MEET THE Saga Research Team
Meg Holden
What is your area of research/expertise?
I am a theorist of social learning, particularly in policy and planning contexts. I look at learning and change from a pragmatic perspective, meaning a perspective that considers contexts and actors to be in an interactive state of continuous evolution. This, I have learned, is an uncommon way of investigating change toward sustainable development.
What is the best thing about being part of the SAGA project?
The diversity of feminist approaches from the diversity of disciplines, cities, and life experiences of SAGA team members brings a radical openness to new possibilities for understanding!
What is the latest word/concept you learned in another language?
Klondike - a word that I had associated with either an influx of wealth as in the Yukon Gold Rush, or a chocolate ice cream treat. It turns out the word is used in a Danish context to signify an off-grid, DIY, squatter community. Boastfully used, even, by Danes who want to point out that as much as the democratic socialist state takes all community members' needs into account, there are cracks in that understanding of local resilience and sustainability, too.
Pascale Elbaz
What is your area of research/expertise?
I examine concepts and terms in relation to social phenomena: new events, tools, and trends that create new concepts, formulated differently in different linguistic forms. Depending on the language used by those using the new concept most, over time these new concepts tend to get fixed in one or more linguistic forms. I am also a translator, Chinese and English to French.
What is the best thing about being part of the SAGA project?
The SAGA project aims to approach sustainable cities through language diversity : how do different stakeholders dream, create, build, live in cities? How do they express their will and their needs in words? How do these expressions translate into other languages? What parts are lost in translation?
What is the latest word/concept you learned in another language?
The latest word/ concept I learned in English was ocean-brain. It is a neologism that was coined by a journalist who is also suffering from ADHD. She said that ADHD was not only a health condition to her but a state of mind and that she kind of liked the way she sees the world, although coping with everyday life was not that easy. So, to express this state of mind, she coined the concept of "ocean-brain", a brain that has no limit, like the ocean. Will this new concept find another linguistic form or is this the perfect one?
Salla JOKELA
What is your area of research/expertise?
I have a broad interest in the spatial aspects of urban transformation, sustainability, and community formation. Rather than viewing space as a neutral backdrop to society, I am interested in how space is produced and shaped through everyday practices, discourses, and visual images. My research has focused on national identity politics, city branding, urban tourism, digital peer-to-peer platforms (Airbnb, Uber etc.), and education for sustainable urban development.
What is the best thing about being part of the SAGA project?
I speak Finnish, which is small language spoken by around five million people. Because of this, I have worked hard to adapt my mindset to the standards of the English-speaking international academic community. It is exciting to be part of a linguistically diverse team that appreciates language differences instead of viewing them as a problem to be overcome. I am looking forward to learning more about how local meaning-making and cultural values embedded in language can help us to pave the way toward sustainable futures.
What is the latest word/concept you learned in another language?
I learned the word gulahallan in Sámi language, which is spoken by the indigenous Sámi people who inhabit the region of Sápmi in northern parts of Finland, Norway, and Sweden, and northwestern parts of Russia. Gulahallan is often translated as “communication”, and it emphasizes the importance of listening to understand. Besides referring to interpersonal interaction, gulahallan is used to describe communication with the environment – the art of listening to and understanding land.
Annika AIRAS
What is your area of research/expertise?
My research centers on urban planning and sustainability. I am interested in cultural, linguistic and historical perspectives on urban planning and redevelopment. In my research I have focused on coastal communities and environments, urban neighbourhood change, and questions of social sustainability. Drawing on my Finnish background, I bring a comparative lens to my work in urban studies in Canada. As part of my teaching, I am developing experiential learning opportunities including field trips, workshops, and an international field school.
What is the best thing about being part of the SAGA project?
SAGA acknowledges the connections between languages and sustainability, which is a relationship that often gets overlooked. The SAGA project invites everyone to draw from their own linguistic backgrounds and expertise to study sustainability. It is a privilege to work with such an interdisciplinary and international team!
What is the lateset word/concept you learned in another language?
I learned about the Swedish concept of “plastpanta”. It refers to a way of life where you are cutting off plastic products to the best of your ability. A friend explained this as a type of “detox” from using environmentally harmful and unnecessary plastic products.
CedisSia ABOUT
What is your area of research/expertise?
