Faculty of

CREATIVE & CRITICAL STUDIES

Vancouver

The University of British Columbia is a global centre for research and teaching, consistently ranked among the 40 best universities in the world. UBC’s entrepreneurial perspective encourages students, staff, and faculty to challenge convention, lead discovery, and explore new ways of learning.

At UBC, bold thinking is given a place to develop into ideas that can change the world.

Kelowna

BOLD THINKING

UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA

TRANSFORMATIVE DIVERSECONNECTED

UBC’s Okanagan campus is a young and distinctive learning community earning international recognition for excellence in research and teaching. Our campus is a model for new ways of thinking about interdisciplinary and innovative programs.

We provide students with a university experience that is transformative, challenging, and competitive, and we are committed to scholarship that drives economic, social, and cultural change.

213 public events hosted

328 students worked on 37 community service learning projects

1,200+ students met with employers at UBC career events

2014 COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT

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OUR STUDENTS

UNDERGRADUATE

7,530 GRADUATE

682

OK ANAGAN CAMPUS 5

A PORTAL FOR GLOBAL ENGAGEMENTUBC’s Okanagan campus delivers enriched educational experiences abroad through research, study exchange, and learning connections around the globe.

International experience opportunities abound: 20 per cent of UBC Okanagan graduating students reported participating in an international learning experience in 2014-15.

UBC students have access to exchange placements with more than 200 partner institutions. With a vast network of partners and collaborators worldwide, the impact of our research and learning is transformative and far-reaching.

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10,000+ STUDENTS, FACULTY AND STAFF FROM 80 COUNTRIES

OUR STUDENTS COME FROM AROUND THE WORLD AND ACROSS THE REGION

FROM BC

60% OTHER CANADIAN

23%INTERNATIONAL

17%

OK ANAGAN CAMPUS 7

A CENTRE OF RESEARCH INNOVATION

TRI COUNCIL & CFI COMBINED AMOUNTS

UBC OKANAGAN RESEARCH FUNDING

$4M

$5M

$6M

$7M

$8M

‘09–10 ‘10–11 ‘11-12 ‘12–13 ‘13–14

FUNDING

$18.5M PROJECTS FUNDED

633

A collaborative, entrepreneurial spirit underpins UBC Okanagan research and is advancing discoveries in fields of critical importance globally and locally.

The Survive and Thrive Applied Research (STAR) initiative exemplifies this spirit of innovation with cutting-edge projects, including control software for unmanned aerial vehicles. STAR brings to market technologies for human protection and performance in extreme, remote, or rural conditions.

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Faculty of Applied Science, School of Engineering

Faculty of Creative and Critical Studies

Irving K. Barber School of Arts and Sciences

Faculty of Education

Faculty of Health and Social Development

Faculty of Management

Faculty of Medicine, Southern Medical Program

College of Graduate Studies

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PROGRAM OPTIONS

UNDERGRADUATE

63 GRADUATE

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14 RESEARCH CENTRES AND INSTITUTES

OK ANAGAN CAMPUS 9

The Faculty of Creative and Critical Studies (FCCS), home to UBC Okanagan’s fine arts programming, offers undergraduate (BA, BFA) and graduate (MA, MFA, PhD) programs. FCCS provides an exciting intellectual environment for critically examining various types of communication within society; the cultural forms, relationships, and institutions that emerge; and the economic and political forces that underlie them.

• Bachelor of Arts — Majors in Art History and Visual Culture, Creative Writing, Cultural Studies, French, English, and Spanish

• Bachelor of Fine Arts — Majors in Visual Arts and Interdisciplinary Performance

• Courses in German, Japanese, Film, Music, and the Digital Humanities

• Disciplinary and interdisciplinary graduate programs

CREATIVE AND CRITICAL

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Innovative experiential learning opportunities transform our students into global citizens who make positive contributions to communities both close to home and farther afield, and build bridges of understanding and mutual development across the world.

Our students blend creative and critical skills and perspectives. They take part in exhibitions around the world; conduct research and immerse themselves in cultural settings while studying abroad; participate in local community projects; and undertake internships with local, national, and international organizations.

FACULTY OF CREATIVE AND CRITICAL STUDIES 11

UNDERGRADUATE PROGRAMSART HISTORY AND VISUAL CULTURE A number of interdisciplinary perspectives explore the world’s diverse artistic traditions, including fine art, architecture, and popular and material culture.

CREATIVE WRITING Students learn from intimate workshops in fiction, poetry, and other genres, as well as innovative courses in editing, publishing, and community learning, taught by critically acclaimed writers.

CULTURAL STUDIES Examining the relationship between culture, power, and identity, students gain self-reflexive and socially engaged knowledge, skills, and experiences.

ENGLISH The wide-ranging and inherently interdisciplinary work of English literary scholars examines cultural production—including poetry, plays, novels, short fiction and creative non-fiction—through the ages, and across the globe.

FRENCH Students learn a language spoken on all continents. Study in French can be applied to nearly any field and can facilitate work in every region of the world.

INTERDISCIPLINARY PERFORMANCE This student-centered program focuses on physical theatre, improvisation, solo and collaborative performance creation, as well as intercultural theatre and world performance traditions.

