2020

Below the Radar explores immigration and connecting to community and social justice movements through art with Adriana Contreras, a visual artist and storyteller who captures dialogues as they unfold as a graphic recorder.

As this complicated and tumultuous year comes to a close, there is much to reflect upon. While our public programming has been limited to the virtual world for the time being, we look forward to welcoming our communities back to in-person programming in Fall 2021.

“Cities are fundamentally about people.” Mary Rowe joins Below the Radar to discuss the pandemic moment as an opportunity to reimagine how we live together in an urban environment. She and Am Johal are in conversation about the urgent need to build social solidarity around collective disaster, honing in on how people are in relationship with their community at the hyperlocal level.

In this episode of Below the Radar, Brandon Yan, the executive director of Out on Screen, joins producers Fiorella Pinillos and Paige Smith to discuss his work in film education dialogue and fostering inclusive spaces for youth. Brandon speaks to supporting queer and trans youth in schools by bringing queer joy into classrooms, working collaboratively to push forward policy change, and reimagining the future of the Vancouver Queer Film Festival.

Below the Radar’s Am Johal talks issues in urbanism and art as a research method with Sabine Bitter, Jeff Derksen, and Helmut Weber of the cultural research collective, Urban Subjects, based in Vancouver and Vienna. In this episode, they reflect on past arts exhibitions and programs they’ve facilitated on the urban experience, image politics, and visual representations of urbanism.

SFU librarian Baharak Yousefi joins Am Johal on Below the Radar to discuss critical librarianship, interrogating the entrenched systems and structures of libraries. She speaks to issues around the way librarians are schooled, the commodification of knowledge, and the need to make libraries welcoming spaces to all.

Barbara Holland is a leading community engagement scholar who has done extensive research in the areas of organizational change in higher education, service learning, and community-university partnerships. In this episode, she is in conversation with host Am Johal about the shifting landscape of community engagement and embedding engagement in the culture of the urban university as a method of scholarship, teaching, and learning.

When Sobhana Jaya-Madhavan landed in Vancouver 25 years ago from Malaysia, she was told her foreign credentials would make it hard to find employment as a social worker and was encouraged to apply for minimum wage jobs. In this episode, Sobhana is in conversation with Am Johal about the joy of finding community in a new place — and the barriers to employment she experienced as a newcomer to Canada.

Below the Radar explores Lacanian theory with Lacan Salon President and SFU English Professor Clint Burnham. Clint speaks to how Lacan’s ideas are taken up in the digital age. Clint takes up Lacanian theories of the ‘unconscious,’ ‘extimacy,’ or ‘the split subject,’ as well as Žižek’s works, to unpack racism and microagressions; intimacy and digital devices; and virtual interactions and teaching in pandemic-times.

Dalannah Gail Bowen reflects on a lifetime of making music and convening community in the Downtown Eastside of Vancouver. A passionate singer, community arts administrator, and activist, Dalannah shares her philosophy of walking compassionately through the world and how she aims to make space for — and remove barriers to — finding connection through art making.

Our longtime community partner Karen Jamieson Dance has returned with the Carnegie Dance Troupe to present their work in progress performance Recollect. This year’s collaborative performance was lead by Julie Lebel, a choreographer with a wide breadth of experience with community engaged dance.

Below the Radar unpacks ethics in community-engaged research and experiential learning with Kari Grain, who has been working with host Am Johal at SFU’s Community-Engaged Research Initiative. Kari speaks to her dissertation on the impacts of international service learning on local community partners.

Community-engaged scholar and filmmaker Lyana Patrick joins Am Johal to discuss how an Indigenous approach to community-building can positively impact the health and wellness of communities. Combining a diverse interdisciplinary background with her own lived experience, Lyana’s work addresses the ongoing colonial impacts of governance and urban planning on Indigenous community health.

Since the onset of the COVID-19, WISH Drop-In Centre Society has rapidly expanded its efforts to support street-based sex workers. Am Johal is joined by executive director, Mebrat Beyene, to discuss how WISH and other Downtown Eastside service providers are collectively responding to the pandemic, which has restricted services and exacerbated many pre-existing crises facing the community.

Reflecting on a podcast milestone during crisis times. Two years and 86 episodes later, Below the Radar is going strong with 25,000+ listens. SFU’s Vancity Office of Community Engagement launched this podcast with the aim of connecting with our community in a new way.

