The Centre for Feminist Research (CFR) presents “Feminism and Palestinian Women’s Struggles”, a talk by Nahla Abdo, on March 17 from 3 to 5pm at 305 Founders College.

Palestinian women’s experiences in the anti-colonial struggle are as long as their experiences with settler colonialism. Still, and not unlike the struggles and very existence of their people in general, women’s struggles have largely been ignored, if not silenced.

When Palestinian women began to get involved in the armed struggle against settler colonialism, the West, in general, and the feminist movement, more specifically, began to take interest in their struggle.

This talk discusses the Western feminist discourse on Palestinian women’s struggles and the responses to such discourse by Palestinian women political activists.

Abdo is an Arab-Canadian feminist, political activist and professor of sociology at Carleton University. She has extensive publications on anti-colonial feminism, racism, nationalism and the state in the Middle East with special focus on Palestinian women.

The introduction will be led by Meg Luxton, a professor in the School of Gender, Sexuality and Women’s Studies in the Faculty of Liberal Arts & Professional Studies (LAPS).

Light refreshments served. RSVP to juliapyr@yorku.ca. Please note this event counts towards seminar requirements for GFWS students.

The event is co-sponsored by the Department of Anthropology, Department of Equity Studies, Graduate Program in Gender, Feminist and Women’s Studies, the School of Gender, Sexuality and Women’s Studies, Department of Social Science, Department of Political Science, and the Graduate Program in Social and Political Thought.

For more information, email cfr@yorku.ca.

Two women named in the YWCA Toronto International Women’s Day 2016 Women of Distinction announcement will be guest speakers at the Alexander F. Chamberlain Speaker Series at York University on March 15.

Youth activists Tessa Hill and Lia Valente will speak about their activism, their use of digital media to create community, and their commitment to changing rape culture from 10:30am to noon in the Renaissance Room, 001 Vanier College.

Hill and Valente began the successful “We Give Consent” campaign to encourage the Ontario Liberal government to include consent in the Ontario sexual education curriculum. Their online petition was signed by over 40,000 people, resulting in an invitation by Premier Kathleen Wynne to discuss their concerns about the curriculum.

The producers of Allegedly, a documentary on rape culture available on YouTube, Hill and Valente have been widely interviewed by the media and have recently been nominated for CBC Radio’s “Torontonian of the Year” award.

The YWCA Toronto’s 2016 Women of Distinction list salutes the achievements of women and the impact of those achievements “one the lives of girls and women in this city – and beyond”.

The event is presented by the Children’s Studies Program in the Department of Humanities in the Faculty of Liberal Arts and Professional Studies.

The Centre for Feminist Research (CFR) presents “The Hidden Palace: Everyday Practices and Performances of Affinitive Labour in Queer Japanese Migrant Lives”, a talk by Dai Kojima, on March 15 from 3 to 5pm at 626 Kaneff Tower.

In this talk, Kojima will discuss formations of queer kinship through his ethnographic engagements with “Ooku Vancouver,” a self-organized collective of gay Japanese men located in Vancouver, B.C.

Carefully attending to informants’ identifications with the popularized drama of women who were both emplaced and displaced (Ooku was the secluded living quarters for the wives and concubines of the Shogun in medieval Japan), this presentation traces the economic, affective and pedagogical dimensions of queer immigrant kinship that Ooku Vancouver (OV) enables.

Based on two case studies, OV as an im/migrant entrepreneurial node and OV’s regular, private karaoke events, this talk considers these hidden practices of care and kinship as affinitive labours which structure and mediate intergenerational feelings of loss and collective survival.

Kojima argues for a queering of representations and archives of Japanese im/migration experience beyond stereotypes of stoicism, servitude and silence, and towards a reconceptualization of kinship relations and political possibilities in the Japanese diaspora in Canada.

Kojima is the 2015-16 Visiting Postdoctoral Scholar at CFR. He received his PhD from the University of British Columbia specializing in migration and diaspora studies, queer studies and media studies. His ethnographic doctoral research examined the cultural politics of mobility in queer Asian diasporas. His current research explores the gendered and queer dimensions of labour practices among Japanese im/migrants and queer entrepreneurs in Vancouver and Toronto. His most recent works appear in Anthropologica and Reconstruction.

He will be introduced by David Murray, professor of anthropology in the Faculty of Liberal Arts & Professional Studies (LA&PS).

Light refreshments served. Please RSVP to juliapyr@yorku.ca.

The event is co-sponsored by the Department of Anthropology, York Centre for Asian Research (YCAR), and Sexuality Studies, York University.

Please note this event counts towards seminar requirements for GFWS students.

Students from York University’s Health & Society program have created a unique and evocative exhibit depicting the life stories and experience of students like themselves – first- and second-generation refugees and migrants to Canada.

The project, “A New Home, A New Opportunity” drew its inspiration from the plight of Syrian refugees in the fall of 2015. It is intended to foster awareness of the rich life stories of students who come to Canada – and ultimately to York University – in search of a better life.

The free public exhibit is set to run March 8 to 10 at in the Bear Pit, Central Square. A seven-minute video made collaboratively by students and a York film graduate presents a rich compilation of recorded interviews with York first- and second-generation migrant and refugee students.

A display of 18 material culture object images and the accompanying texts explore what Canada means to these students and their memories of a life left behind.

