February 7, 2012 Dr. Werner Antweiler, Sauder School of Business: On International Trade
February 14, 2012 Dr. Courtney Booker, Department of History: On Medieval History
February 28, 2012 Dr. Mark Vessey, Principal, Green College: On Green College
March 6, 2012 Dr. Kim Schonert-Reichl, Faculty of Education: On Human Development, Learning and Culture
March 13, 2012 Dr. Rashid Sumaila, Director, UBC Fisheries Centre: On Fisheries and economics
March 20, 2012 Dr. Andrew Wallace-Hadrill, Roman Studies Cambridge University: Cecil H. and Ida Green Visiting Professor.
March 27, 2012 Dr. Rena Sharon, School of Music: On Collaborative Piano
April 3, 2012 Dr. Rosie Redfield, Department of Microbiology: On bacteria and sex
April 10, 2012 Dr. Julio Montaner, Faculty of Medicine: On Aids research
April 17, 2012 Dr. Dietrich Jung, Green College Visiting scholar, University of Denmark
April 24, 2012 Dr. Jaymie Matthews, Department of Astronomy: On stellar astrophysics
May 1, 2012 Dr. Andre Marziali, UBC Engineering Physics: On Engineering Physics
January 10th – James Tansey, Sauder School of Business
January 17th – Rosie Redfield, Microbiology
January 24th – Erica Frank, MD
January 31st – Werner Antweiler, Sauder School of Business
February 7th – Alejandra Bronfman, History
February 14th – Kim Schnoert-Reichel, Education
February 21st – Andre Marziali, UBC Engineering Physics
February 28th – Mark Vessey, Green College
Dr. Carlos Ventura, from the department of Civil Engineering will discuss his role as the Director of the Earthquake Engineering Research facility at UBC as well as some of the recent seismic trends in structural engineering.
February 1
Dean of Arts and Haitian scholar, Gage Averill will discuss his new role at UBC as well as his recent Grammy nomination for his project, Alan Lomax in Haiti: Recordings for the Library of Congress, 1936-1937.
January 25
Dr. Perry Adebar from the Department of Civil Engineering will discuss structural engineering as a field of study as well as his current research on Concrete Structures and Seismic Design.
Dr. Brandon Konoval from the School of Music will discuss his current research and and cross appointment in both the School of Music and the Arts One Programme.
Dr. Marilyn Chapman will discuss her role as the lead researcher and author of the new guide for full-day kindergarten in the province, as well as her role in directing the Institute for Early Childhood Education and Research in UBC’s Faculty of Education.
October 5th
Dr. Neil Safier from the Department of History discusses his new class on the history of Amazonia as well as his recent trip to Manaus, Brazil.
Dr. Ken Bryant from the UBC Department of Asian Studies will discuss his upcoming class on Bollywood film as well as the histories of the languages of Urdu and Hindi in literature and popular culture.
September 7th
Professor Gu Xiong, UBC Department of Art History and Visual Art discusses his exhibit “Becoming Rivers” at the Museum of Anthropology;how his work focuses on the dynamics of globalization and on identity shifts for individuals and local cultures, addressing how integration and assimilation, histories both collective and personal, and cultural synthesis cut across boundaries.
Dr. Janet Werker, Director of the Infant Studies Centre Speech and Language Processing, UBC Department of Psychology. Dr. Werker discusses her research of infants growing up bilingual and language acquisition in infancy; speech perception, cognitive development and parent-infant communication.
May 4th
Dean Emeritus Marty Hollenberg, former UBC Dean of Medicine discusses some of the accomplishments made by the faculty of Medicine while he was Dean during the years 1990-1996; as well as what he is currently doing outside of academia since his retirement.
Professor Alfred Hermida from the UBC School of Journalism discusses how journalism and forms of media are changing (he is an authority on digital journalism, having been a founding member of BBCnews.com) as well the rise of social media and the role of citizen journalism.
April 20th – Guest Host Andy Torr
Professor Scott Hinch from the UBC Faculty of Forestry discusses his research on salmon migration as well as his role as Director of the UBC undergraduate program in Natural ResourcesConservation; the largest and fastest growing applied environmental science programs on campus and one of a kind in Canada.
April 13th – Easter Monday
April 6th
Professor Emeritus and renowned pianist Robert Silverman, from the UBC School of Music discusses his beginnings; what ultimately motivated him to become a pianist and teach piano at UBC and how he continues to strive to “bring notes on a page to life as vividly as possible”.