Am Johal is joined by Derek Woods, an assistant professor of Media Studies at the University of British Columbia. They discuss Derek’s intersecting expertise in media studies and ecotechnology, examining what he deems the three defining characteristics of ecotechnology: artificial ecosystems, media archaeology, and the cultural imaginary through science fiction.

A visual artist who grew up in Vancouver’s Chinatown, Gwen Boyle’s work explores movement, history, and place. The granddaughter of a Pender Street jeweller, Gwen draws inspiration from the sights and sounds of her childhood — the clinking of beads on an abacus, the hammering of jade, the melting of gold.

Working at the intersection of race, class, gender, sexuality, Jen Sungshine collaborates with fellow Love Intersections artists to celebrate diasporic narratives of queer identities. Jen joins host Am Johal to discuss art making and storytelling as a tool to address systemic racism and build understanding in conversations about gender and sexuality.

Urban Indigenous youth are taking the lead, advocating for policies that uphold the rights of Indigenous peoples on and off-reserve. Host Am Johal is joined by Jessica Savoy and Edgard Villanueva-Cruz from Aboriginal Life in Vancouver Enhancement Society (ALIVE). They discuss their recent report, Our Place, Our Home, Our Vision: Youth Voices of East Vancouver. The report contains Indigenous and non-Indigenous youth-generated recommendations for bringing urban Indigenous voices to the table, applying UNDRIP across different levels of government, and creating new models of self-governance for Indigenous people living off-reserve or in urban centres.

Below the Radar explores unfolding the enfolded with Laura U. Marks, an SFU professor and scholar who works on media art and philosophy with an intercultural focus. She is in conversation with co-hosts Am Johal and Paige Smith about her research into experimentalism and aesthetics in Arab cinema and the connections between Islamic art and philosophy and new media art. Laura talks about co-founding the Substantial Motion Research Network, tracing cultural and artistic genealogies, and de-westernizing artistic practices. They also discuss the concerns around the environmental consequences of streaming media that led Laura to create the Small File Media Festival.

Whose city is it anyway? Who does it embrace, who does it marginalize, and who does it push away from legibility? Whose bodies matter and whose don’t? Is the ‘Right to the City’ just words on a page?

Ta7talíya Nahanee joins Am Johal to discuss her work in creating social change through decolonial facilitation, rooted in Indigenous ways of knowing and chenchenstway, the law of lifting each other up. Ta7talíya shares her journey of founding Decolonizing Practices, developing Sínulhkay and Ladders, and how she engages people in conversations about redress, land equity, privilege, and resisting the comfort of complacency in neocolonial systems. She also speaks to Indigenous language resurgence, decolonizing identity, and the idea that decolonization is an ongoing and personal process of self-actualization.

Am Johal is joined by Eris Nyx, an artist and community organizer in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside who advocates for tenants' rights and an end to the war on drugs. She and Am discuss the impact of COVID-19 on drug users and residents of Single Room Occupancy (SRO) hotels, and how restricting visitors in SROs and reducing access to services during the pandemic has heightened safety concerns around a volatile supply of drugs. Eris shares how the Downtown Eastside community has been organizing to respond to the several and intersecting systems of oppression they are facing.

Elvy Del Bianco of Vancity Credit Union speaks to the power of cooperatives to help communities meet their own needs. He is in conversation with host Am Johal about the role coops can play in the production of social goods, and how they can support communities of entrepreneurs, small businesses, non-profits, and workers through solidarity and infrastructure.

In this episode, Justine and Laurie are in conversation with Am Johal about their shared work, the radical centering of care and wellness in their collaborations, as well as the social choreographies and relational choreographies that can be found in the everyday.

Yulanda Lui and Rachel Lau share experiences from the making of the radio documentary series, Speak My Language, which highlighted the stories of Chinese-Canadian seniors facing barriers in accessing the BC healthcare system. A project of Yarrow Intergenerational Society for Justice, the radio pieces were created in collaboration with youth and seniors under the mentorship of project coordinator and lead artist Rachel Lau with the support of Yarrow co-founder Yulanda Lui. This episode is hosted by our Office’s previous Communications Coordinator, Rachel Wong, and touches upon ethical community-based storytelling and accessing healthcare for non-English speakers.

