UNews - PUBlic Professor

PUBlic Professor Series talk to highlight the value of oral histories as we examine the Nikkei experience

trevor.kenney — Mon, 20 Jan 2020 21:16:06 +0000

On Thursday, January 23, ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge kinesiology professor, Dr. Carly Adams, will present, “Hey, why don't we have a bonspiel?” Oral Histories, Sport, and (re)Imaging Community. This is the fourth talk of the 2019/20 season for the Faculty of Arts & Science’s PUBlic Professor Series. The free event runs from 7 to 9 p.m. at the Sandman Signature Lethbridge Lodge and is open to the public.

This talk will address two projects, separated by time and space, to consider the place of oral history in contemporary scholarship and communities. On the one hand, Adams considers the case of the Preston Rivulettes, arguably the greatest women’s hockey team ever to lace up their skates. On the other, she considers a current project she's working on with Dr. Darren Aoki (Plymouth ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ, UK), in which they consider community (re)building in the Nikkei community in southern Alberta in the post-WWII period. Individually and together, these projects highlight the value of oral histories, both in terms of drawing attention to histories too often left in the margins of scholarly work, and in reminding ourselves and each other about critical moments, peoples and communities in histories of the places and spaces we inhabit.

Adams is a Board of Governors Research Chair (Tier II), acting associate dean in the School of Graduate Studies and associate professor in the Department of Kinesiology & Physical Education. She is also a founding and active member of the Centre for Oral History and Tradition. She is in her third year of a five-year appointment to the Canada Sports Hall of Fame Honoured Members Selection Committee.

As a social historian and an advocate for oral history, Adams explores community, resiliency and gender in her research, with a focus on sport, recreation and leisure experiences. She is author of Queens of the Ice, a book about the Preston Rivulettes women's hockey team from the 1930s, the editor of a textbook, Sport and Recreation in Canadian History and co-editor of Routledge Handbook of Sport History, both forthcoming in 2020.

In 2017, she teamed with Aoki and several community partners (Galt Museum, Nikka Yuko Japanese Canadian Garden and Nikkei Cultural Society of Lethbridge and Area) to launch the Nikkei Memory Capture Project, a long-term community-based oral history project to spur the narration of the history of Japanese Canadians in the second half of the twentieth century.

PUBlic Professor Series talk analyzes the benefits and risks of artificial intelligence

trevor.kenney — Wed, 13 Nov 2019 21:12:56 +0000

We hear about artificial intelligence (AI) in all sorts of high-tech and somewhat distant technologies like self-driving cars and robotics, but AI is here in your life right now in ways that you may not realize. Banking, insurance, medicine, education and the justice system all offer examples of how AI has been and continues to be put to use. But what are the downsides to this, and how can we harness the power of AI in ways that benefit everyone? From deciding who gets a bank loan to learning how men and women write differently, we need to have an understanding of how AI is being used, and what the implications mig We hear about artificial intelligence (AI) in all sorts of high-tech and somewhat distant technologies like self-driving cars and robotics, but AI is here in your life right now in ways that you may not realize. Banking, insurance, medicine, education and the justice system all offer examples of how AI has been and continues to be put to use. But what are the downsides to this, and how can we harness the power of AI in ways that benefit everyone? From deciding who gets a bank loan to learning how men and women write differently, we need to have an understanding of how AI is being used, and what the implications might be.

On Thursday, Nov. 21, Dr. Jackie Rice will present The Benefits and Risks of Artificial Intelligence.

On Thursday, Nov. 21, ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge computer science professor, Dr. Jackie Rice, will present The Benefits and Risks of Artificial Intelligence. This is the third talk of the 2019/20 season for the Faculty of Arts & Science’s PUBlic Professor Series. The free event runs from 7 to 9 p.m. at the Sandman Signature Lethbridge Lodge and is open to the public.

Rice earned a BSc in 1993, an MSc in 1995, and a PhD in computer science in 2003 from the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Victoria. From 1995 to 2000 she worked as a computer consultant for various areas of industry and has been teaching at post-secondary institutions since 1995. She has taught at the U of L for the past 17 years.

Rice's experiences as one of very few women in her area have shaped how she conducts research. As well, these experiences have given her the drive to encourage diversity, and not just in computer science. As a result, Rice is active in outreach and mentoring for young people from many different backgrounds, including working with the local sea cadets as a civilian instructor. She is currently an associate dean with the Faculty of Arts & Science.