Dr. Carl Wieman, Nobel laureate, discusses his beginnings and the research that led him to receive the Nobel Prize in Physics in 2001. He also discusses the goals of the Carl Weiman Science Education Initiative at UBC to achieve highly effective, evidence based science education for all post-secondary students by applying the latest advances in pedagogical and organization excellence.
March 23rd
Dr. Michael Hayden, UBC Department of Medical Genetics and Canada’s Health Researcher of the Year, 2008. Dr Hayden discusses his goals to understand how changes in specific genes result in specific diseases, usually in adult life, in particular Huntington disease. He also discusses his Ripples of Hope Foundation that will bring trainees from Africa to Canada to study in four areas of global health.
March 16th
Professor Tara Lee, Department of English discusses her research interest in minority Canadian Literature, specifically Asian Canadian literature and her motivation for and philosophy in teaching it. She also answers the question, what can you do with an English degree besides teach?
March 9th
Dean of Applied Science, Dr. Aboulnasr discusses her recent appointment to the faculty as well as her research in Electrical Engineering in the field of digital signal processing and her role as the principal investigator on an interdisciplinary inter-university project on smart hearing aids with Siemens, Germany.
March 2nd
Cathleen With, MFA graduate from UBC Creative Writing Department discusses the debut of her first novel, Having Faith in the Polar Girls’ Prison.
Professor Benjamin Perrin, from the UBC Faculty of Law; a speech that he delivered to the BC Human Rights Coalition and the United Nations Association in Canada on the 60th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights last December 10th, 2008.
February 10
Prof Talk features a panel lecture from last October; experts from the UBC Departments of Economics and Political Science form a panel to discuss factors leading up to the current global financial crisis. The panel was called “Balance and Blowup” – an analysis of the current financial crisis. Panelists Dr. Paul Beaudry and Dr. Michael Devereux from the Department of Economics.
February 17
Part two of “Balance and Blowup” – an analysis of the current financial crisis. Panelists Dr. Angela Redish from the Department of Economics and Dr. Yves Tiberghien from the Department of Political Science.
February 24
Doctoral student Sonja Klinsky from the UBC Institute for Resources, Environment and Sustainability talks about her thesis titled: Across Years, Lands and Oceans: Justice and Scale in Climate Change Policy Decision Making.
January 6
Professor Keith Maillard, UBC Creative Writing Department
Keith Maillard discusses his current work. He is an internationally acclaimed writer and novelist, specialising in fiction and poetry; and he also Chairs one of North America’s most successful Creative Writing programs.
January 13
Dr. Hadi Dowlatabadi, The Institute for Resources, Environment
and Sustainability, UBC
Professor Dowlatadabadi discusses “Why we have been failing to take on more efficient and environmentally friendly technologies; and why adaptation to climate change will be so much more difficult than academics have been postulating”
January 20
Dr. Ira Nadel, The UBC department of English
Ira Nadel discusses his most recent projects and new work: a biography of the American playwright and filmmaker David Mamet, pub. Feb. 2008 and a book co-authored on the Golden Gate Bridge entitled Golden Gate Bridge, History and Design of an Icon, also pub. in 2008. New work: a biography of the American popular writer and author of Exodus, Leon Uris.
January 27
Professor Benjamin Perrin, UBC Faculty of Law
Benjamin Perrin discusses his current research on Human Trafficking in Canada which is the first comprehensive account of Canada’s involvement in human trafficking for sexual exploitation as well as his involvement at the Third World Congress Against Sexual Exploitation of Children held in Rio De Janeiro, Brazil Nov 25-28
Professor Alan Matheson, UBC School of Music. Alan Matheson is a Canadian trumpeter, pianist, composer and arranger. Alan currently teaches trumpet and jazz piano at UBC.
December 9th
Doctoral student T. Todd Jones, UBC Department of Zoology. Groundbreaking research of critically endangered leatherback turtles; part two of a two part series on the current crisis of the world’s marine ecosystems.
November 25th
Dr. Daniel Pauly, Director of UBC Fisheries Centre. Management of world’s fisheries; part of a two part series on the current crisis of the world’s marine ecosystems.