In this episode, Lindsey is in conversation with Am Johal about her new book, This Atom Bomb in Me, a reckoning with our nuclear past that resonates with the present moment. Through Lindsey’s experiences of growing up in the Manhattan Project secret city, Oak Ridge, Tennessee, the book traces the radiating influence of the arms race on American politics and culture.

In this interview, Leilani Farha speaks to concerning patterns in housing globally, including homelessness, evictions, unaffordability, and the financialization of housing. They discuss opportunities in Canadian housing policy, Vancouver’s housing crisis, and the incredible importance of having a safe place to call home during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Finding a lack of space for experimentation and play in Vancouver’s theatre scene, New(to)Town Collective formed to provide accessible, low-barrier physical theatre training to the community. Our host, Am Johal speaks to two of the collective’s founding artists and alumni of SFU’s School for the Contemporary Arts, June Fukumura and Anjela Magpantay. They discuss barriers facing emerging artists in the city, as well as how they embrace messiness and opportunities for interdisciplinary collaboration in their by-donation Training Jams.

With the rise of podcasting as a forum for academic conversations and as a teaching tool, Hannah McGregor of SFU’s Publishing department set out to investigate — and enact — podcasting as a form of scholarly communication, knowledge mobilization, and open pedagogy. Hannah is in conversation with host Am Johal about her research into the exciting potentials of scholarly podcasting, and the power of the podcast as a grassroots, decentralized medium.

Jackie Obungah, our office’s Summer 2020 Co-op Communications Specialist, guest hosted an episode of Below the Radar featuring a conversation with Aida Mwanzia.

Am Johal is joined by Maltese-American cartoonist Joe Sacco, renowned for his long-form graphic journalism and field work in conflict zones and places where people are facing displacement and dispossession. They discuss his new book, Paying the Land, dealing with the painful history of the relationship between Indigenous peoples and resource extraction in northern Canada, as well as overarching themes of dispossession, the violence of settler-colonialism, and the bonds between people and land that are prominent in his work. Joe also shares some of his upcoming projects and touches on the intensification of political tensions in Portland, OR, where he lives.

Jackie Obungah is in conversation with Aida Mwanzia about the importance of centering Black youth and community perspectives in policymaking. Aida speaks about a policy brief she wrote as part of the LEVEL Youth Policy Program advocating for a cap on international student tuition, as well as her experience working with Ethọ́s Lab to create accessible and inclusive tech spaces.

Black Youth Organizers on Mutual Aid and Community Responses to COVID-19

How do we come together to make and enjoy art in a time of physical distancing? Interdisciplinary artist and community organizer Vanessa Richards joins host Am Johal in his backyard for a physically-distanced conversation about convening community through music during the pandemic.

On this episode of Below the Radar, our guest host, Jackie Obungah, is joined by Ayaan Ismaciil and Natasha Mhuriro. They discuss the importance of starting a Black in BC Mutual Aid fund during the pandemic as a means of community support and sustenance, and they also explore the continued solidarity between Indigenous and Black communities in working towards liberation.

On this episode of Below the Radar's Pandemic Conversations series, our host Am Johal is joined by Ann Livingston, community organizer and drug user activist. Ann is the co-founder of the Vancouver Area Network of Drug Users, and is currently the Executive Project Coordinator of the BC-Yukon Association of Drug War Survivors.

On this episode of Below the Radar, our host Am Johal is joined by Amal Ghazal, Director of the Centre for Comparative Muslim Studies at SFU. They sat down to speak about her role at SFU and her approach to community engagement within Muslim communities and beyond.

On this episode of Below the Radar, we speak with Kenneth Bailey, the co-founder of the Design Studio for Social Intervention. With our host Am Johal, he discusses how social justice issues have been exacerbated during the pandemic and protests in support of racial justice and defunding the police.

On this episode of Below the Radar, our host Am Johal is joined by Adel Iskandar, Middle East media scholar and Assistant Professor of Global Communication at Simon Fraser University’s School of Communication. His research primarily involves media, identity and politics. Adel is also the co-editor of online publication Jadaliyya, and academic podcast Status.

