Conference Dates: Friday, April 8, 2022 (held virually via Zoom)
Friday, April 29, 2022 (held in-person at Glendon College, 2275 Bayview Ave, Toronto)*
Submissions Deadline: February 1, 2022
The study of Canada is fraught with ironies and contradictions: on the one hand about Canada’s greatness, and on the other critiques exposing how Canadian settler colonial society reproduces itself through global structures of oppression. Navigating this terrain has made researchers understandably weary—whilst remaining hopeful for the future.
The 2022 Annual Robarts’ Graduate Conference will be confronting some of the mainstream representations of Canada with the realities of lasting systemic inequities and the lack of collective action for necessary change. Mobilizing ongoing frustration, impatience and fatigue in a critical and interdisciplinary study of Canada, this conference will reflect on these asymmetries and points of rupture, while also highlighting key pathways to transformation and futures of hope. How are mainstream representations about Canada reproduced and what makes them myths, charades and ironies? What are the gaps between representations and praxis? Where is transformative action being developed and what does it look like? Why are we so tired of trying to reconcile the multiple visages of the country?
This conference will be partly held online to accommodate presenters and panelists from near and far. Please note that for the in-person component of the conference, the Robarts Centre will not reimburse transportation costs to presenters and panelists.
Graduate students are invited to submit proposals for presentations that fit one of the following panel topics:
- Addressing the Climate Emergency
- ‘Canada the Kind’ on the World Stage
- Extractive Industries and Canada’s Economic Priorities
- Indigenous Resurgence
- Indigenous-Settler Relations in a Time of Reconciliation?
- The Myth of Multiculturalism
- Race and Racism in Canada
- The State Facing a Changing Canadian Society
- The Well-Being of Canadians
We encourage students from a wide variety of disciplines to interpret these topics from their perspective. Students can, as a group, also submit panel proposals. Applicants will be notified by 1 March 2022 of their acceptance status and applicants will be offered an opportunity to publish their papers in the Robarts Centre for Canadian Studies’ online publication Canada Watch.
Please submit proposals (max. 250 words) at https://form.jotform.com/RobartsConference/submissions by Tuesday, 1 February 2022, and contact robartsconference@gmail.com should you have any questions.
*The conference will be held in-person on 29 April 2022 if allowed by York University and public health guidelines. If not, it will be held virtually.