In this talk, she will explore both the benefits of the amazing recent advances in artificial intelligence, as well as the risks these present to society.

PUBlic Professor Series event explores how humans talk to robots

trevor.kenney — Mon, 21 Oct 2019 15:58:39 +0000

Robotics is a transformative technology, and within the coming decade, we’ll likely have smart and helpful machines that will exist alongside us at home and in the workplace. Those machines should, quite literally, do what we tell them to do. That is, we should be able to communicate our goals to robotics systems in the same way we interact with other people; we should be able to talk to robots. However, there’s a significant problem: most robots can’t hear.

Dr. Matthew Tata’s Cognitive Robotics Lab in the U of L’s Department of Neuroscience has been developing auditory AI for the past five years.

On Thursday, Oct. 24, ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge neuroscience professor, Dr. Matthew Tata, will present How to Talk to Your Robot: Using Cognitive Neuroscience to Make Robots That Can Hear. This is the second talk of the 2019/20 season for the Faculty of Arts & Science’s PUBlic Professor Series. The free event runs from 7 to 9 p.m. at the Sandman Signature Lethbridge Lodge and is open to the public.

Tata’s Cognitive Robotics Lab in the U of L’s Department of Neuroscience has been developing auditory AI for the past five years, and this talk will explore how we solve some of the problems that face all hearing systems, whether they are biological or machine. Auditory AI needs to solve these computational problems in fast and efficient ways, so we turn to the human brain for inspiration in developing our algorithms. By studying how we localize sounds, understand speech, and focus our auditory attention, we not only achieve a better understanding of how the human brain works, but we also can translate these discoveries into algorithms for robots so they can behave more naturally in the auditory world.

His research program explores how the brain solves the computational problems of vision and hearing, using a range of technologies including dense-array electroencephalography (EEG), perceptual psychophysics and computer simulations. He is passionate about applied science and the translation of basic research into technologies that help people

Tata is also the co-founder and CEO of Reverb Robotics, a Lethbridge-based tech startup that develops auditory artificial intelligence for robotics and autonomous applications.

PUBlic Professor Series opens with an exploration of what it means to be human

trevor.kenney — Mon, 23 Sep 2019 16:07:54 +0000

Seeing ourselves in other animals is a very human thing to do. On the one hand, this is entirely appropriate — we are animals ourselves after all. On the other hand, it can give rise to a misleading view of other species if we insist on comparing them to humans, especially as we often consider ourselves to be above the other animals: our large relative brain size, and spectacular ability to invent and use technology, seems to place us at a remove from the rest of the Animal Kingdom. How best, then, to understand what it means to be human, and appreciate our place in Nature?

Dr. Louise Barrett will present, Supercharged Apes and Supersized Minds, How to Think Like an Animal, to open the 2019-20 season of the PUBlic Professor Series.

On Thursday, September 26, ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge psychology professor, Dr. Louise Barrett, will present Supercharged Apes and Supersized Minds: How to Think Like an Animal. This is the first regular talk of the 2019-20 season for the Faculty of Arts & Science’s PUBlic Professor Series. The free event runs from 7 to 9 p.m. at the Sandman Signature Lethbridge Lodge and is open to the public.

Barrett has studied the behaviour of wild African primates for the past 25 years, along with studies of human behaviour and ecology. In this talk, she offers her perspective on how humans and other species differ, and how to reconcile our animal and cultural natures. Her suggestion is that we need to pay as much attention to bodies as well as brains, and the manner that humans and other animals extend their biological capacities by exploiting the structure of the environment. What makes humans clever may, paradoxically perhaps, be found outside our heads, rather than in them.

Barrett was born and educated in London, England. She holds a BSc in ecology and a PhD in anthropology from ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ College London, and is currently a Canada Research Chair in Cognition, Evolution and Behaviour at the U of L. In 2016, Barrett was inducted as a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada. In collaboration with Peter Henzi, Barrett ran the De Hoop Baboon Project in South Africa for 12 years, and currently co-directs the Samara Vervet Monkey Project in South Africa (10 years and counting).

Her research centres on the issue of how ecology shapes patterns of social evolution, from a “radical enactivist” perspective, and includes work on thermal physiology and responses to climate change, early life experience and behavioural plasticity, social network influences on behaviour, and collective behaviour.

