UNews - Department of English

Doing open science in COVID-19 times

caroline.zentner — Tue, 03 Nov 2020 18:16:38 +0000

One might assume the travel restrictions imposed as a result of the COVID pandemic would have open science researchers ready at the bat.

While open access to science aims to make scientific research and data easily available to the broader public, it turns out the digital environment may have a few gaps. Dr. Dan O’Donnell, an English professor with expertise in digital humanities, wanted to take a closer look at how science training was faring in the pandemic and he’ll explore the topic thanks to a $50,000 US grant from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.

“Ultimately, the project is to look at how all the different open science training organizations have been adapting to the shutdowns due to COVID-19, what resources they’ve used to adapt and to what degree what they’re doing might be better or pointing to improvements,” says O’Donnell, the principal investigator.

One such science training organization is Force 11, of which O’Donnell is past president. As a scholarly society, it focuses on how technology can be used to improve open access, partially through its summer school on scholarly communication at the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of California — Los Angeles. About 20 other groups are also participating in the project, including The Carpentries, which teaches coding and data science skills to researchers, and OpenCon, a platform for students and early career academic professionals to advance open access across disciplines.

“All of these organizations are groups that train people in open science,” says O’Donnell. “One of the really interesting things about the way we’re trained to be researchers is that it’s the only thing we’re trained in where we are not trained by an expert; we’re trained by watching someone else, usually our professors.”

Given rapid technological developments, open science research and training and data management can outpace the kind of training students are getting. Open science training organizations aim to fill the need.

The project, expected to take eight months to a year, is in its beginning stages but O’Donnell has some anecdotal evidence based on the fact the Force 11 summer school was forced to go completely online this past summer. The summer school provides space for people who have developed new tools, methods or approaches to teach their material to students.

“Our sense at the Force 11 summer institute is that we’ve discovered what we should have been doing,” he says. “While in-person was great, people really loved it, they felt they made good contacts and the networking was fantastic, the cost barrier was quite high. We certainly doubled our attendees by going online.”

The digital format worked better for teaching purposes, but not all facets of the summer institute could be carried out in an open fashion. The group couldn’t find an open registration system and ended up cobbling together an alternative. The conference has focused on enabling participation from low- and mid-income economies but using Zoom meant the group had to follow American software licensing rules and that prevented students in some countries, such as Iran, from participating.

“You should be able to conduct open science iteratively as open science, even train open science using open materials,” O’Donnell says. “Discovering that that’s not possible is actually going to be an important result.”

U of L English student earns two academic awards

caroline.zentner — Thu, 20 Dec 2018 22:34:37 +0000

Silva Baiton, a fourth-year ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge student, didn’t expect her essay would win this year’s Michael Chan Prize in Asian Studies, let alone win a second award when she presented her essay at a conference.

“I was super excited to find out about the Michael Chan Prize,” she says. “I was scheduled to present the paper at the Japan Studies Association of Canada annual conference the next weekend so it definitely gave me a boost of confidence.”

The second award, the Klaus Pringsheim Student Presentation Award, was given to her following the conference.

“I was the only undergraduate student at this conference,” she says. “When I got the email that I won first place, I was in shock for about 10 minutes. It was a great experience and I learned a lot at the conference.”

Baiton, an English major with a double minor in Asian Studies and Japanese Studies, wrote about Burakumin, an outcaste group in Japan that has experienced severe discrimination. Historically, they were at the bottom of the social order because they worked in occupations that were considered to be tainted by death, such as butchers, slaughterhouse workers, leather workers and undertakers.

“I was drawn to this topic because, in my second year, I went to two lectures by a scholar named Jessica Main,” she says. “She talked about this subject of Burakumin and how these people were discriminated against.”

Dr. Main is a professor in the Department of Asian Studies at the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of British Columbia who focuses her research on modern Buddhist ethics, social action and institutional life in East and Southeast Asia.

“Even today, if you have this heritage there’s still discrimination going on,” says Baiton. “People have trouble entering companies and getting ahead in society. They’re kind of forced to reject that heritage.”