On this episode of Below the Radar, our host Am Johal sits down with Dan Adleman, an Assistant Professor of Writing and Rhetoric at the University of Toronto. He has also previously taught at the University of British Columbia, Simon Fraser University, British Columbia Institute of Technology, and Emily Carr Institute of Art + Design.

On this episode of Below the Radar, our host Am Johal sits down with Karen Jamieson, Vancouver-based dancer and choreographer. Karen's company Karen Jamieson Dance works with residents of Vancouver's Downtown Eastside through community engagement and cross cultural dancing, and is recognized nationally as groundbreaking. Additionally, her work, "Sisyphus," was named one of the 10 Canadian choreographic masterworks of the 20th century by Dance Collection Danse.

We are excited to welcome our new co-op student Jackie Obungah to the SFU’s Vancity Office of Community Engagement team!

On this episode of Below the Radar's Pandemic Conversations series we talk with Garth Mullins, documentarian, community organizer, and host and executive producer of the podcast CRACKDOWN.

On this episode of Below the Radar's Pandemic Conversations series our host Am Johal speaks with public health practitioner, activist and LGBTQ community leader Michael Roberson. They talk about how to read the current political times.

On this episode of Below the Radar, our host Am Johal speaks with Louise Schwarz, founder and co-owner of Recycling Alternatives. Am and Louise talk about the cultural shift surrounding recycling from 1989, when Recycling Alternatives was founded, to today. They also discuss the future of recycling and waste management, and what policies might help keep more waste out of landfills.

The beginning of July 2020 marks the end of Rachel Wong’s time in our Office. Rachel began as a Communication co-op student 13 months ago and eventually became a permanent employee.

The COVID-19 pandemic has changed most aspects of life. Here at SFU’s Vancity Office of Community Engagement, we continue to explore some of these changes.

On this episode of Below the Radar, our host Am Johal and guest host Fiorella Pinillos are joined by carla bergman, an independent scholar, filmmaker and producer. Alongside videomaker Corin Browne, carla is the co-director of EMMA Talks, a mini-art-festival and speaker’s series by women.

From everyone here at SFU’s Vancity Office of Community Engagement, we’d like to celebrate Indigenous History Month. We want to highlight some of the Indigenous thinkers, academics, and artists we’ve had the opportunity to work with this year through both our podcast Below the Radar and our public programming.

On this episode of Below the Radar, we are joined by Janice Abbott, the CEO of Atira Women’s Resource Society. Our office’s Program Assistant Paige Smith sits down with Janice to discuss how the pandemic has affected the work of Atira in combatting violence against women.

On this episode of Below the Radar, our host Am Johal and guest host Rachel Wong are joined by Jackie Wong. Jackie currently is the Director of Communications and Race Equity Project Director at Hua Foundation and is a long-time collaborator and friend of SFU’s Vancity Office of Community Engagement. Together, they talk about Jackie’s past work as a journalist, the current work that she does in Chinatown with regards to decolonization and working with youth, and how her different experiences have shaped her approach to the work and research she does.

On this special edition of Below the Radar, guest host Tiffany Muller Myrdahl (SFU Gender, Sexuality and Women’s Studies and SFU Urban Studies) interviews Brett Stoudt. Brett came to Vancouver in early 2020 to give a workshop on participatory action research based on the work and research that he does at the City University of New York. In this episode, Tiffany and Brett talk about what participatory action research is, the Public Science Project and Morris Justice Project, and what it means to do research with and for the community rather than about it.

On this episode of Below the Radar's Pandemic Conversations series, our host Am Johal chats with Kimberley Wong. Kimberley currently sits as the Chair of the City of Vancouver's Chinatown Legacy Stewardship Group, the co-chair of Vancouver Just Recovery Coalition, and the Community Development Coordinator for the Hua Foundation. Kimberley talks with Am about her current work in Chinatown and how its been affected due to COVID-19.

In this episode we talk with Dr. Ethan Taylor, professor in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry at the University of North Carolina. With our host Am Johal, he discusses the current research on selenium as an anti-pathogenic factor in emerging zoonotic viral infections, such as COVID-19.

In the sixth episode of Below the Radar's Pandemic Conversations series, we talk with Angela Marie MacDougall, Executive Director of Battered Women's Support Services here in Vancouver, Canada. With our host Am Johal, she discusses how COVID-19 is affecting gender inequality and violence within intimate relationships.

