Below the Radar Transcript
Fall 2023 Kick-Off
Speakers: Julia Aoki, Am Johal, Kathy Feng
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Julia Aoki 0:06
Hello, welcome to Below the Radar. I'm Julia Aoki, Program Manager with SFU's Vancity Office of Community Engagement, sitting with our regular host of Below the Radar, Am Johal.
Am Johal 0:16
Hello, nice to see you.
Julia Aoki 0:18
Hi. I'm also here with Kathy Feng, Research Assistant with the Office, and podcast producer and editor extraordinaire. Hi Kathy.
Kathy Feng 0:26
Hi, how are you?
Julia Aoki 0:28
So, Below the Radar's fall 2023 season kicks off on September 5, and we'll be releasing new episodes every Tuesday. This season, we speak to local and international academics and artists on topics ranging from continuing and emergent forms of fascism, and diasporic narratives and experiences in literary, visual, and moving image arts, to citizen journalism in Africa and shifting dynamics of labor in an increasingly casualized economy here in BC. Am maybe you could start by telling us about some of your guests on this season of Below the Radar.
Am Johal 1:02
Totally. We're super excited to get rolling into fall 2023 with 15 episodes coming out weekly. We're gonna start things off with a couple of episodes that relate to fascism or growing forms of authoritarianism. We have Alberto Toscano, who was with us from SFU—a political theorist and writer. He's got a book called Late Fascism coming out with Verso. Ruth Ben-Ghiat who oftentimes is on CNN as a public commentator on new forms of American authoritarianism, teaches at NYU. We have faculty member Ryan Tacata. We have writer Charlotte Gill, [who has] a new book called Almost Brown that's out, a memoir about her family. The book's just been out a couple of months. Angela Aujla, who's a graduate of SFU and artist who lives in Ontario now. We have a wonderful documentary filmmaker, Ali Kazimi, who was last year here with the DOXA Festival, where he screened a number of his newer works. He also did a documentary on the Komagata Maru "continuous journey." We have the director of the Institute for the Humanities, Samir Gandesha—the 40th anniversary of the Institute is happening, something started by one of our original, OG faculty members, Jerry Zaslove, "Jay Z." And we're going to be talking to Alex Hemingway from the CCPA [Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives], Bruce Mutsvairo who's been a Community Engaged Research Initiative Research Fellow with us as well, coming all the way from University of Utrecht.
Kathy Feng 2:29
Am, was there anything that surprised you about the season? Anything that surprised you in the conversations?
Am Johal 2:35
No, it's just it's interesting in the different ways that people are working, whether they're writing or working as artists, how they approach their work, whether it's a documentary filmmaker, a writer, or a theorist, you know, what is it that captivates them about a particular topic, how they bring up personal concerns within those constraints. So lots of great voices, really excited about it. But I'm most excited about a series of five episodes that are going to be coming out that both Julia, and Kathy, and Sam are working on, so I'm going to throw it back to you.
Julia Aoki 3:13
Yeah, so the three of us will be ending the season with a series of episodes featuring local arts collectives and organizations who are working through and maybe against the constraints of operating in a very costly rental and real estate market, and the confines of standard governance models to develop platforms for experimentation and self determination. These are still in formation. But what are you hoping to highlight in these final episodes, Kathy?
Kathy Feng 3:44
Well, with our series, I was really hoping to look at some of the work that fellow artists and community organizers do around the city to cultivate community within arts and culture. For me in particular, as a recent graduate of SFU's School for the Contemporary Arts, with a major in visual art. I am focusing on people like me, other fellow art school grads, recent art school grads that are working to build this community within Vancouver's art scene facing exactly what you're talking about these these barriers that come with living in the city. And I know our friend, colleague and fellow editing superstar Sam [Walters], with a background in theatre, is looking to do something similar with their episode in the series as well. So, yeah.
Julia Aoki 4:29
That's great.
Am Johal 4:31
Yeah, Sam's been working out of Progress Lab, doing lots of great work. And, you know, it's really hard not to talk about the housing and the economic situation in terms of the conditions required for making work in the city, whatever your artistic discipline.
Kathy Feng 4:46
Totally, and being an artist within the institution, you know.
Julia Aoki 4:49
Yeah. I'm really interested in how these organizations are working through those constraints to do community-engaged work specifically and how they're working to kind of put their community at the center of the work through their governance models or through their programming—which, of course, can be an additional challenge when standard governance models kind of tend to privilege more professionalized artists and board members.
I think it's shaped up to be a very nice season of really engaging conversations. So I'm looking forward to having them out there for everyone to hear.
Kathy Feng 5:24
Me too.
Julia Aoki 5:25
Great. That's wonderful, thanks so much guys.
Below the Radar is a knowledge democracy podcast created by SFU's Vancity Office of Community Engagement, recorded on the territories of the Musqueam, Squamish and Tsleil-Waututh peoples. Make sure to follow us on Instagram at sfu_voce to stay up to date on our newest podcast releases and tune in September 5 for our fall season of Below the Radar.
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