Baiton’s essay discussed the origins of Burakumin subcaste, which dates from as early as the 700s, and developments through to the modern period of Japan, roughly the late 1800s. She described their resistance efforts and the role of literature in the resistance, as well as how these people were represented in the literature of the time.

“Usually, these representations were pretty negative and the characters were exploited,” she says. “I’m interested in how literature can influence the discourses around Japanese identity and what that means. Because of their physical and social isolation, Burakumin were not thought to be ethnically Japanese; instead people believed they came from Korea, Russia or elsewhere. So, although this group actually was Japanese, they were further othered and excluded from society in a circular way.”

In March, Baiton will travel to Tokyo to participate in an exchange program at Rikkyo ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ until August, before returning to the U of L to complete her final year of studies. She hopes to teach English in Japan and, eventually, pursue a master’s in Japanese literature.

Pursuing such a dense program of studies has made Baiton a disciplined time manager.

“I try to schedule times to just relax and I never work late into the night or lose sleep. You have to be at your best if you want to do well,” she says. “Also, I think it’s important not to compete with others or compare yourself to others or what they’re doing. Just try to do your own best and don’t expect too much and then if something good comes along, then it’s just really affirming of the hard work you’ve done.”

Alumni Profile - Brenna Scott

trevor.kenney — Tue, 24 Apr 2018 17:26:27 +0000

Alumni have always played an important role in the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ community and the U of L Alumni Association (ULAA) has been key in that process. Whether at ULAA executive meetings, or board and senate meetings, this diverse group represents U of L alumni around the world.

But just who are they? Get to know your ULAA council members through this series of profiles.

Meet Brenna

Brenna Scott with her beloved dog, Waffles.

She’s a passionate volunteer with a penchant for organization and a dog named Waffles. U of L Alumni Association Vice-President Brenna Scott (BA ’16) shares these and other things you might find interesting.

Name: Brenna Scott

Role on the ULAA: Vice President

Hometown: Calgary, Alta.

Degree: Bachelor of Arts

Major: English

Student Clubs/Activities: ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge Students’ Union

Current Job: Administrative Assistant at Select People Solutions

Favourite U of L Memory: Advocating on behalf of students during my time as Students’ Union President

What is the first thing you want people to know about you? I am passionate about writing and volunteering in the community; I have Crohn’s disease; and I have a wheaten terrier named Waffles who I am absolutely obsessed with. (I also could not pick just one thing to share).

What is an unusual habit or an absurd thing you love? I absolutely love organizing and sometimes have to restrain myself from organizing someone else’s desk during meetings.

What is your favourite fail? (A time when an apparent failure was for the best). My favorite fail is definitely when we bought our puppy Waffles. At the time, my spouse and I lived in a basement suite that had a clear “no pet policy” but, unfortunately, I wasn’t able to follow the rule because I fell in love with the dog (and who can say no to love?). As a result, we ended up buying the puppy and, in turn, for the first month he came absolutely EVERYWHERE with me. It all worked out in the end though because our landlord at the time was a realtor and ended up finding us our first home. We always joke that we bought our first home not for us, but for our dog.

What is the best investment you’ve ever made? (Can be money, time, energy, etc.) The best investment I’ve ever made was definitely my degree. I learned so much in those five years, not only through my classes, but through the experiences I had that helped shape me into the person I am today.

What purchase of $100 or less has most positively impacted your life in the last six months? I bought entry to the Colour Fun Run when my work decided to enter a team and it was definitely a great use of my money! I have always wanted to do a Colour Run. We had a blast getting colour thrown at us and took loads of photos once we were all colourful. If you haven’t participated in the run before I would highly recommend it!

What belief, behaviour or habit has most improved your life since graduation? Always being open to meeting new people. You never know how those connections will positively impact you down the line. Find something you are passionate about and get involved! That is the best way to meet like-minded people.

Future Commons project designed to foster new research network

caroline.zentner — Wed, 15 Nov 2017 20:56:09 +0000

While the Internet was originally designed as a way for research scientists to share their work, people soon began using it for all types of communication from email to online shopping. The resulting revolution in global communication changed the playing field for many businesses and industries except for, ironically, research publishing.

