Data at Risk Series: Candis Callison

Arctic Journalisms, Civic Spaces and Indigenous Publics

Mobilizing Indigenous experiences with and narratives about climate change through various media provides important insight for broad global publics about what it means to live with climate change both in the observable present and the predicted future. Representing and reporting on diverse Indigenous peoples however can be extremely challenging given that mainstream media narratives have often tended to reproduce stereotypes, ignore Indigenous knowledges, erase the ongoing impacts of colonialism, and/or frame Indigenous people as proxies, victims, or heroes. Drawing on research related to media in and about the Canadian Arctic, this talk examines how and where journalism might contribute to communal resilience, historical understandings of adaptation and climatic shifts, and reflect robust civic spaces and imaginations among global and regional audiences that include Indigenous publics.

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Candis Callison is Assistant Professor in the Graduate School of Journalism at the University of British Columbia, Chair of the Bachelor of Media Studies Program, and author of How Climate Change Comes to Matter: The Communal Life of Facts (Duke University Press, 2014). Her research and teaching are focused on changes to media practices and platforms, journalism ethics, the role of social movements in public discourse, and understanding how issues related to science and technology become meaningful for diverse publics. Prior to her academic work, Candis produced, wrote, and reported for television, the Internet, and radio in Canada (CBC, CTV) and the United States (Lycos, Tech TV). This year she is in residence at Princeton University as the Pathy Distinguished Visitor in Canadian Studies.

Lunch will be provided to those attending the talk. 

When data are at risk, public life suffers. Data at Risk is a four-part lecture series addressing the effect of precarious environmental data on efforts to save the environment. Focusing on how journalists, academics and artists use storytelling and visual tools to foster better awareness of the environment, Data at Risk is co-sponsored by the Center for Media at Risk at the Annenberg School for Communication and DataRefuge of the Penn Program in Environmental Humanities at the School of Arts and Sciences.