Thursday, February 19, 2009

Performed Ethnography in HIV Education, Presentation University of Toronto

The Centre for Urban Health Initiatives Youth Sexual Health RIG is pleased to announce our next seminar entitled:

Performed Ethnography,
HIV/AIDS & Aboriginal Youth
with Dr. June Larkin, Tiffany Nelson, and
Christine Smillie


University of Toronto, University College, 15 King's College Circle RM 244
March 4th 1:30-3:00

"In this presentation we present an innovative knowledge dissemination strategy for research on HIV/AIDS and Aboriginal youth. Through a partnership with Native Child and Family Services and the Gendering Adolescent AIDS Prevention (GAAP) project, The Universityof Toronto and a group of Aboriginal youth worked with Aboriginal actor, *Herbie Barnes, to turn data collected in a study on HIV/AIDS and Aboriginal youth into scripts and discussion questions for HIV/AIDS education. We will discuss the process of developing the scripts and the value of this approach for HIV prevention. The presentation will include samples of the youth performances."

(*As an actor Herbie has worked on many stages across Canada, in such plays as: Toronto At Dreamers Rock, The Gap, and The Hobbit as well as acting in such films as: Hidden in America, Dance Me Outside, and the series, Due South and The Rez.)



Free, all are welcome, please RSVP to adrian.guta@utoronto.ca

Wednesday, February 18, 2009

Knowledge Translation Takes Progressive Turn, Mapping New Terrain Through Critical Realism and the Arts

We have been pleased recently to report on the cutting edge creative projects and research currently underway across the country by the respected members of our Canadian Creative Arts in Health, Training and Education Journal Advisory Board.
Today we feature recent work by Pia C. Kontos, Research Scientist, Public Health Sciences, Toronto Rehabilitation Institute and Assistant Professor University of Toronto, who has worked in the areas of research based theatre in traumatic brain injury, embodied selfhood, caregiving and "expressions of personhood" and Alzheimer's Disease.


New work by Pia Kontos Ph.D. and Blake D. Poland Ph.D. (Critical Social Theory, Qualitative Methods, Social Geography) recently published at Biomed Central examines
how, through use of critical realism and the arts, "knowledge translation" can take place in an entirely different way. The paper explores how the arts can offer important and exciting new research and learning possibilities for progressive approaches to KT.

Excerpt from the paper posted at "Implementation Science":

"Mapping New Theoretical and Methodological Terrain for Knowledge Translation: Contributions From Critical Realism and the Arts"

"This paper presents a KT model, the Critical Realism and the Arts Research Utilization Model (CRARUM), that combines critical realism and arts-based methodologies. Critical realism facilitates understanding of clinical settings by providing insight into the interrelationship between its structures and potentials, and individual action. The arts nurture empathy, and can foster reflection on the ways in which contextual factors influence and shape clinical practice, and how they may facilitate or impede change. The combination of critical realism and the arts within the CRARUM model promotes the successful embedding of interventions, and greater impact and sustainability.....CRARUM has the potential to strengthen the science of implementation research by addressing the complexities of practice settings, and engaging potential adopters to critically reflect on existing and proposed practices and strategies for sustaining change."

For full paper visit


National Association for Drama Therapy Conference White Plains NY
























This news in today from National Association of Drama Therapy NADT Conference Chair, Mark Beauregard, RDT, LCAT:



"Finding Home: Pathways To Belonging"
Annual Conference of The National Association for Drama Therapy

November 5-8, 2009 in White Plains NY

Greetings,
I am writing to remind you that the deadline for submission of proposals for workshops for the 2009 Annual National Association for Drama Therapy Conference is MARCH 7th 2009. Now is the time to submit your proposals! For more information and for submission guidelines, visit the NADT website.








Sunday, February 15, 2009

Saldana to Conduct Ethnodrama and Arts Based Research Workshop at Fifth International Congress of Qualitative Inquiry

Registration is underway for The Fifth International Congress of Qualitative Inquiry to be held May 20 - 23, 2009 at The University of Illinois Urbana Champaign. I was pleased to see Johnny Saldana will be offering a workshop at the Congress this year "Ethnodrama and Ethnotheatre: Arts-Based Research from Page to Stage". Johnny Saldana is also a member of our CCAHTE
Journal (Canadian Creative Arts in Health, Training and Education Journal) Advisory Board.