She is also interested in how culture and biology intersect to influence human behaviour and runs several projects on human behavioural ecology, including field research in Samoa and the Canadian North. Her most recent book is Beyond the Brain: How Body and Environment Shape Animal and Human Minds (Princeton ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ Press).

PUBlic Professor Series features Johnston discussing the role of place in shaping our past, present and future

trevor.kenney — Fri, 22 Feb 2019 17:13:07 +0000

Just as every population cohort is presented with different sets of circumstances, every geographic location has associated with it, constraints and opportunities that are specific to time and place.

This is the fifth talk of the 2018-19 season for the Faculty of Arts & Science’s PUBlic Professor Series.

On Thursday, February 28, ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge geography professor, Dr. Tom Johnston, will present The Geography of Circumstance. This is the fifth talk of the 2018-19 season for the Faculty of Arts & Science’s PUBlic Professor Series. The free event runs from 7 to 9 p.m. at the Sandman Signature Lethbridge Lodge and is open to the public.

Drawing on examples ranging in scale from the neighbourhood to the nation-state, from the micro scale to the macro, in this presentation Johnston will explore the manner in which geographic location, both in absolute and relative terms, plays a role in shaping futures and helps us explain the present and the past.

Before taking up his appointment at the U of L, Johnston earned degrees from the universities of Guelph and Waterloo, and completed a post-doctoral fellowship at Massey ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ in New Zealand. His research interests focus on resource policy analysis and structural change in rural systems, especially the agricultural sector. His current research projects include a study of the effectiveness of voluntary-adoption resource stewardship programming, and human dimensions of wildfire, especially the post-event recovery phase.

Johnston teaches courses on introductory human geography, agricultural geography, the rural-urban fringe, the geography of Canada and the history of geographic thought.

The final talk scheduled for 2018-19 will feature geography professor, Dr. Hester Jiskoot. Details on Jiskoot’s presentation can be found at: ulethbridge.ca/artsci/publicprofessor.

PUBlic Professor Series talk explores the building blocks of African development

trevor.kenney — Fri, 18 Jan 2019 21:34:07 +0000

African development efforts have gone through sharp turns and twists since the dawn of independence in the late 1950s. Lessons from analyzing these efforts point to the reorientation of the incentive structures for politicians, business elites and the electorates, as the critical pillar among the building blocks of Africa’s development.

On Thursday, January 24, ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge economics professor Dr. Alexander Darku will present The Building Blocks of Africa's Development: Resources, Politics and Economics. This is the fourth talk of the 2018/19 season for the Faculty of Arts & Science’s PUBlic Professor Series. The free event runs from 7 to 9 p.m. at the Sandman Signature Lethbridge Lodge and is open to the public.

In this presentation, Darku will critically analyze the factors that have driven Africa’s growth and development through its resources, political and economic building blocks in three different periods. The first period (1957-1965) marks the early sweep of independence and the ascendency to political leadership of nationalistic figures (the great enthusiasm and foundation era). The second period (1966-early 1980s) witnessed the second wave of independence and the emergence of military coup d’état to depose the nationalistic leaders who supposedly had become power drunk and destructive to nation building efforts (the transition and derailment of nation building era). The third period (early 1980s-present) is the policy and program realignment era, where the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank took centre stage of economic policy formulation and implementation through the Stabilization and Structural Adjustment Programs.

Dr. Alexander Darku is an associate professor of economics at the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge and an associate director of the Prentice Institute for Global Population and the Economy. Darku has two main lines of research. The first focuses on the relationship between international trade, economic growth and income distribution, in the developing countries. The second focuses on the relationship between business cycles, poverty and income inequality. In addition to numerous articles in international peer review journals, and background papers to policy documents at the World Bank, Darku is also the author of three books.

Further talks scheduled for 2018/19 feature Dr. Tom Johnston (geography) and Dr. Hester Jiskoot (geography). Details on each of their presentations can be found at: ulethbridge.ca/artsci/publicprofessor.

PUBlic Professor Series talk explores why Canadians remember some wars and let others fade

trevor.kenney — Mon, 19 Nov 2018 22:12:53 +0000

The first time the new Dominion of Canada sent troops overseas, and the first time it fought in a war against another country, was on the veldts of South Africa. This would seem, among those who associate military firsts with national maturity, to be a significant milestone. But Canadians, by and large, don’t remember their participation in the Second Anglo-Boer War (1899-1902).

