Speaker Series

Tifanie Valade, doctoral student, Faculty of Education, University of Ottawa

How do transmedia franchises and popular cultural memory relate to gender and subjectivity in early childhood education? Tifanie Valade presents a study from two early childhood education centers that examines how young children use gendered transmedia narratives in their imaginary games. The results suggest that popular cultural memory plays an important role in the adoption of gendered subjectivities from transmedia narratives. In this study the children alternated between accepting and resisting the hegemonic gender discourses found in the stories and films of princesses and superheroes.

To listen to the conference in full (French only): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TGapz6SUbJ0

SpeakerSeries Poster E

Aboriginal Place-Stories, Curricular Topographies, and Reimagining Inherited Geographies of Citizenship

Dr. Dwayne Donald

Assistant professor Faculty of Education Universtiy of Alberta

Recent curricular initiatives across Canada emphasize engagement with Aboriginal issues and perspectives across grade levels and subject areas.  This major public political shift is indicative of the changing character of the relationships connecting Aboriginal peoples and Canadians.  In this presentation, I will show how Aboriginal-Canadian relations have typically been conceptualized according to geographies of citizenship that organize people in troubling ways.  These geographies of citizenship are predicated on colonial frontier logics and promote certain curricular sensibilities.  I will present Aboriginal place-stories as examples of organic curriculum that have the potential to inspire decolonized curricular topographies and promote an active reimagining of Aboriginal-Canadian relations.

Dwayne Donald (Apiyomaahka) was born and raised in Edmonton and is from the Papaschase Cree.  He is an Assistant Professor in the Faculty of Education at the University of Alberta.


Just Talk?: The Educational Value of Oral History Production

Dr. Kristina Llewellyn

Assistant Professor of Social Development Studies

Is oral history produced through simple conversation with education stakeholders?  What value does oral history provide for educators and education researchers?  This address will explore critical methodological and theoretical issues for conducting oral history that when carefully considered increase the educational value of oral history.  In so doing, the address explores one of the key research areas for Making History: Narratives and Collective Memory in Education, namely, the influence of oral history on the narrative of educational history.

Kristina Llewellyn est professeure agrégée de Social Development Studies (avec une spécialisation en éducation) à l’Université de Waterloo. Elle travaille à la formation d’histoires orales depuis plus de dix ans. Ses plus récents projets portent sur l’analyse d’histoires orales d’enseignantes afin de comprendre la « démocratie » en éducation durant la période d’après-guerre au Canada. Dr. Llewellyn est co-éditrice de la revue de la Canadian Oral History Association, Oral History Forum d’histoire orale. Elle est également chercheure associée à l’Unité de recherche Faire de l’histoire : récits et mémoire collective en éducation de l’Université d’Ottawa.

Watch Llewellyn conference PART 1

Watch Llewellyn conference PART 2


Collecting Oral History with any grade level, from Elementary Grades to Graduate School

Barbara Brockman

“Collecting Oral History” is a project which integrates historical inquiry, reading, writing, visual arts and research.  Barbara Brockmann observes that children naturally soak up historical knowledge long before they are formally taught it – and that teachers need to help students make connections their society and history before the popular myth makers in the media do it with inaccurate knowledge. What better way to help students make the connections than with their own family stories?   Easy to institute and deeply affirming, see student samples and find out how to run the project yourself

Barbara Brockmann is the 2002 Winner of the Governor General’s Award for Excellence in Teaching Canadian History Teacher, and an OCDSB Instructor, B. Ed Program, University of Ottawa

Brockmann Part 1

Brockmann Part 2

Français