“There are some of the memories that we remember but we try not to look at, the violence and the street harassment of girls, and the individuals with disabilities that were looked down upon. And these are issues that we study here at York and we are educated about them,” says Zakia Razai, York student and Afghan refugee. “However, there were good things too, like family, friends and the food of course, and just the atmosphere of being there and being welcomed that makes it home. I feel I am living with two different identities, one that’s attached to back home, Afghanistan, and one that’s here.”

The exhibit is meant to reveal how these students are redefining the meaning of Canadian multiculturalism.

The exhibit runs for three days, from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. For more, call Sumaya Abdullahi at 647-529-0763 or Daniel Porretta at 416-835-8630.

Is the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) good for Canada and good for member countries in Asia and Latin America?

The York Centre for Asian Research (YCAR), the Centre for Research on Latin America and the Caribbean (CERLAC), and the International Development Studies program will host a panel discussion on March 15 to explore the implications of the TPP.

The TPP is an agreement negotiated between 12 countries around the Pacific Rim, in both the Americas and Asia. It was signed in 2015 and awaits ratification by national legislatures in signatory countries, including Canada. The agreement is wide-ranging and addresses issues such as barriers to trade, intellectual property rights, labour migration, corporate regulation and dispute resolution.

Many have argued that it has profound implications for a wide range of economic sectors in all signatory countries, as well as for labour and the role of the state.

From a range of perspectives, the panelists at the March 15 event “Debating the Trans-Pacific Partnership: Perspectives from Canada, Asia and Latin America” will discuss the pros and cons of the deal both for Canada and for countries in Asia and Latin America.

Panelists include Gus Van Harten, associate professor of law at Osgoode Hall Law School; Lorna Wright, associate professor of international business and organization studies at the Schulich School of Business; and Ricardo Grinspun, associate professor of economics in the Faculty of Liberal Arts and Professional Studies.

Van Harten will bring insights from his areas of expertise which include administrative law, international investment law and arbitration, and the governance of the international financial system.  Wright’s expertise in cross-cultural management, international negotiations, and the internationalization of small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) will also facilitate an engagement with the TPP from an international business perspective. Grinspun will provide insights informed by his areas of research which include the global economy and international trade, with particular reference to Latin America.

The panel will be moderated by Philip Kelly, professor of geography and director of YCAR.

The event takes place 10 to 11:30am, Kaneff Tower, Room 519. All are welcome.

A one-day conference exploring the different crises in Europe will take place on Friday, March 4 from 9:30am to 4:30pm in Ross S674.

The Jean Monnet Chair (Heather MacCrae)and the Hellenic Heritage Foundation Chair (Sakis Gekas) jointly present a full day series of panels during “Reflections on the Crises in Europe” to look at the financial crisis, refugee crisis and institutional crisis straining the European Union (EU).

With the EU evidently at a crossroads, the conference will look at these different crises and what they mean for Europe, democracy and the international community.

Ahead of one of the most important recent meetings of EU heads of state or government with Turkey, this series of panels explores the origins, the current state and the potential consequences of the current crises in Europe.

Confirmed speakers include:

• Leo Panitch, York University, presenting “The European Left in Crisis”;
• Thabit Abdullah, York University, presenting “Reflections on the Roots of the Current Conflict in Iraq”;
• Sakis Gekas, York University, presenting “Living on the edge; Greece as a permanently liminal space?”;
• Feyzi Baban, Trent University, presenting “Neither Guests Nor Refugees: Syrian Refugees and Negotiating Citizenship Rights”;
• Christopher Kyriakides, York University, presenting “Overconsuming Cultures” at the Boundaries of Fortress Europe”;
• Phil Triandafilopoulos, University of Toronto, presenting “Large Scale Forced Migration and the Democratic Constitutional State”; and
• Heather MacRae, York University, presenting “Now what? Europe’s uncertain future”.

Those wishing to attend should RSVP to hmacrae@yorku.ca or agekas@yorku.ca. Refreshments and lunch will be served.

The event is co-sponsored by the Jean Monnet Chair at York University and the Hellenic Heritage Foundation Chair in Modern Greek History.

Joan Judge, professor of History at York University, will launch her book Republican Lens: Gender, Visuality, and Experience in the Early Chinese Periodical Press at an event March 3 hosted by the York Centre for Asian Research (YCAR).

The book explores an often overlooked brand of commercial culture that emerged around China’s 1911 Revolution. Judge seeks to understand the early years of China’s first republic through the mainland Chinese journals Funu shibao (the women’s eastern times). She argues that the commercial press played a key role in shaping gender trends in China’s revolutionary 20th century.

Judge uses cross-genre and inter-media methods to analyze the complexities of China’s past, including cover art, photographs, advertisements, poetry, editorials, essays and readers’ columns. These methods result in important insights into social change and knowledge culture in 20th century China. In particular, they reveal the significance of the scientization of the notion of “experience”, the public recognition of “Republican ladies”, and the building up of “Chinese medicine”.

Judge’s book demonstrates how this journal captures different and often neglected aspects of social and cultural developments in the early years of China’s republic.

The book launch event will include a round table discussion with five scholars in various disciplines who will explore the themes of the book and review its contributions and avenues for further research. The round table participants include:

• Eugenia Lean, Columbia University – modern Chinese cultural history
• Anne (Rusty) Shteir, York University – women and science culture
• Bernard Lightman, York University – history of science
• Yi (Evie) Gu, University of Toronto, Scarborough – photography and visual culture
• Doris Sung, York University – digital humanities

The event takes place in Room 280N, Second Floor, York Lanes, and all are welcome. For more information, visit www.ycar.yorku.ca or contact ycar@yorku.ca.