Doctored!

It feels like I'm still catching my breath, but on Thursday afternoon around 5:00pm, I finally crossed the finish line. I'm officially a doc!

Below is the pre-ceremony group portrait of all the PhD graduands from the School of the Arts, Media, Performance and Design, hoods draped over arms, and already sweltering in our robes. Respect to my lovely and talented cohort-mate Caroline Klimek (front and centre) – I'm not sure I could have made it to the other side of the stage in those heels.

My inspiring doctoral supervisor Caitlin Fisher generously shared the hooding ritual with my aunt Patricia Stamp, a retired professor of African and Development Studies at York, and a lifelong guiding light for me:

Managed to keep that extremely wide-brimmed puffy hat on my head throughout. Harder than it looks!

It was an honour to receive the Governor General’s Gold Medal from Chancellor Kathleen Taylor – one I share with all the colleagues and participants across the world who joined a strange, wonderful adventure in research-creation and artful intelligence.

I love the symbolism of the heraldic elements of Governor General Mary Simon's coat of arms:

My beloved brother, mother and uncle were in the audience, and along with my official and shadow supervisors above, and family and friends beyond, they all deserve medals for the guidance, support, and love they poured into my tank throughout this epic road trip. I only wish my dad had lived long enough for me to hug him that day. 

Finally, who better to have receiving an honorary Doctor of Letters degree at our convocation than Kardinal Offishall himself? Dr. Jason Harrow gave what has got to be among the best honoris causa speeches ever, and as soon as York University posts it, I'm adding it here.

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Dr. Offishall's love letter to Toronto, The Anthem, played us down the aisle at the end of the ceremony. And yes, some of us might have been bopping as we went:

Shadowcasting at Wiky High

Following an inspiring visit in October to Wiikwemkoong High School on Manitoulin Island, I was delighted to return last week for a five-day Shadowpox workshop.

Wiikwemkoong (formerly Wikwemikong) High School flies with the eagles

A dramatic entrance

Teacher Natalie Parrington's brilliant grade 12 English class welcomed Debajehmujig Storytellers directors Joahnna Berti and Bruce Naokwegijig, along with arts animators Daniel Recollet-Mejaki, Quinten Kaboni and Tyler Pangowish, all of whom have collaborated on previous Shadowpox workshops in 2018 and 2022.

With Joahnna Berti and Natalie Parrington in front of a Shadowpox vocabulary list (a good lesson for me in readability levels!)

We were piloting a new branching narrative, Shadowcasting • Mazinaateshin. "Mazinaateshin" is an Anishinaabemowin word that means both “s/he casts a shadow” and “s/he is on television or in a movie,” and echoes the traditional teachings shared by Debajehmujig Knowledge Keeper David "Sunny" Osawabine that we should have compassion for everything and everyone our shadow falls upon. 

The four-scene cycle of Shadowcasting • Mazinaateshin 

This new version of the participatory story framework Shadowpox: The Cytokine Storm takes the form of a choose your own adventure branching narrative, in order to foreground the theme of choice and the effects our choices can have on our own lives and the lives of those around us.

The new Shadowcasting • Mazinaateshin branching narrative 

Students role-played as volunteers in a Phase 1 vaccine trial in the middle of a shadowpox pandemic (a scenario that required a lot more imaginative heavy lifting in Debaj's first workshop back in 2018!). The school's wonderful IT wizard Rudy Mandamin helped set the students up to use Microsoft Stream to record their in-character video journal entries, which would then be embedded in branching narratives using the open-source software Twine.

On screen: Natalie Parrington using Microsoft Stream

We also got to try out a new augmented reality effect I'm half-seriously thinking of calling a "projectro-glyph" (a petroglyph projected on the body). This attenuated vaccine shadowpox glyph was coded in 8th Wall by Shadowpox technical director Lalaine Ulit-Destajo, with the support of the Immersive Storytelling Lab and a Canada Council Digital Greenhouse Grant. Check it out yourself on 8th Wall!

Modeling the new augmented reality Shadowpox effect

Debaj animators Tyler Pangowish and an augmented Quinten Kaboni 

Gchi miigwech, huge thanks, to our hosts at Wiky High and the directors and animators at Debajehmujig, but especially to our multi-talented student workshop participants. I can't wait to see what they do next with all their creativity, intelligence and insight!

I'm also thrilled that Joahnna Berti and I ended the week in discussions with Natalie Parrington and science and technology teacher Chris Mara around a new project for next year, using "citizen science fiction" to explore the energy transition. Stay tuned...

Baa-maa-pii to the electrifying Wikwemikong Warriors!

Gold Eggs

Once when I was in elementary school and my dad came home from parent-teacher interviews, I asked what they had discussed. "They said you're a good egg," was all he would tell me.

He passed away a few years ago, but his lesson in humility about academic accomplishments bubbled back up in my memory this week.

York University’s Faculty of Graduate Studies has awarded six graduates with 2024 Thesis and Dissertation Prizes "for outstanding contributions to the local and global community." 

I'm deeply honoured to be one of them, and thrilled that a fellow member of the Cinema and Media Arts (CMA) department, Pooya Badkoobeh, also won a Thesis Prize for his MFA film “Based on a True Story.” 

Congrats to all the grads, and thanks to the Faculty of Graduate Studies awards committee, my doctoral supervisor Caitlin Fisher, graduate program director Mike Zryd, and the whole department for being such a brilliant place to do research-creation. 

It's more fun to be a good egg when you're in such good company. CMA FTW!

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Update, June 12

I absolutely did not expect this, given that two of the three GG’s last year went to Cinema and Media Arts grads Lawrence Garcia and Aaron Tucker, but here we are!

Three York U graduate students earn Governor General’s Gold Medals

Governor General Mary Simon said of her coat of arms, which is emblazoned on the current medals and is pure visual poetry: "This coat of arms is my story, my true history, and it speaks of my lifelong commitment to bridge-building and family, and of my hopes for a future where we respect and share each other's stories to help foster better relationships between peoples." 

An inspiration to treasure.