Student Work

Within the Social Justice Studies streams, students can complete a major research project, a creative project, or work with a social justice-serving agency to complete a practicum.  The projects and titles listed below are the most recent projects and practicums completed.  The full list of projects for each stream can be found on their dedicated pages.  

 

Creative Projects

Maya Oversby, 

“Be(ad) the Change: Confronting Land Disposition through Kinship and Beadwork.”

Supervisors: Dr. Juan Sanchez Martinez and Dr. Keira Loukes. 

 

Maya’s project foregrounded process as much as process. She help “grabeady” workshops that led participants in a discussion and beading on maps. The symbolism of beading on topographic maps generated a way to take up space and ultimately reclaim Land that was stolen from Indigenous ancestors. While beading, participants are encouraged to engage in conversation surrounding Land. Creating dialogue between different communities and engaging in intergenerational knowledge exchange, especially within the context of extractive industries in the area. This project demonstrates the interconnectedness of art, kinship visiting, and activism all while mobilizing and enforcing movements towards Indigenous sovereignty and Land Back. By networking with other communities and people with similar lived experience, the workshop creates a diverse network of individuals who stand together in solidarity with each other during extractivist agendas being imposed on stolen land.

 

Complete list of creative projects. 

 

Practicums 

Jennifer Bouchard, 

Placement: Ontario Native Women’s Association

Field Supervisor: Yolanda Wanakamik 

 

Portia Opoku and Ximena Izquierdo Urbano

Placement: Elizabeth Fry Society of NW Ontario

Field Supervisor: Lindsay Martin 

 

Raghib Mohammad

Placement: Citizens for Public Justice 

Field Supervisor: Natalie Appleyard

 

Nahid Hasan

Placement: Bringing Our Children Home

Field Supervisors: Fern Chisel and Lauren Augustine 

 

Nahid Hasan

Placement: Thunder Bay Multicultural Association
Field Supervisor: Ahmad Hafez

 

Afsana Rumpa

Placement: NAN Research, Justice, and Policy Group

Field Supervisor: Stephen Lee

 

SHI Xueying

Placement: Thunder Bay Multicultural Association 

Field Supervisor: Tejraj Shah

 

Alexa Kizhakkepurathu

Placement: Beendigen: Anishinabe Women’s Crisis Home and Family Healing Centre

Field Supervisor: Cori Bannon

 

  

 

Complete list of practicum projects 

 

Research Projects

Adana Hinds-Smith
Medical injustices and inequalities in Ontario’s urgent care clinics and non-emergent hospital visits
Supervisor: Dr. Jennifer Chisholm
Second Reader: Dr. Lori Chambers

Abstract: Seeking healthcare for marginalized people in Canada is a complex, anxiety-inducing,
and sometimes harmful experience. It is widely understood in feminist spaces that this unique
and adverse experience is due to the inherent racism and sexism that these marginalized
communities face within colonial Western societies (Bourassa et al., 2005, p. 23-24). While there
is some documentation that marginalized people suffer a disproportionate amount of adverse
health outcomes, very little is known about these outcomes as they relate to the intersection of
gender and race. This research, guided by feminist research principles and intersectionality
theory, examines the social inequalities experienced by marginalized patients, particularly
Indigenous and Black women, in urgent care clinics and non-emergent hospital visits in Ontario.

 

Yumna Vaid
Supervisor: Dr. Debra Mackinnon

 

Gillian Woods
No One Mourns the Wicked: An Examination of Good and Evil in Wicked and Wicked: For Good
Supervisor: Dr. Jennifer Chisholm
Second Reader: Dr. Lori Chambers
 
Abstract: 
No One Mourns the Wicked: An Examination of Good and Evil in Wicked and Wicked: For Good examines how goodness and wickedness is constructed in the films Wicked and Wicked: For Good. This research reflects on the negative impacts that strict binaries of good and evil can have on already marginalized groups such as women, people of colour, disabled individuals, and people from the queer community. In addition, Wicked and Wicked: For Good explores issues related to race, power, and privilege and this research examines the way these films echo current and historical societal attitudes. 

 

 

 Complete list of research projects.