No. 515 - February 21, 2024

  • Coming Events:

    - FIMSWrites - Winter Edition
    - Instapoetics, Poetic Expression and Screen Capitalism
    - Knowledge Translation: Theories and Practices
    - Disposable People: Data cleaning and power in AI ethics
    - Save the Date: The Nest - with Julietta Singh and Chase Joynt
    - Save the Date: Settler Colonial Ways of Seeing
    - Save the Date: Reporting in a house of mirrors

  • Important Dates:

    - Monday, February 19 - Friday, February 23, 2024 - Reading Week (Undergraduate) and MLIS Research Week

  • News & Announcements:

    - MLIS LD Anticipated Appointments for Summer 2024 posted
    - Black History Month - Black Excellence Events

  • Awards & Accomplishments:

    - Miles Bolton
    - Dan Brown (with Hannah Alper, Jessica Counti, Alex McComb and Kai Wilson)
    - Estella Ren
    - Sophia Schiefler

    Publications & Presentations:

    - Yeliz Baloglu
    - Vicky Chung
    - Sarah Sharpe
    - Luke Stark

  • In the Media:

    - Alissa Centivany
    - Susan Knabe
    - Serena Marotta (MMJC'21)
    - Melanie Mills
    - Amara Pope

  • Additional Activities of Note:

    - Dugald Maudsley (MA'86, Journalism)
    - Mark Rayner
    - Screening of La Montaña: Zapatistas' Diplomacies (Sarah Smith)

  • News from the FIMS Graduate Library:

    - Reading Week Hours

  • Next Issue:


Coming Events


FIMSWrites - Winter Edition
Every Wednesday
9:00 a.m. - 12:00 p.m.
Check your Western email for the Zoom link (or contact Pam McKenzie).
Do you expect to have assignment, story, article, report, thesis, and/or book writing deadlines coming up this term? Does having other people writing around you help keep you on-task? Then join us for FIMSWrites, an informal initiative to provide some solidarity in the sometimes-solitary writing process. What it is: a group of people sitting silently together working on their individual writing projects for 25-minute Pomodoro sessions, with short breaks between and a longer mid-morning coffee, snack, and socializing break (virtual fika). What it's not: a writing tutorial or workshop. Open to FIMS faculty and grad students who have writing to work on.

Instapoetics, Poetic Expression and Screen-Capitalism
Wednesday, February 28, 2024
12:00 p.m. - 1:20 p.m.
Attend in person: FNB 4130
Attend online: Register for Zoom link
Presented by Assistant Professor Warren Steele and Media Studies PhD candidate Zak Bronson.
Abstract: Instapoetry is a mode of online poetic expression that combines verse and visual imagery, often in the form of hand-drawn pictures or moody black and white photographs. It also tends to be short, inspirational, and relatable to optimize shareability on Instagram. Some Instapoets have parlayed their work into viable careers. Others, like Rupi Kaur for example, have achieved pop stardom (continue reading).

Knowledge Translation: Theories and Practices
Thursday, February 29, 2024
4:30 p.m.
Attend in person: FNB 4110
Attend virtually: Zoom link TBA
Presented by Jack Kausch, LIS PhD candidate, as part of the Mediations Lecture Series.
Abstract: How can we practice interdisciplinarity in Library and Information Science? Knowledge Translation is an important field in the Health Sciences as it is concerned with translating research into practice and informing patients and clinicians about important new findings in laboratories. This paper presents a new model for domain analytic research for the field of Knowledge Organization (KO), drawing on theoretical frameworks from Translation Studies and Knowledge Translation in Health Information Science to model translational action (continue reading).

Disposable People: Data cleaning and power in AI ethics
Thursday, March 7, 2024
4:30 p.m.
Attend in person: FNB 4110
Attend virtually: Zoom link TBA
Presented by Pinar Barlas, LIS PhD candidate, as part of the Mediations Lecture Series.
Abstract: From employment discrimination to wrongful arrests, many Artificial Intelligence (AI) applications have been found to produce harmful results. These harms affect marginalized groups – such as Black and other non-White people, people with disabilities, and non-men – more frequently and more intensely, in line with existing systematic injustices in society. In order to minimize or counteract these negative effects, researchers have been investigating the results of deployed systems as well as the datasets used to train them (continue reading).