“The Internet was designed as a system for scholarly communication and it’s really the only industry that hasn’t been radically disrupted,” says Dr. Dan O’Donnell, a ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge professor in the Department of English. “The same journals are still in charge, the same five publishers still run the market and the profit margins are the same.”

O’Donnell concentrates most of his research in the Digital Humanities, a field of study that applies tools and methods from computer science to humanities fields such as history, philosophy and literature. The more he dug into the publishing system, the more he became aware that scholarship is still being evaluated and rewarded using performance indicators from the print era. Wanting to address the lack of innovation in scholarly publishing, O’Donnell began working on building a different kind of research network called Future Commons.

“The goal of Future Commons is to develop a set of principles that you can use to adhere to best practice across your research life,” he says. “One of our principles is that research should be freely and publicly available but another of our principles is that you can have closed tools or services. Openness is a principle of ours but we’re not solely about openness, in fact, we’re trying to find a space where corporations could still make profit.”

O’Donnell, along with Educopia Institute, a non-profit organization devoted to building networks and collaborative communities, Force 11, a community working to change scholarly communication through use of information technology, and the universities of Montreal and California-San Diego, recently received $200,000 over two years from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada to move Future Commons forward.

The Open Access model provides scholarly research that is digital, online, free of charge and free of most copyright and licensing restrictions. The model is better developed in the Global South (mid-and low-income economies) than it is in the Global North (high-income economies). To build some bridges between ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ and students on both sides, some of the research funding will go toward a summer school in San Diego in July. The goal is to teach people across disciplines about best practice in scholarly communication.

“The idea is that we can learn a lot back and forth across the boundary. In the north, we have very robust systems for academic freedom and investigator freedom,” says O’Donnell. “In the Global South, Open Access publication is far better developed and much more integral to the lives of individual researchers.

Another aspect of the program will provide opportunities for students through Innovation in Scholarly Communication Fellowships. Students will be invited to propose a project on innovation in scholarly communication and the U of L School of Graduate Studies will pay the tuition while the student does an independent study based on the proposed project.

O’Donnell expects work on the Future Commons will extend into the future as more partners are added and it becomes a full-fledged research network.

“Academic research is a huge driver of our economies and yet, it’s a fairly inefficient system and there’s a lot of evidence that says, because it’s traditionally conservative, it’s not following best practice,” he says. “Given how much money the public invests in university research, one of the goals here is to at least improve the efficiency of the delivery system without selling the public good to private corporations.”

U of L researchers awarded more than $907,000 in research funding

caroline.zentner — Wed, 15 Nov 2017 17:40:49 +0000

Today, Kirsty Duncan, Canada’s Minister of Science, announced the recipients of several Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) grants and seven ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge researchers are among those who secured funding for their projects.

“I want to commend the grant and scholarships recipients whose tireless efforts help us better understand our world and our relationships with each other,” says Duncan. “Our government is proud to support these talented researchers and scholars who are pushing the boundaries of knowledge to the benefit of Canadians and our growing middle class.”

“We are extremely pleased that seven U of L research projects were successful in this competition,” says Dr. Claudia Malacrida, associate vice-president (research). “It demonstrates the strength of our researchers in the social sciences and humanities and we congratulate each one of them.”

The funding includes Partnership Development Grants, designed to foster new research with new or existing partners, Insight Development Grants that support research in its beginning stages, and Insight Grants for long-term research initiatives. The research projects are diverse, spanning the fields of visual arts, anthropology, psychology, digital humanities, finance and history and gender studies.

Dr. Dan O'Donnell

Dr. Dan O’Donnell, a professor in the Department of English, conducts research in the Digital Humanities, where tools and methods from computer science are applied to humanities fields like history, philosophy and literature. His digital tools, like the Internet, make it easy to share research information widely, but O’Donnell has found the world of research publishing hasn’t changed much, with the same major publishers running the market. He began working on building a different kind of research network called Future Commons where research is freely shared and publicly available and where corporations can still make a profit. The Partnership Development Grant, which includes three other organizations, will facilitate research to further the Future Commons network. For more information visit Future Commons.