November 18th
Dr. Michael Zeitlin, Department of English: William Faulkner, aviation and fascism. Doctoral student Simon Rolston, Department of English: Contemporary American prison writing
November 11th
Dr. Marvin Westwood, Department of Education and Counselling Psychology. Returning veterans; treating post traumatic stress disorder. Dr. Sherrill Grace, Department of English. RSC Symposium, “The Cultures of War and Peace”
November 4th – Debut of Prof Talk
Doctoral student Mehre Gomez Fonseca, Womens Studies. Stephen Harper’s apology to residential school survivors.
Why are certain people and places vulnerable? Who is responsible for remedying the situation? And what is fair? Why is historical research important?
Tina Loo is a professor in the department of history at the University of British Columbia. She is a leading scholar of Canadian and environmental history. Her work has focused on the nature and impacts of the state’s actions to manage human and non-human environments in the interests of development. She is also recognized for her outstanding and innovative teaching techniques and commitment to mentoring.
In her latest, book, Moved by the State, Forced Relocation and Making a Good Life in Canada she explores the contradiction between intention and consequence as resettlement played out among Inuit in the central Arctic, fishing families in Newfoundland’s outports, farmers and loggers in Quebec’s Gaspé region, Black residents of Halifax’s Africville, and Chinese Canadians in Vancouver’s East Side. In the process, she reveals the optimistic belief underpinning postwar relocations: the power of the interventionist state to do good.
"Why basic research matters" with Natalie Davis "Manitoba's Sayisi Dene: Forced relocation, racism, survival from CBC archives (1978)" "Northeast Falsecreek plan" "Why do you love history?" produced by the UBC History Department "The People Tree" Interview clip with Tina Loo
Why are the health of our oceans important for our survival? Why does it matter to find creative ways of protecting them?
Rashid Sumaila is a Professor and Canada Research Chair in Interdisciplinary Ocean and Fisheries Economics at the Institute for the Oceans and Fisheries, and the School of Public Policy and Global Affairs, University of British Columbia. His research focuses on bioeconomics, marine ecosystem valuation and the analysis of global issues such as fisheries subsidies, marine protected areas, illegal fishing, climate change, marine plastic pollution, and oil spills.
You can can learn more about his work through The Institute of Oceans and Fisheries on the website https://oceans.ubc.ca
Audio Played:
"Collapse of Newfoundland cod fisheries" End of the Line Documentary "How can we help less developed economies" Wassily Leontief, 1973 Nobel Prize Winner (Economics) and Creator of the input-output technique "How More Efficient fishing can protect the ocean" produced by National Geographic
How do geochemists study the chemical composition of earth? How do geochemists better our understanding of the earth's interior, natural resources, climate change, human impacts on the environments, and hazards like earthquakes, tsunamis and volcanoes?
Dominique Weis is a professor in the UBC Department of Earth, Ocean, and Atmospheric Sciences at the University of British Columbia. She is a renowned leader in the application of trace elements and radiogenic isotopes analysis. Her analytical insight has enabled new discoveries into Earth systems such as mantle plumes and hotspot volcanoes. Through the analysis of a wide range of materials such as honey, salmon, or belongings, her expertise allows the opening of new lines of research into health, local pollution/food security, and archeology/Indigenous-led studies. She is a Canada Research Chair in the Geochemistry of the Earth’s mantle
Audio Played: "An Isotopic Talk and Tour: The Pacific Centre for Isotopic and Geochemical Research" produced by PCIGR "Clair Patterson The Clean Room: Inside Look | Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey" Produced by National Geographic
What strategies are used to improve physical activity following a stroke? How is stroke research put into practise? What kinds of stroke recovery programs see the best outcomes?
Janice Eng is a professor in the UBC Department of Physical Therapy at the University of British Columbia. She is a world leader in stroke recovery research, from basic neurobiology to novel clinical interventions and treatment programs, and has implemented these programs globally. Professor Eng is the Canada Research Chair in Neurological Rehabilitation, has been recognized for excellence in mentoring early career faculty, and is a Fellow of the Canadian Academy of Health Sciences.
"Stroke Recovery Through Exercise featuring UBC Vitality study participant Marco Chorbajian" produced by UBC "Hero in You" Interview with Rick Hansen, produced by the BC Hall of Fame "Excerpt from Awakening the Mind: The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat" produced by the World Science Festival
What strategies are used to improve physical activity following a stroke? How is stroke research put into practise? What kinds of stroke recovery programs see the best outcomes?
