Upcoming Events
Institute for Healthy Living and Chronic Disease Prevention Lecture | Oct 17
Building palliative care capacity by engaging generalist providers and patients and families
Please join Dr. Hsien Seow, Professor, McMaster University, and Canada Research Chair in Palliative Care and Health System Innovation, who will share results from a palliative care education trial called CAPACITI and the lessons learned from the Waiting Room Revolution.
The event is free and open to the public but registration is required.
Tuesday, 17 October 2023 - 11:00am
Healthy Aging Research Seminar | Oct 18
with Dr. Barbara Marshall, Professor Emeritus from the Department of Sociology at Trent University
How can we understand aging through things that are measurable and displayed as numeric scores, trends, and algorithmic predictions? How do digital technologies like wearable fitness trackers (such as FitBits and Apple watches) and ambient monitoring systems (such as in-home sensor systems) transform bodily movements and functions into data? What happens to such data? In this talk, Dr. Marshall will explore how this data is translated into actionable knowledge, shaped by cultural narratives that view aging bodies as potentially modifiable and open to optimization but at the same time inevitably in decline and always at risk. What gets highlighted, muted or left out altogether in this translation? Who has agency in shaping the stories told by the data? How might data collected and aggregated from digital technologies influence the standards we set for what is considered ‘successful aging’? And what does this mean for older adults? While the use of digital data may detect, predict or even prevent some age-related concerns, this quantification may also restrict fuller and more diverse understandings of aging. Drawing on insights from several collaborative research projects, as well as extant work in the emerging field of socio-gerontechnology, Dr. Marshall will suggest some critical questions that might guide our thinking about aging, technology and digital culture.
Speaker Biography: Dr. Barbara Marshall was a member of the Sociology department at Trent University for 32 years, where she was a founding member of the Trent Centre for Aging and Society and was honoured with Trent’s Distinguished Research Award in 2006. Both her teaching and research have been in the areas of social theory, gender, sexuality, embodiment, aging and technologies. She continues to collaborate, research, and write while enjoying retirement on Vancouver Island. She is currently principal investigator on the SSHRC-funded project “Digital Culture and Quantified Aging” (with Stephen Katz and Wendy Martin), co-investigator on the Aging in Data research partnership (PI Kim Sawchuk) and have recently completed a CIHR-funded project (with Stephen Katz) on digital infrastructures for health and aging as part of a four-country collaboration through the European “More Years, Better Lives” initiative. Some current projects include research on how old bodies are visualized through datafied care technologies (with Wendy Martin, Kirsten Ellison and Isabel Pedersen), the implications of AI systems for reshaping gerontological knowledge (with a team of collaborators from the international Socio-gerontechnology Network) and the need for more nuanced and multidimensional understandings of ‘technogenarians’ (with Stephen Katz, Nicole Dalmer and Kirsten Ellison).
This lecture can ONLY be viewed in-person at the BMO Great Hall, VanDusen Botanical Garden (virtual attendance is not provided). We plan to have a recording available. If you wish to receive the recording please contact us after the event at healthy.aging@ubc.ca
Wednesday, 18 October 2023 - 2:00pm
Healthy Aging Symposium | Nov 19 & 20
Registration deadline October 19, 2023
The symposium is hosted by the Edwin S.H. Leong Centre for Healthy Aging in partnership with the Aging in Place Research Cluster, UBC Health, and the Centre for Technology Adoption for Aging in the North. The symposium will be in person on the UBC Vancouver campus.
This inaugural symposium will bring together researchers, trainees, and stakeholders across disciplines to provide a holistic and comprehensive perspective on aging. This interdisciplinary focus will enable reflection, discussion and community engagement on the biological, social, cultural and environmental determinants of healthy aging and strategies for prevention and early intervention to increase health span and add quality years to life.
The two-day event will feature oral presentations, a poster session, interactive panel discussions, and networking. To facilitate knowledge exchange and collaborations, the symposium will feature just one session at a time.
Registration deadline October 19, 2023
Travel Group | Oct 19
In the land of the long white cloud.
with Graeme Wynn, Professor Emeritus Geography
Aotearoa/ New Zealand has been something of a second home for me. I taught there in the mid-1970s and have made innumerable visits of varying duration since, the most recent of which was in April-May of this year. My original plan was to centre this talk on these recent travels, but as the weather was less co-operative than it might have been, I will also dig into my library of digital images (from the last twenty years) to display something of the New Zealand landscape, reflect on the devastating effects of the 2010-2011 Canterbury earthquake sequence, ponder the challenges and results of (the ongoing) rebuild of Christchurch, and reveal some of the roots of my fascination, as an historical geographer and environmental historian, with this strikingly diverse and dynamic land.
Format: Zoom
If you wish to receive the zoom link for the meeting and are not already on the EC Travel group list, please contact Paul Steinbok at psteinbok@cw.bc.ca.
A zoom link will be sent out before each meeting.
Thursday, 19 October 2023 - 3:00pm
Department of Educational Studies Seminar | Oct 20
with Mateus Tremembé, Tabitha Robin and Pasang Yangjee Sherpa
Indigenous Peoples have long identified colonialism, capitalism, and the commodification of nature as the central drivers of climate change. However, mainstream technocratic climate solutions fail to address these systemic root causes, often resulting in projects that violate Indigenous sovereignty and exacerbate ecological injustices. Against these false solutions, Indigenous communities around the world are leading their own climate responses and ‘just transitions’, grounded in their connections to territory, ancestral knowledges, and responsibilities to current and future generations. This panel, convened by Indigenous youth leader Mateus Tremembé, brings together Indigenous scholars who are challenging climate colonialism and catalyzing Indigenous-led responses to the climate crisis.
This event is co-sponsored by the Department of Educational Studies, the Centre for Critical Indigenous Studies, and the Centre for Climate Justice. It is part of a three-part seminar series organized by Mateus Tremembé focused on Indigenous Just Transitions, with other events happening at Trent University and the University of International Integration of Afro-Brazilian Lusofonia (UNILAB) in Brazil.
Speakers
Mateus Tremembé is a youth leader of the Tremembé da Barra do Mundaú Indigenous People, located in the municipality of Itapipoca, Ceará, Brazil. Mateus is a community organizer, agroecological farmer, food security and Indigenous food culture researcher, agronomy student at UNILAB, and Mitacs Accelerate intern in the Department of Educational Studies at UBC. He is currently leading research projects about just transitions in food systems and climate education in his community
Tabitha Robin, Ph.D. is a mixed ancestry Metis and Cree researcher, educator, and writer. She is an Assistant Professor in the Faculty of Land and Food Systems at the University of British Columbia. She spends much of her time learning about traditional Cree food practices.
Pasang Yangjee Sherpa, Ph.D. is a Sherpa anthropologist from Pharak, northeast Nepal. She is an Assistant Professor of Lifeways in Indigenous Asia at the University of British Columbia. Her research topics include Indigeneity, human dimensions of climate change and the Sherpa diaspora. She uses ethnographic methods to study everyday concerns of Himalayan people in order to normalize their experiences and represent them as equal partners in decision-making spaces.
Photo Group | Oct 20
Theme: "Mountainscapes"
As always, you can send photos on other themes, and the photos can be recent (preferred!) or from your catalog.
Please send two photos to Richard Spencer on this theme (or your choice) before the meeting.
If you would like to join, please contact Richard Spencer at richard@rhspencer.ca for Zoom details
Check out the Photo Group’s Flickr account to view photos from their last meeting.
Friday, 20 October 2023 - 3:00pm