(from the ICQI programme)

Workshop Title: Ethnodrama and Ethnotheatre: Arts-Based Research from Page to Stage

No prior theatre or performance experience is needed to participate in this workshop. Arts-based research, ethnodrama in particular, has been advocated by such key figures in qualitative inquiry as Norman K. Denzin and Yvonna S. Lincoln as a powerful way for ethnography to recover yet interrogate the meanings of lived experiences. This workshop will introduce the fundamentals of dramatizing data and explore how qualitative research transfers "from page to stage." The session will provide a literature review of available ethnodramas with participants reading aloud informally from scripts (and, pending A/V availability, watching videos of ethnotheatrical performance). We will then explore how the participants' personal lived experiences can become "autoethnographic monologues." Participants will select a personal story as the basis for workshopping an informal retelling of that work to peers. The facilitator will guide each researcher-as-storyteller through the process of selecting necessary sensory details, choosing evocative language, and employing gesture and voice as instruments for dramatizing the data.

The deadline for submitting papers is past, however, registration for the Congress itself is ongoing. The Congress has some excellent presentations and workshops planned. A great opportunity to connect with others with like interests around the inspiring theme,

"Advancing Human Rights through Qualitative Inquiry"



Friday, February 13, 2009

Culture of Creativity Necessary in Contemporary Education Practice According to Artist and Educator Robert Kelly


It is good to see our Canadian Creative Arts in Health, Training and Education Journal Advisory Board members making news across the country. I recently came across an article with news about Robert Kelly "Giving Rise to Excellence" written by reporter Valerie Berenyi at The Calgary Herald.

I am including an excerpt from the article below:

"Robert Kelly has a big idea: He wants to drag our education system--which he feels is mostly about convention and producing good little consumers-- kicking and screaming into the 21st century by embracing a culture of creativity.

In his new book Creative Expression, Creative Education (Detselig Enterprises Ltd.), Kelly, an associate professor in The University of Calgary's art department, argues we are evolving from the information age, focused on mass consumption, into the conceptual age, one fuelled by innovation.

Citing the work of writers like Daniel Pink and Charles Leadbeater, Kelly says a culture of creativity is already emerging. He points to the collective energy spurring new entities like open source software, YouTube and Wikipedia.

"If we are to produce engaged citizens," he says, "our education system must learn to balance the traditions of discipline, standardization and measurement with ideas, creativity and collaboration."

"The archetype in art is someone waiting in their studio for some magnanimous vision. But the worst way to get a good idea is to sit in a room by yourself."

Kelly says his book, co-written with poet (and professor) Carl Leggo from the University of British Columbia, is intended to give parents and educators a grounding in creative theory.

The first of three books in a series, Creative Expression, Creative Education was funded with a grant from Alberta Education. It may be used as a resource as the government embarks on an overhaul of the fine arts curriculum for kindergarten to Grade 12. "

(in the book Creative Expression, Creative Education over twenty creative producers representing a wide range of disciplines bear witness to personal acts of creativity. )


Friday, February 6, 2009

Urban Youth and Determinants of Sexual Health Symposium

Call for Submissions

“Urban Youth and the Determinants of Sexual Health” Student Symposium


The Centre for Urban Health Initiatives (CUHI), along with the Mark S. Bonham Centre for Sexual Diversity Studies, the LaMarsh Centre for Research on Violence and Conflict Resolution, the York Institute for Health Research, the Centre for Urban Schooling, Gendering Adolescent AIDS Prevention, Toronto Public Health, Planned Parenthood Toronto and the University of Toronto Sexual Education and Peer Counseling Centre invites you to submit an abstract for presentation at the 2009 Student Symposium on Urban Youth and the Determinants of Sexual Health. This is a FREE symposium that will be held on Thursday, March 26, 2009 and invites anyone interested in youth sexual health to attend.

The goal of the symposium is to bring together university students to share their research and artistic pieces on youth sexual health and to engage and network with other students, academics, policy makers, and community members involved or interested in Urban Youth and the Determinants of Sexual Health. Students are encouraged to use this symposium as an opportunity to present research ‘in progress’, test out ideas for a thesis or dissertation proposal, or present original research or artistic pieces.

Projects that are selected for the Student Symposium will be promoted on the CUHI website. A total of three awards will be granted to students in categories of poster, oral, and artistic presentations.

For more information see pdf of poster here


Thursday, February 5, 2009

Occupational Therapist collaborates with children, parents, healthcare providers to design creative play space

posted by: Cheryl McLean
Canadian Creative Arts in Health, Training and Education Journal


I recently had an opportunity to connect with Occupational Therapist, Jen Gellis, B.Sc.OT, M.A.A , Design Candidate at Emily Carr University in Vancouver.
I found it interesting how Jen had combined her background as an Occupational Therapist with applied work designing play spaces for disabled children. I asked Jen to report on some of the details of her project for our visitors to the "Arts and Health Crossing Borders" blog.