Janice Eng is a professor in the UBC Department of Physical Therapy at the University of British Columbia. She is a world leader in stroke recovery research, from basic neurobiology to novel clinical interventions and treatment programs, and has implemented these programs globally. Professor Eng is the Canada Research Chair in Neurological Rehabilitation, has been recognized for excellence in mentoring early career faculty, and is a Fellow of the Canadian Academy of Health Sciences.
"Stroke Recovery Through Exercise featuring UBC Vitality study participant Marco Chorbajian" produced by UBC "Hero in You" Interview with Rick Hansen, produced by the BC Hall of Fame "Excerpt from Awakening the Mind: The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat" produced by the World Science Festival
Who was Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky? Why did he have such an important influence in world literature? How is his work still revered and interpreted today? Why is Russian literature of the 19th century still on many best-seller lists?
Katherine Bowers is an expert in Russian literature and culture. Her research interests include genre, narrative, and imagined geography. Her first monograph, Writing Fear: Russian Realism and the Gothic (University of Toronto Press, forthcoming), examines the way Russian realist writers used narrative models from European gothic fiction in their work. Dr Bowers is the Vice-President of the North American Dostoevsky Society and serves as a Member-at-Large on the Executive Board of the Canadian Association of Slavists.
Dr Bowers’s monograph about the influence of gothic writing on Russian realism is in press. Her new book project is about science fiction, Arctic space, and alternative temporalities.
Dr Bowers is actively involved in Dostoevsky studies. She edits the blog of the North American Dostoevsky Society, The Bloggers Karamazov. In 2021 a new volume she co-edited with Kate Holland will be published: Dostoevsky at 200: The Novel in Modernity. Additionally Drs Holland and Bowers have received a SSHRC Insight Grant (2019-25) Digital Dostoevsky, a digital humanities research project investigating Dostoevsky’s corpus.
“Crime and Punishment at 150? – interview with Katherine Bowers on University of British Columbia Faculty of Arts Spotlight page, 19 Oct 2016" "Irvin Weil, a professor emeritus from a Professor Emeritus in the Department of Slavic Languages" "Anne Hruska, lecture at University of Berkeley" "Reading from Crime and Punishment, by George Guidall, Audiobook Classics on Youtube" "Joseph Frank, American literary scholar and leading expert on Dostoevsky from Stanford University archives"
What is Perimenopause? What are later life ovulation disturbances? How can women better understand their menstrual cycles during all phases of their life?
Jerilynn C. Prior is a Professor of Endocrinology and Metabolism at the University of British Columbia, working on women’s health. She studies menstrual cycles, the effects of ovulation and its later life disturbances. She is the Scientific Director and Founder of the Centre for Menstrual Cycle and Ovulation Research. The Centre publishes scientific results and disseminates information directly to women.
She has studied women’s menstrual cycles, perimenopause, menopause and the causes for and treatment of osteoporosis. She has shown that regular cycles (with enough estrogen) commonly do not produce sufficient progesterone (anovulation or short luteal phases). She is widely sought as a speaker for professional and lay audiences and is the author of the award-winning book Estrogen’s Storm Season: Stories of Perimenopause, a fiction book designed to inform and empower perimenopausal women.
More information can be found on the Centre for Menstrual Cycle and Ovulation Research can be found at: www.cemcor.ca
Audio played:
"The Puzzle of Perimenopause, Keeping a Daily Diary" produced in 1995 in partnership with UBC Biomedical Communications and CEMCOR. "Ursula Franklin" produced by Historica Canada’s Heritage Minutes "The ABCs of Osteoporosis Prevention for Premenopausal Women", produced by CEMCOR
Shari L. Forbes is the Canada 150 Research Chair in Forensic Thanatology at the Université du Québec à Trois-Rivières (UQTR). She is the Director of the first human taphonomy facility in Canada for Recherche en Sciences Thanatologiques [Expérimentales et Sociales], also referred to as REST[ES]. She is an advocate for Equity, Diversity and Inclusivity (EDI) and has a deep commitment to the implementation of EDI values in academia. She has encouraged young adults to become engaged in science through her roles as an Ambassador for the Sydney Science Festival, the National Youth Science Forum, and Science Rendezvous.