Mary Kavanagh

Mary Kavanagh, a professor in the Department of Art, will examine nuclear anxiety in the post-Cold War era through interviews with visitors to Trinity, the site of the world’s first atomic bomb detonation. A rehearsal for the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Trinity was the codename for the test blast in 1945, deep in the desert south of the Manhattan project’s headquarters in Los Alamos, New Mexico. Tourists now flock to the site during bi-annual open houses. Kavanagh, through interviews conducted at the site, plans to generate a series of art works or “chapters” that include moving-image vignettes, photographic works, book works, installations and an experimental documentary film that explores urgent questions of the nuclear age. For more information visit Atomic Tourism.

Dr. Catherine Kingfisher

Dr. Catherine Kingfisher, an anthropology professor, will explore urban collective housing communities as non-individualistic approaches to well-being. Such communities work to balance independence and interdependence by including both personal/private and shared/collective spaces, and, unlike many intentional communities, are integrated with, rather than segregated from, society at large. Kingfisher will compare communities in Tokyo and Vancouver to gain insight into how this model of the good life operates in cultural contexts that historically and ideologically have stressed different aspects of individualism and collectivism. The project is situated in the context of increasing academic and governmental interest in happiness and well-being. For more information visit Intentional Communities.

Dr. Fangfang Li

Dr. Fangfang Li, a psychology professor, will examine factors that may influence speech errors in second-language learners. She found that errors made by local students in French Immersion programs persisted over time, even though researchers expected the students would make fewer speech errors when they reached higher grades. Li hypothesizes that the errors persist because opportunities to speak with native French speakers are limited in a community where English is the dominant language. Li’s research will look at a mixed bilingual program in Edmonton to see if the second-language learners there, who have more opportunity to speak with native speakers, produce more accurate speech as they advance to higher grades. For more information visit Second-language Learning.

Dr. Yutao Li

Dr. Yutao Li, a professor in the Faculty of Management at the U of L’s Calgary campus, will explore the costs and benefits of banks’ involvement in lending networks. While greater connectivity in a network can be helpful because it gives a bank more information it can use to evaluate a borrower’s credit risk, it can also be detrimental if risk enters the financial system and spreads throughout the network, as it did during the financial crisis of 2007-2008. Li’s study is the first to investigate banks’ lending networks and the research will help build understanding about how banks’ network connectivity affects information acquisition, lending practices and quality of financial reporting. For more information visit Banking Networks.

Dr. Paul Vasey

Dr. Paul Vasey, a psychology professor, will delve into competition for mates in cultures that recognize third genders, specifically the muxes in the Istmo region of Oaxaca, Mexico and the fa’afafine in Samoa. The fa’afafine and muxes are same-sex attracted feminine males or what could be termed transgender in North America. They engage in sexual activity with masculine men who are bisexual, thus creating a competitive atmosphere for heterosexual women. In contrast, women in Euro-American cultures most often face competition from other women. Vasey and his students will conduct research in Canada and at their field sites in Samoa and Mexico to see how the presence of third-gender males affects the behaviour and psychology of heterosexual individuals. For more information visit Mate Competition.

Dr. Carol Williams

Dr. Carol Williams, a professor in Women and Gender Studies and History, and her collaborators, Linda Weasel Head, Hali Heavy Shield and Faye Heavy Shield, will assemble diverse and new historical accounts of Kainai women’s social reform work between 1968 and 1990. The researchers will engage with the Kainai community and propose a series of cultural and historical workshops for all age groups to encourage conversation and storytelling. The study hopes to challenge the colonial character of the archives as they exist and the myths of Indigenous-Settler relations. The study, in line with the recommendations from the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, seeks to expand historical literacy about how Kainai women transformed their communities. For more information visit Kainai Women’s Activism.