What can COVID-19 teach us about health inequities that are present in our society? Our latest installment of Below the Radar Pandemic Conversations explores the current situation of COVID-19 and what previous pandemics can teach us about what is happening globally. Am Johal sits down with Meaghan Thumath, a clinical scientist at the Centre for Gender and Sexual Health Equity and clinical associate professor at UBC’s School of Nursing.

On the fourth episode of Below the Radar's Pandemic Conversations series. Today we talk with Meaghan Thumath, a clinical scientist at the Centre for Gender and Sexual Health Equity and clinical associate professor at UBC’s School of Nursing. With our host Am Johal, she discusses her previous international work studying and combatting pandemics and how this has informed her current understandings of COVID-19, both globally and locally here in Vancouver, Canada.

On this episode of Below the Radar, our host Am Johal is joined by Michael Byers, an author and professor of Political Science at UBC, where he holds the Canada Research Chair in Global Politics and International Law. He is also the co-director of the Outer Space Institute, a transdisciplinary international network for space studies. Michael’s work focuses on international law, climate change, the Arctic and outer space. He sits down with Am to chat about Arctic sovereignty, international cooperation, space law and issues in outer space.

In this episode of Below the Radar's Pandemic Conversations series we speak with ICU physician and writer Dr. Kevin Patterson about what he has learned working in the front lines during COVID-19. He chats with Am Johal about planning for a second wave, what we can learn from past pandemics, the relationship between this outbreak and climate change, and how we can improve our local healthcare systems here in Vancouver, Canada.

On this episode of Below the Radar, our host Am Johal is joined by Tara Mahoney, the Research and Engagement Coordinator of SFU’s Community-Engaged Research initiative team (CERi). Tara holds a PhD from SFU’s School of Communications, is also a research fellow in climate change communications at the David Suzuki Foundation and is the creative director of Gen Why Media. She sits down with Am to talk about her research in the recent years, involving the emerging forms of participatory political culture in Canada.

What is it like to work on the front lines of a major pandemic? On our latest Below the Radar Pandemic Conversations episode, we meet Dr. Kevin Patterson, an ICU physician who works in critical care in Nanaimo. Dr. Patterson is also a writer and novelist.

This episode of Below the Radar features two members of SFU’s Community-Engaged Research Initiative, or CERi: co-director Stuart Poyntz and program manager Joanna Habdank. Both Stuart and Joanna bring their own experiences and expertise to CERi with hopes to create more opportunities for research that is respectful, ethical, and collaborates with community members. They discuss with host Am Johal what Community-Engaged Research is and how SFU is answering the call to provide more opportunities for collaboration in research with communities.

What impact will COVID-19 have on geopolitics and climate change? That is the question that Paul Rogers answers on the latest installment of Below the Radar Conversations.

In this episode, Am Johal speaks with Paul Rogers on the impact that COVID-19 has on geopolitics and climate change, his readings on the responses of individual countries to COVID-19, and how we might find a way forward together.

On this episode of Below the Radar, we welcome psychoanalyst Hilda Fernandez and clinical counsellor Fernanda Selayzin Souza who practice in Vancouver. Both Hilda and Fernanda dive into a discussion around urban intimacy and the good life, including how technology impacts intimacy and relationships, the potential mainstreaming of polyamory, and the differences across generations and cultures that change the way we relate to others and ourselves.

In this first episode of Below the Radar's Pandemic Conversations series, we hear from Dr. Kelley Lee, Canada Research Chair in Global Health Governance at Simon Fraser University. In this conversation, she chats with Am Johal about the World Health Organization and COVID-19.

We were thrilled to host Dr. Andrew Petter, president of SFU, on the latest episode of our Below the Radar podcast. Petter came into the role of president in 2010, and 10 years later, he is ready to move on to the next chapter of his life.

On this episode of Below the Radar, we are joined by SFU President, Andrew Petter. For 10 years, Andrew has led SFU in becoming Canada’s Engaged University. Am Johal talks to Andrew about the experiences he had prior to coming to SFU, what it’s been like to serve as SFU’s president, and why SFU will always be a big part of his life.

