Volume 42, numéro 1, 2021 "Covid and the Academy" & Open-themed Research

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This paper discusses the recent backlash against public monuments spurred by Black Lives Matter (BLM) protests in North America and elsewhere following the killing by police of George Floyd, an unarmed African-American man in the United States. Since this event, protestors have taken to the streets to bring attention to police brutality, systemic racism, and racial injustice faced by Black and Indigenous people and people of colour in the United States, Canada, Great Britain and some European countries. In many of these protests, outraged citizens have torn down, toppled, or defaced monuments of well-known historic figures associated with colonialism, slavery, racism, and imperialism. Protestors have been demanding the removal of statues and monuments that symbolize slavery, colonial power, and systemic and historical racism. What makes these monuments problematic and what drives these deliberate and spectacular acts of defiance against these omnipresent monuments? Featuring an interview with art historian Charmaine A. Nelson, this article explores the meanings of these forceful, decolonial articulations at this moment. The interview addresses some complex questions related to monumentalization and the public sphere, symbolism and racial in/justice. In so doing, it suggests that monuments of the future need to be reimagined and redefined contemporaneously with shifting social knowledge and generational change.

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There is a knowledge gap about how the intersections of gender, race, culture, age, income, social class, and other identities shape Black women’s experiences of intimate partner violence (IPV). In this qualitative study, we utilized an intersectional approach to examine how IPV is experienced and managed by racialized women, and in particular, our focus was to explore the IPV experiences of Black Nova Scotian women in and beyond midlife and their experiences of seeking support. Participant recruitment was predictably challenging, but we were able to collect in-depth interview data from a Black woman who identified as being in and beyond midlife and who had experienced IPV in the past and from three people who provided support to Black women in a paid capacity. An interpretive narrative approach was utilized to identify five dominant themes: descriptions of the experiences of IPV for Black women; strategies for coping with IPV; strategies in supporting Black women experiencing IPV; barriers in accessing support; and challenges in the delivery of support. The knowledge gained through this research provides important insights about the experiences, barriers faced, and how to address these challenges for Black women who experience IPV in and beyond midlife.

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Being queer can be filled with moments of isolation: not fitting in to heteronormative rites of passage, not knowing if or when to come out in academia, and now, trying to cope with the difficulties induced by officially-mandated social distancing in a global pandemic. Although isolation is a common human experience, for queer people it is often an intimate part of their stories, leaving lasting scars. Experiences of isolation, loneliness, and being “othered” have serious consequences. Through autoethnographic queer inquiry, we explore isolation and how it shapes teaching and learning. Drawing on concepts of the outsider-within and the uncanny, and distinguishing isolation from loneliness and solitude, we share our personal stories of isolation through the perspective of a performative “I”, examining how our pedagogical philosophies and practices inevitably reflect our queer experiences. Coming from different disciplines of practice, we met because of the COVID-19 pandemic, which prompted this return to old and new forms of social isolation—the old being the experience of growing up queer and the new through teaching online. From our perspectives across a generational divide, we trace the unsettling experiences of being queer and teaching in our COVID bubbles, and we attempt to navigate ourselves and our students safely through disconnection and isolation.

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What is the result of bringing unrealistic and overwhelming conditions of motherhood into the context of a global pandemic? This article aims to explore the impacts of maternal expectations and experiences in the context of COVID-19. Through first-person accounts of eighty self-identified mothers parenting through COVID, we aim to explore “good” mother myths, feelings of failure, and the paradoxical freedoms that occur under pandemic time.