Centre for the Study of Scholarly Communication to work with international collaboration on peer review

trevor.kenney — Thu, 13 Jul 2017 16:28:07 +0000

Dr. Daniel Paul O’Donnell of the Centre for the Study of Scholarly Communication and Department of English at the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge is collaborating with an international team on a project that investigates academic peer review.

The project, led by Principal Investigator Dr. Martin Eve at Birkbeck College, ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of London, has been awarded a grant of $99,000 from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. This project will analyze the role of peer review in the research cycle to develop better ways of using expert opinion to assess and improve the literature.

The research team – comprised of Eve, Dr. Cameron Neylon (Curtin ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ, Australia), O'Donnell (U of L), Dr. Jennifer Lin (director of Product Management at Crossref), Dr. Damian Pattinson (vice-president of Publishing Innovation at Research Square), Samuel Moore (King’s College London) and Dr. Veronique Kiermer (executive editor, Public Library of Science (PLOS)), who initially convened at the Mellon-funded Triangle Scholarly Communications Institute – will investigate the peer review database at PLOS ONE, the largest scientific journal in the world.

The reports, which will be strictly anonymized and treated as confidential, will be examined using a range of close-reading, distant-reading, and stylometric approaches. The team hopes to understand the shape of peer-review at scale, leading to a better understanding of the oft-hidden process.

“Every academic in the world is familiar with peer review,” says Eve. “We all participate in this system. However, surprisingly little is known about what peer review looks like at scale. Using a set of cross-disciplinary methodologies, we will study the writing patterns of reviewers and look for trends that can give us insight into how reviewers respond to requests for evaluation.”

“Working with the Birkbeck group allowed us to find ways to leverage our large dataset of reviews while maintaining confidentiality,” says Kiermer. “This is a great opportunity for PLOS to partner with experts to gain insights and promote evidence-based approaches to peer review.”

“This is an exciting project for the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge’s new Centre for the Study of Scholarly Communication,” adds O’Donnell. “It demonstrates the international and interdisciplinary scope of Scholarly Communication research and provides valuable opportunities for the students who work in it.”

Incurable Romantic

david.kirby — Tue, 26 Nov 2013 19:01:27 +0000

In his masterpiece Tintern Abbey, poet William Wordsworth describes returning to the banks of the River Wye in southeast Wales and experiencing an odd combination of his present impressions, the memory of a past visit, and the thought of how he’ll look back on this moment in years to come. For 2013 Distinguished Alumnus of the Year Dr. Robert J. H. Morrison (BA ’83), Wordsworth’s famous words have never resonated more deeply.

“That poem’s got it all,” he says as he starts reciting lines from memory in a performance that would captivate even the most dismissive of students.

Dr. Robert Morrison is a world-renowned scholar of 19th century English literature whose clear and thought-provoking approach to his subject matter has earned him international praise.

His playful approach belies the seriousness of his endeavour. Morrison is a world-renowned scholar of 19th century English literature whose clear and thought-provoking approach to his subject matter has earned him international praise. Reflecting on everything that he’s accomplished, he adamantly maintains that none of it would have been possible if he hadn’t enrolled in a first-year English class with Dr. Paul Upton at the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge.

“That class changed my life,” says Morrison, who admits he arrived at the U of L in 1979 without much direction. “Upton’s class had a profound impact on me. I’ve been in universities from 1979 until today and have never encountered a teacher like him. He was conversational, impassioned and deeply caring about poetry."

Having discovered his passion, Morrison pursued a degree in English and completed a Bachelor of Arts in 1983.

“The ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge was the perfect fit for me,” says Morrison, looking back on his undergraduate experience. “The fact that it was a small, vibrant university in my hometown made all the difference to the student I was back then.”

Heeding the advice of another influential professor, Dr. Bill Lambert, Morrison followed his passion for Romantic literature to the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Oxford where he completed a Master of Philosophy under the tutelage of Jonathan Wordsworth, the great, great, great nephew of the poet who captured Morrison’s attention as an undergraduate student.

“It was Dr. Lambert who recommended I read Jonathan and think about Oxford,” says Morrison, who was again grateful for the connections he made at the U of L. “I wouldn’t have got there on my own.”

