The Provost and Vice-President Academic, UBC Okanagan invites you to a talk
You’re not crazy, you’re not wrong:
HEARING EXPERIENCES OF PEOPLE OF COLOUR IN THE UNIVERSITY
Professor Anthony Stewart
John P. Crozer Chair of English Literature, Bucknell University, Pennsylvania, USA
Date: September 17, 2020
Time: 1:00 – 2:30 pm Vancouver time | 4:00 – 5:30 EST
Format: Webinar; the talk will be followed by a discussion and Q&A moderated by Minelle Mahtani, Senior Advisor to the Provost on Racialized Faculty, UBC Vancouver
Cost: Free
Abstract
The conventional image of the university is of a place that promises an environment where open-minded people exchange ideas freely, for the benefit of all parties equally. And for some, that is the experience of a university campus. But for others—specifically students, faculty, and staff of colour—the campus is a contradictory space, where tolerance is promised but not always delivered, and where the ugly realities of everyday non-campus life are also a significant part of the university experience. As the populations on university campuses change, if slowly, it becomes more and more important that everyone on campus come to understand how this place feels when it does not live up to its lofty aspirations.
“As a Black Canadian, the Canada that I have come to see is different from the idealized Canada of Tim Hortons commercials, Hockey Night in Canada and countless other imaginings. It’s a Canada that takes credit for a level of open-mindedness that far exceeds its reality. It’s a Canada that distinguishes itself for its population of citizens who passively lay claim to welcoming difference while staying silent when those around them who are in fact different are disenfranchised, dehumanized, undervalued and left to feel that we do not belong in the country in which many of us were born, or about which we are told tales of tolerance.”
– Anthony Stewart
About Professor Stewart
Anthony Stewart is John P. Crozer Chair of English Literature at Bucknell University. He is the author of George Orwell, Doubleness, and the Value of Decency (Routledge, 2003), You Must Be a Basketball Player: Rethinking Integration in the University (Fernwood, 2009), and Visitor: My Life in Canada (Fernwood, 2014). His latest book, Approximate Gestures: The Meaning of the Between in the Fiction of Percival Everett was published this spring by Louisiana State University Press. In 2016, he co-edited Post-Racial America? An Interdisciplinary Study, with Vincent Stephens, and in 2018, he co-edited (with Joe Weixlmann) a special issue of African American Review, on the work of Percival Everett. He is in the earliest stages of his next project, which will be a critical reflection on notions of home, as represented in the work of several African-descended writers, some of whom are American and some of whom are not, who write about ideas of home, whether that be the United States or elsewhere.
Professor Stewart did his undergraduate work at the University of Guelph, MA and PhD at Queen’s, and held his first academic position at Dalhousie (1996 – 2013). He moved to Bucknell University in 2013.
Discussants
Binta Sesay, Student (Year 3), International Relations, UBC Okanagan; Equity and Inclusion Assistant, Equity and Inclusion Office, UBC Okanagan
Binta spent the last academic year as an executive member of the African Caribbean Student Club. Binta passionately advocates for women’s rights and the awareness of Black students’ experience on campus amongst others. Her goal is to make the campus a more diverse, inclusive and equitable environment for all marginalized groups.
Hussein Keshani, Associate Professor, Faculty of Critical and Creative Studies, UBC Okanagan
Hussein is an Associate Professor in Art History and Visual Culture at UBCO. As a specialist in South Asia and the Islamic World, his research and teaching interests include challenging Eurocentrism in the study of contemporary and historical arts, as well as the digital humanities.
Q&A will be Moderated by
Minelle Mahtani
Associate Professor, Institute for Social Justice and Senior Advisor to the Provost on Racialized Faculty, UBC Vancouver
Opening & Closing Remarks will be provided by
Ananya Mukherjee Reed
Provost and Vice President Academic UBC Okanagan and Professor in the Department of Economics, Philosophy and Political Science