Prof. Forbes’ research investigates the chemical processes that occur in soft tissue decomposition. Her research aims to increase the knowledge base relating to decomposition chemistry to identify an accurate biochemical signature for estimating time since death. She has studied these processes in terrestrial, aquatic, and atmospheric environments throughout Australia, Canada and the USA. Her current research focuses on identifying an accurate chemical profile of decomposition odour using advanced chemical instrumentation. Her research assists police canine units to enhance their training protocols for cadaver-detection dogs deployed to forensic and mass disaster investigations. Her expertise is regularly requested to assist police with locating and recovering buried or concealed evidence, including human remains, drugs, explosives, weapons, and currency. [biography taken from Shariforbes.com]
Audio played: "What happens to your body after you die" by Science Insider "The Story of Ada Lovelace" produced by the Institute of Engineering and Technology (IET) "Visiting the Brewarrina First Traps" produced by Now-ness.
Born and raised in Johannesburg, South Africa, in the turbulent apartheid years, Dr. Bonny Norton learnt at an early age the complex relationship between language, power, and identity. Now a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada and a Distinguished University Scholar in the Department of Language and Literacy Education at UBC,her passion for social justice and the role of language education in social change has fuelled her extensive body of research in North America and Africa. Her research is centrally concerned with the promotion of multilingual literacy for children, youth, and adults, and is informed by her seminal work on identity and language learning, described in her 2010 AERA award as “changing the face of second language research”. Her work has introduced novel conceptions of identity to the field of language education, and has been the subject of journal special issues in the USA (1997, 2003, 2017), Japan (2002), China (2007), and Europe (2016). Her publications have been translated into French, Chinese, Portuguese, and German. Dr. Norton’s construct of investment has had a profound impact on international scholarship, and is the topic of a special issue of the leading journal, Langage et Société (2016). Her theory, based on extensive research, holds that while a language learner may be highly motivated (a psychological construct), the learner may not be invested (a sociological construct) in the language practices of a given classroom or community, which may, for example, be racist, sexist, or homophobic. A highly productive scholar, her publications include 5 books, 4 journal special issues, and 125 peer-reviewed articles and book chapters. Her current research addresses multilingual literacy for children in African and Canadian communities, and is included in the 2014 special issue she guest edited for the Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development on “Multilingual literacy and social change in African communities” and her 2017 co-edited special issue of the Modern Language Journal on “Transdisciplinarity and language teacher identity”.
“Bridging Classroom and Community: Languages and Cultures in Action” offered in the Department of Modern Languages and Literatures at Western University in London, Ontario, Canada
UNESCO celebrates International Literacy Day every September 8th. In 2019 its focus was on ‘Literacy and multilingualism’ Embracing linguistic diversity in education and literacy development is central to addressing these literacy challenges and to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals.
Professor Zubeida Desai, Dean of Education, University of the Western Cape, interview from HIGHER EDUCATION TODAY -- Language and Education produced by the University of the District of Columbia and the University of Cape Town
"Multilingual approaches to teaching and learning," at Purnululu Independent Aboriginal Community School in Australia, teaching literacy across all levels of the school, produced by AITSL.
Dolph Schluter is an evolutionary biologist who studies adaptive radiation — the evolution of ecological diversity in groups of organisms that are multiplying rapidly. Dolph’s research suggests that ecologically induced adaptation can result in the evolution of new species. He has worked on Darwin’s finches and helped to develop the three-spined stickleback as an experimental model for studies of adaptive radiation.
Dolph and his team investigate the ecological forces that drive the rapid origin of new species and allow them to persist, the genetic basis of species differences, and the wider ecological impacts of adaptive radiation.
His studies of sticklebacks and other species have allowed Dolph to build a model of a process that he terms ecological speciation, in which adaptation to different environments generates new species. He is the author of The Ecology of Adaptive Radiation (2000) and The Analysis of Biological Data (second edition, 2015). [ Biography taken from The Royal Society]. For more information about his research lab in the UBC department of Zoology, visit: https://www.zoology.ubc.ca/~schluter/
Leslie Anthony is a Whistler-based writer, editor, biologist and occasional filmmaker. A former editor at Powder, Bike and SKIER magazines, he continues his residence on the masthead of numerous ski and outdoor publications globally. At home, Anthony oversees award-winning Mountain Life Annual, pens a weekly column in Pique Newsmagazine, and writes broadly on travel, adventure, science and the environment in magazines like Canadian Geographic. Author of two previously acclaimed titles, Snakebit and White Planet, his latest book is The Aliens Among Us: How invasive species are transforming the planet—and ourselves.
How does literature nourish science? When does physics become poetry? An event of cosmic proportions from 5x15, as masterful storyteller Carlo Rovelli discusses life & the universe. Readings from The Order of Time & Seven Brief Lessons of Physics.