Save the Date: The Nest - with Julietta Singh and Chase Joynt
Friday, March 8, 2024
10:30 a.m. - 12:00 p.m.
FNB 4110
Presented by Julietta Singh, decolonial scholar and author, and Chase Joynt, FIMS Asper Fellow. Light refreshments at 10:30 a.m. followed by the talk.
Abstract: In this talk, Chase Joynt and Julietta Singh explore the practice of collaboration, the complexities of archival research, and the work of fabulation through their feature-length experimental documentary, The Nest. The film centers on radical women, interracial alliances, and anticolonial pasts across 140 years of Canadian history told through the story of a single house in Winnipeg, Manitoba. The documentary, currently in post-production with the National Film Board of Canada, looks to architecture as a portal through which to tell unexpected and interconnected histories of Indigenous uprising, ecopolitical activism, disability rights, and the racialization of a nation (continue reading).

Save the Date: Settler Colonial Ways of Seeing
Tuesday, March 12, 2024
Time TBA
Location TBA
Presented by Danielle Taschereau Mamers, author of Settler Colonial Ways of Seeing: Documentation, Administration and the Interventions of Indigenous Art, and PhD'17 (Media Studies).
Abstract: How are documents good for thinking about settler colonial policies? And how can art help us look at documents and the policies they bring into being? For many decades, Canadian state agents have used paperwork to materialize the category of Indian status. From the text of the Indian Act to registration forms, status cards, and reports, administrative documents have been tools that the state has used to make visible—and invisible—Indigenous peoples (continue reading).

Save the Date: Reporting in a house of mirrors
12:00 p.m. - 1:30 p.m.
Attend in person: FNB 4130
Attend virtually: Zoom link TBA
Presented by Justin Ling, Montreal-based investigative journalist and author. Refreshments will be served.
Description: These days, it feels like we don't even know what we're arguing about anymore. Our society has been riven by political polarization, paranoid populism, even extremism, brought on by a deluge of misinformation, disinformation, and conspiracy theories. Our collective conversation has been warped, skewed, stretched, and shrunk beyond recognition, making it harder and harder to see what's right in front of our faces. Journalists have rushed around, trying to correct all the distortion — often to little avail. Our body politic has suffered as a result, with crises and critical policy questions being ignored in favour of ideological crusades and small grievances made to look massive (continue reading).
 


Important Dates

- Monday, February 19 - Friday, February 23, 2024 - Reading Week (Undergraduate) and MLIS Research Week


News & Announcements


MLIS LD Anticipated Appointments for Summer 2024 posted
FIMS invites applicants to the MLIS anticipated appointments listed for the Summer 2024 term. Postings will close on March 2, 2024. See the full list online.

Black History Month - Black Excellence Events
Join others at Western as they listen, learn and discuss the legacies of Black People in Canada and around the world. For a full listing of events, visit the 2024 events page.


Awards & Accomplishments


Miles Bolton, BA'23 (MIT), was nominated for John H. McDonald (JHM) awards for both featuring writing and sports writing he produced as a reporter for the Western Gazette in 2023. The winners were announced in Edmonton at NASH 86 on February 17.

Dan Brown, FIMS lecturer and current Editorial Support Manager for the Western Gazette, is part of a team from the paper nominated for 10 separate John H. McDonald (JHM) student journalism awards, to be presented in Edmonton at NASH 86 on February 17. The Gazette received more nominations than any other student publication in Canada. FIMS students who were members of the Western Gazette team in 2023 include Hannah Alper, Miles Bolton, Jessica Counti, Alex McComb, Estella Ren, Sophia Schiefler and Kai Wilson.

Estella Ren, current MIT/BMOS student and editor-in-chief of the Western Gazette, was nominated for a John H. McDonald (JHM) award for investigative journalism produced in 2023. The winners were announced in Edmonton at NASH 86 on February 17.