On Thursday, November 22, ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge Canadian Studies professor, Dr. Amy Shaw, will present 'A Devil-May-Care Sort of Swagger’, A Case for Remembering Canada in the Boer War.

Why? Why do we remember some wars and let others fade? The Boer War’s relative absence in our national memory is a shame because having it as part of our narrative could help us understand several elements of late-Victorian Canadian society, including ideas about gender roles, perceptions of duty, and how imperialism was understood on an individual level.

On Thursday, November 22, ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge Canadian Studies professor, Dr. Amy Shaw, will present 'A Devil-May-Care Sort of Swagger’: A Case for Remembering Canada in the Boer War. This is the third talk of the 2018/19 season for the Faculty of Arts & Science’s PUBlic Professor Series. The free event runs from 7 to 9 p.m. at the Sandman Signature Lethbridge Lodge and is open to the public.

Shaw is an associate professor in the Department of History at the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge where she teaches courses in Canadian history, especially cultural and military history. She grew up in Ontario and earned her PhD from Western ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ, in London, Ont. In her teaching and research, Shaw is interested in understandings of citizenship and responsibility, especially in wartime, and how they intersect with ideas about gender.

Some of Shaw’s research on the Boer War has been published in articles on dissent in Canada against the war, and on the public discussion of soldiers’ bodies during the war. Her current book project gathers this all together to look more broadly at Canadian perceptions of the Anglo-Boer War, especially in terms of ideas about imperialism.

The Second Anglo-Boer War was seen by many Canadians as an opportunity to showcase British imperial righteousness and unity, as well as the distinctive national strengths of the young Dominion. Shaw is very interested in how many commentators of the day talked about the bodies of the Canadian soldiers, and the Afrikaners they were fighting. Examining how the soldiers were represented, and what this might mean about normative manliness and the qualities and behaviour of ideal citizens, offers useful insight into the society of the day, and of Canadians’ relationship to imperialism at the turn of the twentieth century.

Further talks scheduled for 2018/19 feature Dr. Alexander Darku (economics), Dr. Tom Johnston (geography) and Dr. Hester Jiskoot (geography). Details on each of their presentations can be found at: ulethbridge.ca/artsci/publicprofessor.

Dramatic Arctic rescue story of Captain Robert Abram Bartlett the focus of PUBlic Professor Series talk

trevor.kenney — Mon, 22 Oct 2018 17:25:00 +0000

Captain Robert Abram Bartlett (1875-1946) attempted the Pole with Admiral Peary, worked to advance Canadian sovereignty in the Arctic, and, in 1914, was responsible for one of the most remarkable Arctic rescues of all time. His fame extended throughout North America to Europe where he won awards and dined with royalty. Bartlett’s story mirrors that of other early 20th century explorers such as Vilhjalmur Stefansson, Ernest Shackleton, Robert Falcon Scott, Donald MacMillan, and others.

On Thursday, October 25, ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge geography professor, Dr. Maura Hanrahan, will present, Creating Heroes and Claiming the North: Captain Robert Abram Bartlett in the Arctic, as the second talk of the 2018/19 Faculty of Arts & Science’s PUBlic Professor Series. The free event runs from 7 to 9 p.m. at the Sandman Signature Lethbridge Lodge and is open to the public.

Hanrahan earned degrees at Memorial ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ, Carleton ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ and the London School of Economics where she was a Rothermere Fellow and an LSE Fellow. She worked in First Nations and Inuit land claims, right litigation and policy for Indigenous governments across Canada, the federal government and the UN. Later, she was Memorial ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ’s first Special Advisor to the President for Aboriginal Affairs and, following that, Chair of Memorial’s Humanities Program.

She is currently an associate professor in the Department of Geography at the U of L and an adjunct professor at Memorial ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ’s Environmental Policy Institute. She was born and raised in Newfoundland. Through her mother, she is a citizen of Ireland. Through her father, she is a member of Splet’q Mi’Kmaq First Nation, now under the umbrella of Qalipu Mi’Kmaq First Nation.

