in advancing Indigenous resurgence and decolonization. Jarrett is the co-founder and Creative Producer of Revolutions Per Minute, a global new music platform, record label, and artist collective for contemporary Indigenous music; and the host and producer of Reclaimed, a weekly series on CBC Music that explores the sounds of the Indigenous Next Wave. Prior to hosting Reclaimed, Jarrett produced the documentary series RISE for VICELAND; hosted the CBC's Emmy-nominated cross-platform television series ZeD, for which he received a Leo Award nomination; and served as host and producer of Brave New Waves, an acclaimed late night music series on CBC Radio. He also co-founded the New Forms Festival, an annual contemporary art and music festival held in Vancouver. His scholarly research and writing examine Indigenous art, music, and media as emergent forms of political communication. By exploring how Indigenous resistances to colonialism and neoliberal capitalism have changed under globalization, Jarrett's research pursues new pathways in Indigenous resurgence through the creative arts.

Jarrett has worked with CBC Radio and Television, VICE Media, MTV World, NowPublic, Make Believe Media, Elastic Entertainment, and other media, to produce award-winning content for a global audience across all media (web, mobile, TV, and radio). He is nêhiyaw (Plains Cree) and Dene Suline from Frog Lake First Nation in Alberta.

Cite this episode:

Chicago Style

Johal, Am. “Music in the City — with Jarrett Martineau.” Below the Radar, SFU’s Vancity Office of Community Engagement. Podcast audio, December 3, 2019. https://www.sfu.ca/vancity-office-community-engagement/below-the-radar-podcast/episodes/33-jarrett-martineau.html.

When it comes to understanding the world around us, we can look and observe change with our eyes. But what about using our ears to listen to the ways in which our environments change? This is the type of work that Milena Droumeva and Brett Ashleigh do. Milena is an assistant professor of sound studies and Brett is a PhD student. Both of them work and research at SFU’s School of Communication, which is quite world famous in the areas of sound studies and soundscape research thanks to the work of R. Murray Schafer, Barry Truax and others. In this episode, Am Johal sits down with Milena and Brett to talk about how listening can offer a unique insight into the ongoing change around us that we might miss if we don’t take the time to do it.

You can learn more about the Sonic Research Studio and all the work that they do by checking out their website: https://www.sfu.ca/sonic-studio.html.

Watch Milena's TEDxSFU talk, "Sounding out Sexism in Video Games", here: https://www.ted.com/talks/milena_droumeva_sounding_out_sexism_in_video_games

Full episode details: https://www.sfu.ca/vancity-office-community-engagement/below-the-radar-podcast/episodes/32-milena-droumeva-brett-ashleigh.html

Read the transcript: https://www.sfu.ca/vancity-office-community-engagement/below-the-radar-podcast/transcripts/32-milena-droumeva-brett-ashleigh.html

Bio:

Milena Droumeva is an Assistant Professor and the Glenfraser Endowed Professor in Sound Studies at Simon Fraser University specializing in mobile media, sound studies, gender, and sensory ethnography. Milena has worked extensively in educational research on game-based learning and computational literacy, formerly as a post-doctoral fellow at the Institute for Research on Digital Learning at York University. Milena has a background in acoustic ecology and works across the fields of urban soundscape research, sonification for public engagement, as well as gender and sound in video games. Current research projects include sound ethnographies of the city (livable soundscapes), mobile curation, critical soundmapping, and sensory ethnography. Check out Milena's Story Map, "Soundscapes of Productivity" about coffee shop soundscapes as the office ambience of the creative economy freelance workers. Milena is a former board member of the International Community on Auditory Displays, an alumni of the Institute for Research on Digital Learning at York University, and former Research Think-Tank and Academic Advisor in learning innovation for the social enterprise InWithForward. More recently, Milena serves on the board for the Hush City Mobile Project founded by Dr. Antonella Radicchi, as well as WISWOS, founded by Dr. Linda O Keeffe.

Brett Ashleigh is a PhD student at SFU’s Department of Communication. Her research focuses on sex and gender inequity, and proposes feminist interventions through sound design, auto ethnography, and narrative methods.

Cite this episode:

Chicago Style

Johal, Am. “Listening to the World Around Us — with Milena Droumeva and Brett Ashleigh.” Below the Radar, SFU’s Vancity Office of Community Engagement. Podcast audio, November 26, 2019. https://www.sfu.ca/vancity-office-community-engagement/below-the-radar-podcast/episodes/32-milena-droumeva-brett-ashleigh.html.

In August of 2019, The Binners' Project faced a new change. After 5 years, co-founder Anna Godefroy stepped back and The Binners' Project welcomed Landon Hoyt as their new director. As a follow up to one of the first episodes of Below the Radar, we welcomed Anna back to the studio for a conversation with Landon and our host, Am Johal. Together, we talk about the ways in which The Binners' Project helped to provide economic opportunities and reduce the stigma of waste-pickers, and what's next for the group.

To learn more about The Binners’ Project, you can check out their website at https://www.binnersproject.org. You can also take a listen to our previous interview with The Binners’ Project at https://soundcloud.com/sfu_voce/btr-episode-6-binners-project?in=sfu_voce/sets/below-the-radar

Full episode details: https://www.sfu.ca/vancity-office-community-engagement/below-the-radar-podcast/episodes/31-landon-hoyt-anna-godefroy.html

Read the transcript: https://www.sfu.ca/vancity-office-community-engagement/below-the-radar-podcast/transcripts/31-landon-hoyt-anna-godefroy.html

Bio:

Landon Hoyt moved to Vancouver in 2011 to complete his masters in Urban Studies at Simon Fraser University. Since then, he has worked in Community Engagement with the SFU Sustainability Office and SFU Public Square, and also served as Executive Director of Hastings Crossing Business Improvement Association. ​Landon is passionate about bringing those with lived experience into conversations and actions toward making our city a better place for all. He joined the Binners' Project in August 2019 and is excited to return to the work of supporting local economic development and social inclusion.

Cite this episode:

Chicago Style

Johal, Am. “The Future of the Binners' Project — with Landon Hoyt and Anna Godefroy.” Below the Radar, SFU’s Vancity Office of Community Engagement. Podcast audio, November 19, 2019. https://www.sfu.ca/vancity-office-community-engagement/below-the-radar-podcast/episodes/31-landon-hoyt-anna-godefroy.html.