Redeye

True North tells the story of the 1969 protest against racism at Sir George Williams University, now Concordia. Following the occupation of the university, 97 students were arrested or faced deportation. The film includes recent interviews with activists who were involved in the uprising. In making the documentary, director Michèle Stephenson draws on her Haitian and Panamanian heritage, and experience as a social justice lawyer. W...

Following recent court decisions around Indigenous rights and Aboriginal title in BC, public discourse is full of conflicting assertions. Premier David Eby has criticized the court and called their decisions overreaching and unhelpful. RAVEN works to support Indigenous Nations upholding their rights in court. It published an article to clarify some of the confusion, comparing what they are hearing to what they know to be true. We s...

In his new book If You Want to Win, You’ve Got to Fight, transportation activist Carter Lavin shares strategies about how to create the change we want to see in our communities. Whether it’s more protected bike lanes, improved bus service, or safer streets for pedestrians, Carter provides a comprehensive toolbox of campaign tactics and advocacy tips. He is co-founder of the TransBay Coalition and has helped lead and stu...

A new report, co-authored by Lorne Foster and Lesley Jacobs, examines consumer racial profiling of Indigenous people in Canada. The report says it is likely that racial profiling in retail environments is the most frequent form of racism experienced by Indigenous communities. The Heiltsuk Nation released the report as part of its filings for a BC Human Rights Tribunal complaint that will be heard in October. We spoke with Lesley Ja...

In 2021, Betty Baxter was inducted into the Volleyball BC Hall of Fame.   But as a lesbian athlete and coach, the journey to that recognition was far from smooth. Baxter competed in the 1976 Olympics in Montreal and helped found Canadian Women & Sport. She was the first woman coach of a national team, and was then fired from that job because of her sexual orientation. She went on to many new roles in advocacy, activis...

On December 2, the OneBC party released its documentary Making a Killing: Reconciliation, genocide and plunder in Canada. Since then, the writer and producer of the film Tim Thielmann, has been fired along with two other senior staff.  MLA Dallas Brodie has herself been removed as interim party leader.  But the documentary lives on, with Dallas Brodie voicing Thielmann’s script and interviewing all the guests. We ta...

The Hungry Stories Project is a team of scholars, dietitians and artists who are fighting for the elimination of food insecurity by sharing what it takes to collectively care for each other’s food needs.  They are producing resources to understand food insecurity, and they say that we need to look at root causes. Dr. Jennifer Black is a member of the Hungry Stories Project  and Associate Professor in Food, Nutrition...

The Canadian Museum for Human Rights in Winnipeg was built to educate Canadians about stories of global injustice. Yet in the more than 10 years since it opened, it has not meaningfully acknowledged the dispossession of Palestinians in 1948 that resulted from the founding of Israel. But now the CMHR has announced an exhibit titled Palestine Uprooted: Nakba Past and Present to launch next year. Jonah Corne is an associate professor ...

Bruce McIvor has written a new book that should become essential reading for Canadians who want to advance reconciliation. Indigenous Rights in One Minute gives clear and concise answers to questions like who qualifies as Métis and what the Doctrine of Discovery is.  Bruce McIvor is the founder and senior partner at First Peoples Law and an adjunct professor at the University of British Columbia’s Allard School of Law. H...

At the end of her mother’s life, writer and academic Julietta Singh returns to Winnipeg to say goodbye to her childhood home. As she digs into the history of the house, she uncovers 140 years of forgotten matriarchs and political rebels she never knew. Singh has teamed up with acclaimed filmmaker Chase Joynt and the National Film Board to create a documentary that interweaves Indigenous, Deaf, Japanese and South Asian histori...

The practice of people self-identifying as Indigenous has come into sharp focus after a number of high-profile cases of “pretendians” claiming to be Indigenous without evidence. However, far less attention has been given to Indigenous people being wrongly labelled as pretendians.  In a recent article for Policy Options, Debbie Martin argues that the rush for Indigenous identity policies at universities has led to p...

The deputy mayor of Tirana, Albania says she realized one day that her city had been planned with one user in mind - an adult male who needed to get to the office as quickly as possible. She says everything about Tirana’s streets, public spaces and transport systems were designed to make his life easy. Anuela Ristani is one of the women in local government that we get to meet in Women Changing Cities, a new book by Canadian a...

The War on Cars podcast delivers news and commentary on the latest developments in the worldwide fight to undo the damage caused by cars. Sarah Goodyear is a journalist and author, Doug Gordon is a TV producer, writer and safe streets advocate. Sarah and Doug are authors along with Aaron Naparstek of Life After Cars, a book that offers an overview of the societal and environmental costs of the automobile and the forces that have cr...

In the aftermath of October 7, 2023, Canada saw a rise in anti-Palestinian and anti-Arab and antisemitism that affects many areas of life and work for Canadians. So begins a report produced by the Islamophobia Research Hub at York University. The incidents documented in the report portray a climate of repression, violence and censorship across the country and throughout multiple aspects of life in Canada. We spoke with Nadia Hasan,...

Changes in law that bring about more equality have complex roots, but they almost always start with someone who takes a stand. A new book examines ten of the legal cases that advanced women’s rights in Canada. The stories it tells of the women who challenged the law remind us that advances in equality are hard-won and should never be taken for granted. The book is titled Women Who Woke Up The Law. We spoke with author Karin W...

International students have long been seen as a source of extra income by Canadian universities, who charge them much higher tuition fees for the same education as domestic students. In their new book, Not Your Cash Cow, Not Your Scapegoat, the Racialization of Asian International Students Collective studied the experiences of over 145 international students from China, India and South Korea at five universities. We speak with Lori...