Like the other explorers, Bartlett's successes in Arctic exploration were made possible by deliberate and sustained heroic masculine image-making, which masked the complexities of his personality and of his work in the Arctic. On the lecture circuit, in his books and on film, Bartlett carefully constructed a well-received image, buoyed by general understandings of the Arctic as undiscovered and devoid of any organized society. This made the Arctic a unique site for western male exploits. Its harsh environment and climate elevated the Arctic to a testing and proving ground. As explorers foregrounded themselves, they backgrounded the Inuit whose participation in Arctic expeditions was vital. This approach cost and still costs the Inuit. It cost the explorers, too; Bartlett, for one, suppressed his personal struggles as he sought to mirror the image he so successfully created.

This talk promises compelling images, gripping stories of danger and human drama, and important insights on the role Arctic exploration continues to play in Canada for the Inuit and for all Canadians.

Further talks scheduled for 2018/19 feature Dr. Amy Shaw (history), Dr. Alexander Darku (economics), Dr. Tom Johnston (geography) and Dr. Hester Jiskoot (geography). Details on each of their presentations can be found at: ulethbridge.ca/artsci/publicprofessor.

Kingfisher explores models of happiness

trevor.kenney — Fri, 16 Mar 2018 16:47:37 +0000

Dr. Catherine Kingfisher, a professor and researcher in the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge’s Department of Anthropology, will present Locating Happiness: Beyond Individualism on Thursday, Mar. 22, 7 p.m. at the Lethbridge Lodge. The talk just happens to coincide with the focus of her current research project, which is aimed at a non-academic audience and specifically policy makers.

Dr. Catherine Kingfisher has always been keen on influencing public policy with her work, with her latest project designed specifically to appeal to non-��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ, which include policy makers.

The project is a study of two urban collective housing communities, one in Japan, the other in Vancouver. Kingfisher is exploring, in a broad sense, the concept of happiness and what kind of constructs in today’s society serve as models for happiness. She does this against a backdrop of neoliberalism that champions the good life but places responsibility on individuals for achieving their own happiness.

Her current work is the latest progression in an anthropological career that began with her undergraduate studies at Beloit College in Wisconsin, followed by master’s and PhD studies at Michigan State ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ. Her interest in the discipline can be traced back even further, rooted in a childhood that saw her raised in both the United States and the Middle East by two parents from France.

“I think I developed an early sense of cultural relativity, which is the idea that the way we live in the world is only one possibility among many. So, that’s a clear line to anthropology,” she says.

Kingfisher has been at the U of L since 1999, having come to Lethbridge after a six-year stint at ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Waikato in New Zealand where she taught women and gender studies.

Much of her early work at the U of L examined issues of power, inequality, poverty and welfare reform. In 2010, she took note of the rapid rise in happiness studies and the hyper individualization that was being championed. She was appointed a ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ Scholar Research Chair and also earned CREDO funding, allowing her the opportunity to attack the issue.

“I was actively looking for models of happiness and well-being and the good life that do not locate it inside people’s heads but rather in what goes on between people and in particular forms of social organization,” she says.

She spent time in Samoa and then eventually turned her focus to intentional communities in Japan and Vancouver. Urban collective housing communities construct an entirely different approach to achieving happiness because they are founded on community support and engagement – and it seems to be a model that is gaining momentum.

“We’re kind of on the cusp of this as an idea that’s taking off, and anybody I talk to is extremely interested. There’s this real sense of a loss of community ties and people really wanting that. So, I think it’s an idea whose time has come,” she says, citing studies that show how loneliness effectively kills people.

“There’s this recognition that we live in a fragmented, alienated society. I’m not saying everyone needs to move into these communities but we need to look more broadly at what kinds of models of the good life are out there that aren’t just about me talking to myself to develop a more positive attitude.”

While Kingfisher has always been keen on influencing public policy with her work, this project is designed specifically to appeal to non-��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ, which include policy makers.

“The primary output of this project is not going to be academic, it’s going to be a book collaboratively produced with people in both communities,” she says.

She is also working with fellow faculty member Don Gill (fine arts) to produce film shorts that focus on everyday life in each community.

“My big agenda in this project is to spread awareness that there are alternatives out there. If there’s one alternative, there are no doubt many more, so let’s look around. It’s about spreading the word that there are these other ways of thinking about happiness and well-being that don’t just make it something that’s inside your head,” she says.

The PUBlic Professor venue is an ideal opportunity to spread that message.

“I think the format of PUBlic Professor is absolutely brilliant because it challenges ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ to translate our work in ways that demonstrate its relevance to society at large, and also gives us the opportunity to learn from the feedback we get from the audience.”

