The University of Alberta in Edmonton is one of Canada’s top teaching and research universities, with an international reputation for excellence across the humanities, sciences, creative arts, business, engineering, and health sciences. Home to 39,000 students and 15,000 faculty and staff, the university has an annual budget of $1.84 billion and attracts nearly $450 million in sponsored research revenue. The U of A offers close to 400 rigorous undergraduate, graduate, and professional programs in 18 faculties on five campuses—including one rural and one francophone campus. The university has more than 275,000 alumni worldwide. The university and its people remain dedicated to the promise made in 1908 by founding president Henry Marshall Tory that knowledge shall be used for “uplifting the whole people.”
Leaked curriculum drafts in Alberta show a desire to revive old colonial myths. To face today’s challenges, we need stories that teach how humans are related to each other and to all life forms.
‘The Craft: Legacy,’ to be released this fall, is a remake of the 1996 teen witch film ‘The Craft’ and suggests the continued relevance of punk and goth influences for rebellious teens. Here, detail from the 2020 poster.
(Sony Pictures/Blumhouse Productions)
Some horror films explore women’s struggles for empowerment, sexual freedom and self-fulfilment. Six movies show the ghost, bride, mother, vampiress, witch and monster as guises of vengeful women.
Alberta Minister of Health Tyler Shandro speaks during a press conference in Calgary on May 29, 2020. The Alberta government is proposing legislation to accelerate approvals of private clinics in order to get more surgeries done.
THE CANADIAN PRESS/Jeff McIntosh
Recent Alberta legislation increasing privatization in the health sector risks undermining the public health-care system, and will likely put profits over the public interest.
The COVID-19 pandemic has put people with disabilities and chronic health conditions in a precarious position.
(Pixabay)
Disabled Canadians and those with chronic health conditions have been left out of government COVID-19 policies and programs and are struggling financially.
Protestors demonstrated against police brutality in Montréal, on June 7, 2020.
(Steve Daniel/Unsplash)
Around the world, policing — as an institution — is being challenged. But calls to defund the police will fall short if they do not address the history of policing.
Ludwig van Beethoven’s friendship with the Black composer George Bridgetower may have led to rumours of Beethoven being Black.
(Shutterstock)
First the Washington Redskins. And now the Edmonton Eskimos. It’s about time professional sports franchises recognized the harm that comes from racist team names.
Front of the Regina Court House, during the trial of Louis Riel, which began 135 years ago in July 1885.
(O.B. Buell/Library and Archives Canada)
The political metamorphosis of Louis Riel illustrates one of the most paradoxical aspects of nationalism: how former enemies can be transformed into compatriots.
Harvey Weinstein arrives at the Manhattan Criminal Court, on February 24, 2020 in New York City. On March 11 he was sentenced to 23 years in prison for criminal sexual acts and rape.
Timothy A. Clary/AFP
Scandals are violent shocks to social systems, yet not all questionable behaviour produces scandal. How can we explain that some figures escape the consequences of their own behavior while others don’t?
A muezzin calling Muslims to prayer stands on the minaret of the Gazi Husrev-beg mosque in Sarajevo.
(Shutterstock)
Listening more deeply to what makes sounds meaningful for people within their respective contexts matters in an era of rising expressions of racism in the pandemic.
When the Edmonton Eskimos released a statement in support of Black Lives Matter, the team was criticized for not addressing the controversy about its racist team name.
THE CANADIAN PRESS/John Woods
In the wake of protests about systemic racism, sports teams are under increased pressure to lose their racist nicknames. An Inuit scholar calls on the Edmonton Eskimos to do the right thing.
Action-packed police procedurals can often give audiences the false impression that violent crime excuses the excessive use of force by police.
(Unsplash/Matt Popovich)
Television shows about police often perpetuate false narratives about violent crime that excuse police violence.
The Greenwood section of Tulsa, Okla., is seen in flames during in 1921 during one of the worst acts of anti-Black racism in American history.
(Creative Commons)
History will cast a long shadow over Donald Trump’s first campaign rally since the pandemic began.
Protesters march on June 6, 2020, in New York. Demonstrations continue across the United States in protest of racism and police brutality, sparked by the May 25 death of George Floyd in police custody in Minneapolis.
(AP Photo/Ragan Clark)
Research on excessive use of force by police and the sociological context and psychological characteristics of killer cops point to useful policy measures.
Black bear in Jasper National Park, Alberta.
(Shutterstock)
Oklahoma is a place of trauma that cuts much deeper than anything on ‘Tiger King,’ which is essentially poverty porn for people who like to see people make hot messes of themselves.
Seismic exploration lines cut through boreal forest near Fort McMurray, Alta.
(Scott E. Nielsen)
New research identifies areas where species may take refuge as the climate changes and finds they’re largely unprotected.
Municipal workers block the streets of the Medina neighbourhood of Dakar, Senegal, on March 22, 2020 as a bulldozer demolishes informal shops in an effort to stop the spread of the coronavirus.
(AP Photo/Sylvain Cherkaoui)
African countries face unique challenges in their efforts to limit the spread of COVID-19, but lessons learned in other regions where the coronavirus has already peaked may be helpful.
Cutting disability benefits while providing little by way of education and job training is only going to lead to increasing poverty and an increasing disability wealth gap.
(Shutterstock)
Canadians with disabilities often have little to nothing left after paying for food, shelter and other living expenses. We need policies that target the root causes of their inequality.
Le 15 janvier 2020, dans les environs de Budgong, en Nouvelle-Galles du Sud (Australie).
SAEED KHAN/AFP
Avec les feux de forêt, la présence massive de cendres et de sédiments dans les cours d’eau constitue une menace pour l’approvisionnement hydrique des populations.