Sophia Schiefler, BA'23 (MIT), was nominated for John H. McDonald (JHM) award for news reporting she produced as a reporter for the Western Gazette in 2023. The winners were announced in Edmonton at NASH 86 on February 17.


Publications & Presentations


MLIS students, Yeliz Baloglu Cengay, Vicky Chung & Sarah Sharpe, from the ELIP journal's managing editors team shared their experience with other student-run journal editors at the Student Journal Forum 2024, on February, 20th with their presentation titled "More than a Makeover: Reviving ELIP Journal as a completely student-run journal."

Assistant Professor Luke Stark participated in and presented at the 2024 UK-Canada Frontiers of Science Meeting on Artificial Intelligence in Ottawa last week, co-organized by the Royal Society of the UK and the Royal Society of Canada.


In the Media


Assistant Professor Alissa Centivany had the following media appearances:

February 7, 2024: Appeared as a guest on Mike Smyth, CKNW AM-980 Talk Radio Vancouver for a segment titled, "Consequences of Bill 44, BC United CRASHING in the polls, & the rise of the 'Right-to-Repair' movement."

February 14, 2024: Appeared on CBC Afternoon Drive to discuss the rideshare/delivery strike by uber and lyft workers in a segment titled "Rideshare and delivery drivers on strike."

February 14, 2024: quoted in Reuters article titled "Uber, Lyft drivers strike across US, demanding fairer pay."

Susan Knabe, Associate Dean, Undergraduate, was quoted in an article titled "Behind the Screens: What 650 syllabi show about Western's ChatGPT response," published in the Gazette on February 14, 2024.

Serena Marotta, MMJC'21, is featured in a London Free Press article titled "Film reveals link between two missing city women," published on February 20. Serena is the writer, director and producer for a new documentary airing on Paramount+. 

FIMS Library Director Melanie Mills was quoted for an article titled, "These books were challenged at Ottawa's libraries last year," published by CBC News on February 10.

Amara Pope, PhD'23, Media Studies, was interviewed for a profile piece titled, "Dr. Amara Pope - Five Questions With," published by Canadian Beats on January 26.


Additional Activities of Note


Dugald Maudsley, MA'86 (Journalism) wrote and produced a new documentary mini-series called The Secret World of Sound, which premiered on CBC's The Nature of Things on February 15. It's a co-production with Humble Bee Films in the UK and in association with Netflix and Sky TV. Dugald is an award-winning filmmaker who has produced many documentaries through his company Infield Fly Productions.

Mark Rayner, FIMS lecturer, finished up a second season of Re-Creative, an arts podcast he co-hosts with CBC alum, Joe Mahoney. Guests this season included: Terry Fallis, Saul Rubinek, Robert Charles Wilson, David Brin, Robert Sawyer, and FIMS personalities, Jeff Preston and Mark Kearney, among many others. You can find the whole season here: https://re-creative.ca/episodes/ 

Associate Professor Sarah Smith's Practitioner Media Lab is collaborating with the Cultural Studies Program and the Department of Film & Media at Queen's University, as well as the North American Cultural Diplomacy Initiative, to host a screening titled La Montaña: Zapatistas' Diplomacies. This event will take place in Kingston on Feb. 27 and feature a discussion with the director of La Montaña, Diego Enrique Osorno. Professor Smith will be introducing the film, which was released in 2023. The event invitation is available online.


News from the FIMS Graduate Library


Reading Week Hours

Tuesday, February 20th – Friday, February 23rd
(10am - 4pm)
Saturday, February 24th – Sunday, February 25th
(CLOSED)

*Regular hours for the Winter 2024 term resume on Monday, February 26th, 2024.


Next Issue


The FIMS Bulletin is your source for news, announcements, and events pertaining to FIMS graduate programs. Submissions from the FIMS community are always welcome and may be sent via e-mail to fims-communications@uwo.ca .

The next issue of the FIMS Bulletin will be published on March 6, 2024. The deadline to submit content is Tuesday, March 5 at noon.