Robinson finds rich story in research quest

trevor.kenney — Thu, 08 Feb 2018 17:21:17 +0000

Research can be like any expedition – sometimes your proposed route isn’t near as interesting as the side road upon which you happen.

For Dr. Tom Robinson (religious studies), one of those side roads led to an unintended research project and eventual biography of a superstar child evangelist who had previously been ignored in scholarly circles. Her story, and its broader representation of a tumultuous time in American history, is the subject of Robinson’s PUBlic Professor series talk on Thursday, Feb. 15, 2018, 7 to 9 p.m. at the Lethbridge Lodge.

The opportunity to tell the story of a child evangelist set against the backdrop of the Roaring 20s was something Dr. Tom Robinson could not ignore.

Robinson will present Sex, Drugs, Jesus, and Gin as he explores the “Roaring Twenties”, an age of clashes and conflicts, and the life of Uldine Utley, a child evangelist as widely known in her day as the child stars of Hollywood.

He was researching another project when he stumbled upon a column about a girl evangelist that piqued his interest. He skimmed some more articles about her and the phenomenon of child evangelists and was about to resume his intended path of study when he noticed an oddity about the data.

“Clearly there were more references to girl evangelists in the 1920s and 1930s than in any other decade. They were always present, but always fewer than the references to boy evangelists, except in the 1920s and 30s,” says Robinson. “The why question just jumped out at me. I looked at it and basically said ‘You can’t leave that one’.”

The evangelist, Utley, was a true superstar of the times. She began her preaching career at age 11, published a monthly magazine by 12, and by the age of 14 was regularly filling the largest venues in major American cities, including Carnegie Hall and Madison Square Garden. And while authors rarely say a book is easy to write, Robinson admits that the subject matter, the era and the lack of previous study on Utley essentially begged him to put pen to paper.

“Working in a small department like we have here, you teach everything to do with the area you’re in, so while my specialty is considered Christianity in the Roman Empire, I had the opportunity to explore this,” he says. “You never really know if this hampers your work in your primary field, but at the same time you are in control of things and you make your own choices. In this instance, when something falls into your lap that hasn’t been worked on, it’s rare you get that opportunity, so you go with it.”

As Robinson dove deeper into the subject, he discovered that Utley, who passed away in 1995, had a surviving niece and nephew. Meeting with them unearthed a treasure trove of assets, including a cache of unpublished poems that painted a complex portrait of a tortured young woman struggling to uphold the expectations of revivalism against her desire for a normal life.

This contradiction is Robinson’s bailiwick. A faculty member at the U of L for 31 years (he retired this past spring), Robinson says he has always approached issues from a critical perspective, looking at consensus and asking whether the popular theory actually holds up against critical analysis. His study of religion has been the result of a lifelong interest in the subject, having grown up in what he calls a “fairly pious family”. His bachelor studies at the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of New Brunswick focused on philosophy and ancient Greek language, before he pursued a Master’s in Biblical Studies at Vancouver’s Regent College and a PhD in Religious Studies at McMaster ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ in Hamilton.

Looking back over his career, Robinson sees a university that has continued to evolve as it has grown, reflected by the students in his classes.

“In my first years here, that I would have a Muslim or a Hindu student in class would be quite rare. Now, in Religious Studies 1000 we have about 280 students and every semester we have lots of Muslim students, quite a few Hindu students, Sikh students and a mixture of people in Christian traditions. That’s a significant change and reflective of the diversity of our student body.”

The study of religion, and religion itself, will likely never go away, he says, if only because the human experience necessitates some sort of support mechanism, which many have found and still find in religion.

“Will humans ever develop beyond some sort of religious sensibility or some sense of mystery? I think that’s a long way off,” he says. “There’s no doubt that religion can be damaging but it can also be stabilizing. If all the world became prosperous, everyone had no uncertainties, a new car in the garage and a Costco membership, maybe religion would suffer. But I would guess there are enough irregularities of human life that religion will be here as a resource for a long time.”

For a look at the PUBlic Professor Series and upcoming talks, check out this website.

UNews - PUBlic Professor

PUBlic Professor Series talk to highlight the value of oral histories as we examine the Nikkei experience

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PUBlic Professor Series features Johnston discussing the role of place in shaping our past, present and future

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