In the wake of COVID-19, we all need to adapt and learn new ways of doing things. This has been a particularly challenging time for a number of community organizations whose focus is to help those in need. Whether you are looking for some support during this time or want to find ways to help organizations with their work, here are some ways to help.

On this episode of Below the Radar, our host Am Johal is joined by Barbara Adler, interdisciplinary artist, programmer and SFU’s School for Contemporary Arts’ Professional Development Coordinator. Barbara’s artistic work has been presented at The Vancouver Folk Festival, Ballet BC, the Vienna Literature Festival and many more. She currently produces the weekly performance series Sawdust Collector, which showcases experimental and improvised works by established and emerging artists. She holds an MFA in Interdisciplinary Studies from Simon Fraser University.

We currently find ourselves in a time of social distancing and staying at home. While a lot of our public events have been postponed or cancelled for now, we still want to find a way to engage the community and mobilize knowledge.

The Dallas Smythe Memorial Lecture has honoured critical scholars in the field of political economy of communications since 1993. Organized by SFU’s School of Communication, the lecture brings together faculty, students, and the broader community to honour the work and research of Dallas Smythe, who taught at SFU from 1976 until he passed away in 1992.

On this episode of Below the Radar, our host Am Johal is joined by Scott Bernstein, the Director of Policy at Canadian Drug Policy Coalition, a project based at the Faculty of Health Sciences at SFU. He has also done work with Pivot Legal Society in Vancouver and internationally with Open Society Foundations in New York. Together, Am and Scott talk about his work involving harm reduction, decriminalization and drug regulation policies, and discuss potential regulation models with studies such as North American Opiate Medication Initiative (NAOMI) and Study to Assess Longer-term Opioid Medication Effectiveness (SALOME).

Our podcast Below the Radar has officially hit over 10,000 listens! In just over one year, we have accumulated thousands of listens over our collection of episodes. We have and continue to amplify ideas that are flying below the radar, and share them across the globe.

On this episode of Below the Radar, our host Am Johal sits down with John Walker, an award-winning Canadian filmmaker widely known for his documentary films, such as Québec My Country Mon Pays (2016) and Arctic Defenders (2013). He is also one of the co-founders of the Documentary Organization of Canada. In this conversation, John talks about his latest film, Assholes: A Theory. The film is based on the work of Aaron James, author of a book of the same name. Together, they investigate “asshole culture," and the conditions of our contemporary culture that allows assholes to thrive.

Our office is excited to partner with Yarrow Intergenerational Society for Justice on the launch of Speak My Language, a project that features 5 radio documentaries created by teams of youth and Chinese seniors.

At the 5th annual One Book One SFU event, authors Esi Edugyan and Omar El Akkad sat down to discuss Edugyan’s newest novel Washington Black. This year’s event took place on January 30th in the Djavad Mowafaghian Cinema at the Goldcorp Centre for the Arts. In partnership with SFU Library and Pulpfiction Books, our office was proud to facilitate this conversation between these two renowned authors.

On January 30, 2020, SFU celebrated the opening of it’s ninth location at 312 Main. SFU’s Vancity Office of Community Engagement had the opportunity to spend a lot of time in the space already, sharing space with the different community organizations in the building and recording our podcast, Below the Radar, in our office. Now, we’re excited to be joined by our SFU colleagues from SFU Public Square, SFU Lifelong Learning, and SFU’s Community-Engaged Research Initiative (CERi) at 312 Main. We look forward to many more years of community engagement with this neighbourhood and the folks that live and work in it.

On this episode of Below the Radar, Am Johal sits down with Ebony Magnus, the head of the Belzberg Library at SFU Vancouver. Ebony came into the role during SFU Vancouver’s 30th Anniversary and has a focus on community involvement for this branch, both within the university and with the wider community. Together, they discuss some core questions related to libraries, including equal access to technologies, value distinctions between different types of archives, and continued community engagement.

On this special episode live from the Vancouver Podcast Festival, host Am Johal sits down with Glen to talk about who and what influences his work and research, the different projects he’s been involved in over the years, and what continues to inspire him to do the work he does.

Our live recording with UBC professor and author Glen Coulthard is now available! Click here to listen to the episode in full. Read below for more information on this special episode of our podcast Below the Radar.

In this episode, Kamala shares what steps the city has taken, and what more needs to be done, to combat the ever-present consequences of colonization.