From there, he returned home and accepted a teaching position at the U of L. He taught full time in the Department of English in 1987-88, and then returned to the U.K. to pursue a Doctor of Philosophy at the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Edinburgh, which he completed in 1991. Morrison’s doctoral research examined the life and work of famed English essayist Thomas De Quincey, something he continues to do today.

“I’m always working on De Quincey,” says Morrison with a laugh. His book, The English Opium-Eater: A Biography of Thomas De Quincey, published in 2009, was a finalist for the James Tait Black Memorial Prize for Biography, Britain’s oldest literary award, and is recognized as the comprehensive source on the life and work of De Quincey.

“I have always tried to be an academic who took both sides of the job seriously – research and teaching,” says Morrison, echoing some of the same values that remain fundamental to the U of L today. “They cross-fertilize each other and I think that the people who do that make the university experience much more interesting.”

Using his own research interests as a guide, Morrison is helping ignite a passion for literature in the next generation. Currently a full professor in the Department of English at Queen’s ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ, he believes that works written hundreds of years ago have the power to shape today’s world.

“I try to impress on every single one of my students that these works are not just something that happened a hundred years ago,” says Morrison. “Literature shapes our consciousness. What Wordsworth wrote 200 years ago matters now.”

His impassioned approach has earned him the respect of both colleagues and students. He accepts the accolades humbly, but remains true to the love of literature that started it all.

“Paul Upton did an enduring job of impressing on me the importance of literature,” says Morrison, reflecting on how what started as a first-year university class evolved into a lifelong passion.

There’s no doubt Morrison’s students will be saying the same thing years from now.

Morrison, Bowie to be honoured at Alumni Celebration

trevor.kenney — Fri, 20 Sep 2013 16:41:03 +0000

The ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge Alumni Association and Senate will be holding a special Alumni Celebration Saturday, Oct. 19 at 12 p.m in the Markin Hall Atrium, at which they will be honouring
Drs. Robert Morrison (BASc '83) and Gary Bowie.

Dr. Robert Morrison

Morrison, the 2013 Distinguished Alumnus of the Year, is known for a boundless energy and enthusiasm for English literature, and has established his position as an outstanding scholar and educator.

After completing a Bachelor of Arts & Science at the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge in 1983, Morrison continued his education in the UK completing a Master of Philosophy at the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Oxford in 1987 and a Doctor of Philosophy at the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Edinburgh in 1991.

Dr. Gary Bowie

Currently a professor in the Department of English at Queen`s ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ, Morrison is well-respected by both colleagues and students and has been recognized with numerous research and teaching awards. His clear and thought-provoking approach to literature has earned him international praise and he is often quoted as an expert in his field.

Bowie is a founding U of L faculty member, and enjoyed a 30-year career at the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ, spending time as athletic director, professor and coach. In addition to his professional accomplishments, he also made significant volunteer contributions at both the local and provincial level.

5 Questions with Dr. Elizabeth Galway

trevor.kenney — Fri, 05 Jul 2013 21:25:16 +0000

Dr. Elizabeth Galway has been a faculty member in the Department of English since 2003 where she teaches courses in Canadian literature, children's literature and nineteenth-century literature. She is the author of From Nursery Rhymes to Nationhood: Children's Literature and the Construction of Canadian Identity (Routledge 2008), and is currently working on a book about children's literature and the First World War.

What first piqued your interest in your research discipline?

I have a variety of different research interests but my primary research areas are children's literature and Canadian literature. I became interested in these subjects while I was completing work for my master's degree in English literature. I was studying at Durham ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ in the north of England at the time and I was conscious of the fact that the English literature that I had read as a Canadian child had shaped my expectations about life in England, and had led directly to my desire to live and study in Britain. These thoughts about the continuing resonance of children's literature in my own life were the first step towards my reconsideration of the apparent simplicity of the genre. I became interested in exploring what one might call "adult themes" in children's literature, and started to consider how literature for children is inextricably bound up with issues of concern to adults.