'Co-designing Play Spaces in the Therapy Department at Sunny Hill'
Jen Gellis, Emily Carr University

"Co-designing Play Spaces in the Therapy Department at Sunny Hill" is my thesis research project at Sunny Hill Health Centre for Children in Vancouver. B.C. I am trained as an Occupational Therapist and have been working at Sunny Hill for the past five years until last January when I took an education leave to complete my Master's of Applied Arts degree in Design at Emily Carr University.
I intend to share my unique opportunity to explore design from my position as an Occupational Therapist as well as how my approach to my work with children with disabilities has shifted through my exposure to design methods.

The main goal of the Co-design project is to explore the use of creative design research methods (drawing, photography, building, modeling, collage) with children to inform the design of a play space in the therapy department at Sunny Hill. The study involves collaboration with children with disabilities, their parents, caregivers and healthcare providers at the centre.
The project is guided by participatory action research and participatory design research methods. The long term outcome will be the design and implementation of a play space based on collaborations with children who visit Sunny Hill for appointments, their parents as well as healthcare providers at the centre.
I also intend to contribute knowledge in design and occupational therapy...by making new connections between occupational therapy and industrial design, by capturing new evidence and alternative methodological approaches through the use of creative activities and materials as a research method with children and by working in under researched areas, for example the participatory design of healthcare spaces with children with disabilities.
The long-term outcome will be the design and implementation of a play space based on collaborations with children who visit Sunny Hill for appointments, their parents as well as healthcare providers at the centre. A shorter term outcome will be the design of a creative 'toolkit' that can be used by children, parents, healthcare providers and designers (to design adapted equipment, home renovations, perhaps child-friendly knowledge transfer materials etc., healthcare systems and services)."


It is good to hear from students and researchers who are actively using the creative arts as well as design in their applied work in healthcare. Excellent work Jen and we wish you well in this innovative design project! CM

For information about this project contact Jen Gellis at
jengellis@gmail.com







Wednesday, February 4, 2009

Creative Arts Therapies Faculty Position Haifa University

The Faculty of Health and Welfare Sciences and the Faculty of Education, Haifa University, are happy to announce the opening of a search for candidates for a tenure track academic position in The Graduate School of Creative Art Therapies for the 2009-2010 academic year.

The candidates will be required to teach in the Masters Degree Programme, as well as develop research programmes, obtain research grants and supervise advanced level students within the courses of study.

Requirements:

  • completed PhD or confirmation by 1.9.2009
  • relevant academic background in therapy and in the course of study
  • peer reviewed publications in scientific journals
  • teaching experience in Hebrew
  • proven Master level (thesis) supervision of research


Candidates are requested to submit the following:

  • introductory letter containing a description of areas of research, proposed future research plans and a description of your potential contribution to the school
  • detailed Curriculum Vitae including publications, previous places of employment, teaching experience, conferences, grants
  • documents or diplomas confirming degrees in the relevant subject area
  • 1-3 publications
  • names and electronic addresses of three references


Send materials snail mail to:
The Graduate School of Creative Art Therapies, Haifa University, Har Hacarmel, Haifa, Israel and by email by March 6, 2009 to: Professor Rachel Lev, Head of Search Committee rlev@univ.haifa.ac.il

Sunday, February 1, 2009

Tenure Track Position, Social aspects of Health Care, McGill University

Tenure Track Position Social Aspects of Health Care Services

McGill University, Montreal Quebec

Deadline April 1, 2009




McGill University is one of the world's top-ranking universities. It has outstanding research and a very strong commitment to excellent teaching and learning and service to the community. The Faculty of Dentistry, the strongest research dental faculty in Canada, envisions a healthy and equitable society. It is committed to the promotion of oral health and quality of life in the whole population, with emphasis on the needs of under-served communities and individuals.

The Faculty of Dentistry invites applications for a tenure-track position in the Social Aspects of Health Care Services. Requirements for a tenure-track position include a PhD or equivalent degree and the ability to conduct independent research in a relevant field. We encourage people with a background in social sciences and an interest in underprivileged populations to apply. Health and/or social service experience working with underprivileged groups will be at an asset. Responsibilities will include research, teaching and administrative work to support these activities. A working knowledge of French will be advantageous. Rank and salary will be commensurate with experience.

Applications, including a curriculum vitae, a statement of research and teaching interests and the names and postal and e-mail addresses of three referees, should be sent to the address below. The selection process will commence on April 1, 2009.

Dr. Christophe Bedos
Chair, Search Committee Office of the Dean
Faculty of Dentistry
McGill University
3640 University Street, Room M/30
Montreal, PQ H3A 2B2
Christophe.bedos@mcgill.ca
Tel: (514) 398-7203 x 0129
Fax: (514) 398-8900