My area of research/expertise are eco-architecture and eco-urbanism from designer's or developer’s points of view. My recent research projects include OASIS, to support the development and evaluation of Oasis schoolyards projects in Paris (FEDER-UIA, 2019-22) and COOLSCHOOLS (ERA-NET, 2022-25). This program focuses on the consideration of biodiversity, pedagogy, governance and health components in schoolyards in the cities of Barcelona, Brussels, Rotterdam and Paris. I have co-edited a book (2019), (re)Penser la ville du XXIème siècle - 20 ans d'éco-quartiers dans le monde, and other publications comparing model sustainable neighbourhoods in different countries. I also work on the themes of the sensitive/sensory city, including urban walks with residents and co-creation. Currently, I am supervising two theses: the first is on life cycle analysis and the circular economy (recovery of building waste and reuse of materials/furniture) from the scale of urban projects to that of the building, and the second is on green schoolyards with biodiversity inventories and analysis, and surveys on capacities of stakeholders to move on their uses.
What is the best thing about being part of the SAGA project?
The best thing about being part of the SAGA project is to get out of my intellectual comfort zone. To work on the terminology of the sustainable city and comparisons of meanings between languages will be an opportunity to confront myself with new approaches to perception of the city in renewal.
What is the latest word/concept you learned in another language?
« Sisu » in Finnish for resilience and courage or « Hygge » in Danish for well-being, empathy and sociability. Also, I have been very impressed by the democratic practice of Sauna in Finland.
Majken Taftager Larsen
Information coming soon.
Kamala Todd
What is your area of research/expertise?
I'm a Métis-Cree person born into Salish lands. I work at the intersection of film, arts and culture, and urban planning--looking at the stories and worldviews that shape place and are reflected in place. I focus on addressing colonial erasures and dominant narratives, in support of re-Indigenizing the city, through stories, of which language is a crucial part. As we work to address the harms of colonization and its unsustainable ways, Indigenous knowledge, stories, world views, laws, governance, ways of living on the land need to be part of the urban fabric and place making. I work in the current context of UNDRIP and Indigenous rights, and the many ways that we can work towards urban transformations of healing.
What is the best thing about being part of the SAGA project?
As someone who came to academia as more of an artist and practitioner, it's nice for me to be part of a team of creative academics who are focused on urban transformations. I love the energy and possibilities of bringing together people from many places to explore ideas and learn from each other. I look forward to building relationships with local Indigenous language speakers from the territories where SFU is situated, to reflect the depth of knowledge of how to take good care of these lands and waters.
What is the latest word/concept you learned in another language?
My maternal Grandfather did speak Cree when growing up with his family, but he did not speak it with his children. My paternal grandparents were immigrants from Germany, but I do not speak their first language of German. Language is such a central part of identity, and connected to cultural values and ways of seeing, and while it is a deep loss for me to not speak the two main languages of my lineages, we are all impacted by the dominance of English, which forms so much of the context within which we have conversations around healing, hope, resilience, and transformation. I hope that this project helps to uphold the beauty and value of diverse languages and what they hold for understanding and appreciating biodiversity, peace, living in balance with the earth and all our relations. One key word that I know in my Cree language and which forms my world view is Wahkohtowin, a law or teaching which speaks to the interconnectedness of all things; kinship. I believe this way of seeing is at the heart of all cultures, when we look deeply enough, and is the important teaching that we all need to remember if we are to heal the damages humans have caused to the earth.
Parastoo Eshrati
What is your area of research/expertise?
I am a cultural landscape conservationist, with a particular focus on historic cities and Historic Urban Landscapes. My research centers on developing conceptual frameworks for change management in urban and landscape heritage within this ever-changing world.
What is the best thing about being part of the SAGA project?
As a cultural landscape conservationist, I hold the belief that culture is the fourth pillar of sustainable development, and language is the carrier of the wisdom of sustainability inherited from the past, thereby passing it on to future generations with added value, hopefully. I'm proud of working with a multicultural team of experts who all care about exploring the link between language and sustainability.
What is the latest word/concept you learned in another language?
The relatively new English word, "Petrichor," refers to the earthy scent that arises when rain falls after prolonged periods of warm, dry weather. It originates from two Greek words: "petra," meaning rock, and "ikhor," referring to the ethereal fluid that is the blood of the gods in Greek mythology.
In my personal view, when one takes delight in the aroma of petrichor, they might be experiencing a "Proustian moment" – a recollection to the involuntary collective memory of our ancestors who instinctively understood that rain signified the promise of sustainability for life in arid regions of the earth. Perhaps it is for this reason that this scent has captivated humans for centuries.