Dr. Elizabeth Galway believes that children's literature has a profound effect on the attitudes we carry as adults.

Living in England gave me a better understanding of British literature and culture, but it also heightened my awareness of my own status as a Canadian. I began to consider the extent to which the literature read in childhood influences how Canadians perceive themselves, and how others perceive them. I have been able to combine my interests in nineteenth and early twentieth-century Canadian and British literature and to explore how children's literature reflects and influences attitudes towards nationalism, imperialism, gender and citizenship.

How is your research applicable in "the real world?"

We should not consider scholarly research as something separate from "the real world," since the work being conducted across different disciplines is applicable to many aspects of everyday life. Although my current project about WWI has me studying literature written nearly one hundred years ago, it has direct relevance to events taking place today. I recently published an article on the portrayal of child soldiers in WWI literature that can help us understand current debates about the use of underage fighters. Exploring literary portrayals of child contributions to the First World War can help us understand contemporary definitions of childhood that simultaneously include a longing to protect children, a need to shape them into "good citizens", and a desire to give them a sense of confidence and agency.

First World War children's literature may have also had a lasting impact on how Canadians viewed the nation, its role in the world, and concepts of citizenship and patriotism. Canada has not ceased to be engaged in military activity in different parts of the globe, so understanding earlier attitudes towards armed conflict can help us better comprehend our current place in the world.

What is the greatest honour you have received in your career?

Every time that I accomplish something that is part of the job, whether it be receiving a grant, generating a great class discussion, or receiving a copy of one of my publications, I feel a sense of excitement. The most recent achievement that I am very proud of is my role in helping to establish the Institute of Child and Youth Studies (I-CYS) at the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge. This institute represents a major step forward in facilitating interdisciplinary relationships between scholars working in different areas related to childhood studies.

How important are students to your research endeavours?

My desire to become a university professor arose directly from my own love of being a student; so creating a positive experience for students is something that is very important to me. There is a direct link between my research and my teaching and I am often able to include readings on my courses that stem directly from my research trips. For example, on my reading list for Canadian Literature 1867-1914, I have included a number of stories and articles that are long out of print, but which provide students with a more complete picture of what early Canadians were reading. The SSHRC grant for my project on WWI has also enabled me to hire several students as research assistants. They've been a real help to me, and have had the opportunity to conduct hands-on research by visiting libraries and museums, and working with primary source material from the war period. The study of literature can be a very solitary pursuit, so it has been wonderful to have this opportunity to work with students outside of the classroom and to share ideas about the material that is being studied.

If you had unlimited funds, which areas of research would you invest?

If I had unlimited funds, I would invest in every area of research! The real question is how to decide what projects to support when the funds are limited. The short answer is that we need to strike a balance. After all, what good would it do to invent an iPod or a Kindle, if there was no music to listen to and no literature to read?

Each month, the Legend will present 5 Questions With . . . one of our researchers. For a look at the entire catalog of 5 Questions With . . . features, check out the Office of Research and Innovation Services website at www.uleth.ca/research_profiles.

This story first appeared in the June 2013 edition of the Legend. For a look at the full issue in a flipbook format, follow this link.

5 Questions with Dr. Elizabeth Galway

trevor.kenney — Tue, 18 Jun 2013 22:13:37 +0000

What first piqued your interest in your research discipline?

Dr. Elizabeth Galway believes that children's literature has a profound effect on the attitudes we carry as adults.

How is your research applicable in "the real world?"

What is the greatest honour you have received in your career?

How important are students to your research endeavours?

If you had unlimited funds, which areas of research would you invest?

This story first appeared in the June 2013 edition of the Legend. For a look at the full issue in a flipbook format, follow this link.

UNews - Department of English

Doing open science in COVID-19 times

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U of L English student earns two academic awards

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Alumni Profile - Brenna Scott

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Future Commons project designed to foster new research network

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U of L researchers awarded more than $907,000 in research funding

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Centre for the Study of Scholarly Communication to work with international collaboration on peer review

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Incurable Romantic

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Morrison, Bowie to be honoured at Alumni Celebration

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