The second iteration of the Indigenous Futures Research Centre (IFRC) Annual Research Symposium will center around research engaging Indigenous communities and knowledges. Join us as our members spark a dialogue between faculty and students from across the university. illuminating the challenges of the present as they are addressed through concrete, constructive, and critical dreams of the future
Location: 4TH SPACE, 1400 De Maisonneuve Blvd. W. Concordia University
No registration is required; however, seats are limited, so please arrive early. Alternatively, we invite you to check out our programming via 4th Space’s YouTube Channel or via Zoom.
Original Design by Tarcisio Cataldi
2:00 PM
STORYTELLING THROUGH ANIMATION AND DIGITAL MEDIA
Taylor McArthur, Caeleigh Lightning, Neko Wong-Houle
Moderated by Vania Ryan
Brought together to discuss the role storytelling plays in their respective animation and digital media practices are Cree and Irish 2 Spirit artist and a member of Samson Cree Nation, Caeleigh Lightning, queer, registered band member of the Blackfoot, Kainai Nation with Ojibwe, Chinese and Romanian Ancestry, Neko Wong-Houle, and member of the Pheasant Rump Nakota First Nation and multimedia artist Taylor McArthur. As artists who work with experimental animation, 3D animation, and digital media, Lightning, Wong-Houle and McArthur will discuss their practices and share their recent work, what they are currently working on, and what is to come.
3:30 PM
CURATORIAL PRACTICES: RECENTERING INDIGENOUS METHODOLOGIES
Dr. Michelle McGeough, Prof. Hannah Claus
Moderated by Hanss Lujan Torres
For this panel, Art History Professor, Dr. Michelle McGeough (Cree/Métis Settler), and Studio Arts Professor and member of the Tyendinaga Mohawks of the Bay of Quinte, Hannah Claus, will discuss the strategies they have developed when it comes to recentering Indigenous methodologies within curatorial practices. Having both recently curated exhibitions for daphne, a Tiohtià:ke-based and Indigenous-led artist-run center, Dr. Michelle McGeough and Professor Hannah Claus will share insights into their approaches and experiences.
4:30 PM
PAST FUTURE FORWARD: THE MAKING OF A HAWAIIAN VIDEO GAME
Directed by Prof. Jason Edward Lewis, Prem Sooriyakumar
Past Future Forward: The Making of a Hawaiian Video Game tells the story of a group of neophyte designers learning to make the first video game about Hawaiians in space, drawing on their community’s long history of technological innovation.
1:15 PM
INDIGENOUS LINGUISTICS: REVITALIZATION, THEORY AND VISIBILITY
Dr. Sigwan Thivierge, Dr. Elma Moses, Van Racine,
Moderated by Kanontienénhtha Brass
Dr. Sigwan Thivierge, Linguistics Scholar from the Long Point First Nation (Winneway, QC), Van Racine MA student (INDI) from the Beaverhouse First Nation and Dr. Elma Moses, Eeyou (Cree) storyteller and scholar, will come together to discuss Indigenous linguistics, especially that of Algonquian, Kartvelian, Anishinaabemowin and Eeyou Languages. More specifically, they will present on Indigenous languages visibility, revitalization and Indigenous linguistics theories.
2:30 PM
(NEW) MATERIALITIES: INTERDISCIPLINARY BEADING, FEATHERWORK AND TANNING
Brooke Rice, Sierra Barber, Rodrigo D’Alcântara
Moderated by Dr. Miranda Smitheram
This panel brings together Sierra Barber, Upper Mohawk/mixed-European artist from Port Dover, ON, Rodrigo D’Alcânta, Brazilian, transnational, and multi-disciplinary visual artist, researcher and curator, and Brooke Rice, Master’s student, Individualized Program (INDI) and member of the Snipe clan of the Kanien’kehá:ka Nation. Each panelist will present their work which spans painting and beading practices, featherwork, and tanning practices. Together they explore what could be referred to as (new) materialities.
4:00 PM
ABUNDANT INTELLIGENCES: INDIGENOUS KNOWLEDGES AND AI
Dr. Suzanne Kite, Dr. Ceyda Yolgörmez, Leasi Vanessa Lee Raymond, Michael Running Wolf
Moderated by Prof. Jason Edward Lewis
“We are what we imagine,” writes Kiowa author N. Scott Momaday (1997). “Our best destiny is to imagine… who, and what, and that we are.” The Abundant Intelligences research program re-imagines how to conceptualize and design Artificial Intelligence (AI) based on Indigenous Knowledge Systems. Their approach is grounded in Indigenous epistemologies containing robust conceptual frameworks for understanding how technology can be developed in ways that integrate it into existing lifeways, support the flourishing of future generations, and are optimized for abundance rather than scarcity.
Abundant Intelligences is headquartered at the IFRC, directed by an Indigenous leadership group with a majority Indigenous research team of 48 co-investigators and collaborators at 13 universities/research institutes and 8 community-based organizations in Canada, the United States, and New Zealand. The panel will put in conversation Leasi Vanessa Lee Raymond (Samoan, Senior Program Manager white for Abundant Intelligences), Dr. Suzanne Kite (Oglála Lakȟóta performance artist, visual artist, composer and academic), Dr. Ceyda Yolgörmez (Postdoc at the Indigenous Futures Research Centre) and Micheal Running Wolf (Northern Ceyenne/Lakota/Blackfeet, PhD Candidate in Computer Science at McGill University).
5:30 PM
RECEPTION
SHIFT Concordia
Catered by Chef Swaniege