SPANISH Students learn this Romance language in a vibrant and friendly environment. Summer programs may lead to a Spanish-speaking country to experience the culture.

ARRAY OF OPTIONS

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VISUAL ARTS This program is dedicated to skill development, entrepreneurial opportunity, and critical thinking while immersing students in drawing, painting, printmaking, photography, sculpture, and digital media arts.

GRADUATE PROGRAMSMA DEGREE IN ENGLISH Students learn and apply theoretical and practical tools involved in advanced literary studies in English. Graduates are prepared for a variety of professions that value strong communication skills and competence in writing and textual analysis.

MASTER OF FINE ARTS (MFA) Students undertake advanced practice in three specializations: Creative Writing, Visual Arts, and Interdisciplinary Studies.

INTERDISCIPLINARY GRADUATE STUDIES PROGRAM (IGS)

Offered via the College of Graduate Studies, IGS supports both master’s and doctoral level studies tailored to each graduate student’s interests within the Faculty’s diverse research areas, including:

• Cultural Literacies and Practices• Eco Cultures• Latin American and Iberian Studies• Media and Digital Cultures• Postcolonial Imaginaries

Students can also apply to do an IGS master’s degree in French studies.

FACULTY OF CREATIVE AND CRITICAL STUDIES 13

A key focus of FCCS’s mission is to facilitate—and engage in—research and creative activity of the highest calibre. While our faculty and students are involved in cutting-edge scholarly activities in a variety of areas, we have particularly strong, established, and highly recognized research expertise in the following areas:

CULTURAL LITERACIES AND PRACTICES is centred on the production, theorizing, and analysis of literature, visual art and performance, including writing, editing, publishing, transmission, and curating.

ECO CULTURES focusses on culture and ecological issues, particularly art and criticism involving relations with the more-than-human world and ecological collaborations.

MEDIA AND DIGITAL CULTURE in the arts and humanities, including print media, television, film, live performance and computing, and born-digital technologies.

POSTCOLONIAL IMAGINARIES engages with the theoretical, methodological, and practical implications of the critique of colonial, neocolonial, and imperial power relations, from historical, contemporary, and comparative perspectives.

FACILITATE AND ENGAGE

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FCCS values teaching excellence as a fundamental pillar of our mandate. We pursue initiatives that build on our faculty members’ distinguished record of instruction, which ensures that our students have the highest quality of learning in our courses and across our programs.

FACULTY OF CREATIVE AND CRITICAL STUDIES 15

Constance Crompton Assistant Professor, Digital Humanities

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CODING KNOWLEDGEResearcher is digitizing history to preserve the past and secure the future

Constance Crompton researches code as a representative medium, asking questions of databases and programming languages that others might ask of print, oil paint, and photography: What does each medium allow us to say—or not say—about people? And, how do we use code to express real-world information?

The technical aspect of coding was always attractive to Crompton, but dabbling in English studies honed her critical thinking, leading her to use computing methods to understand historical questions. “I am passionate about this work because it matters to the future of knowledge,” she says.

Pairing expertise in code with a passion for gender studies, Crompton and colleagues are building an interactive digital resource for the study of LGBT history in Canada. The work takes place, alongside other projects, in The Exchange: A Humanist Data Lab. Reconfiguring information will allow users to explore the people, places, events, and publications that defined the history of gay liberation in Canada, sharing histories that might otherwise be lost.

“Understanding how the past was different from the present lets us imagine different futures and challenges the status quo,” says Crompton. “This research helps people learn to think and make informed choices. Analysis of the past empowers us to imagine a creative future.”

FCCS FACULTY 17

THE ART OF CONVERSATIONTheorist and researcher uses 3-D art to prompt critical thinking about creative spaces

A visual artist who also explores writing, performance, and sculpture as forms of expression, Samuel Roy-Bois was drawn to FCCS by the unique environment that mixes creative and critical studies. “My practice is very hands-on but is re-informed by theory and academic research,” he says. “It’s fitting to be in an environment where people push both sides of the art.”

Roy-Bois seeks to inspire students with the combination of visual arts and creative writing in his classes, which focus on academic ways of doing research in the creative arts. Roy-Bois hopes to provide students with real-world experience and equip them to understand all the components of art. In his artistic practice, Roy-Bois shows his work across the country in annual exhibitions. His work focuses on ideas related to the built environment and architecture, and he explores these through immersive installations, fiction, and sound. “It’s really about the making of things, the transformation of materials, and the stories that can be built around this process,” he says.

Roy-Bois continues the conversation in the interdisciplinary Research Studio for Spaces and Things, funded by the Canada Foundation for Innovation.

“We are starting conversations that explore complex concepts and allow for the creation of unusual juxtapositions that provoke thoughts.”

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Samuel Roy-BoisAssistant Professor, Sculpture & 3-D

FCCS FACULTY 19

Hussein KeshaniAssociate Professor, Art History and Visual Culture

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THE DIGITAL PICTURE Historian uses digital technologies to explore new avenues for communication

Hussein Keshani is passionate about exploring the creative worlds of human history. Initially interested in architecture, Keshani’s focus shifted when he encountered few histories of art and culture of the non-Western world in his training. Curiosity led him to become an architectural historian, specializing in the Islamic world and South Asia.

Field research in places such as India comes with challenges—navigating local politics, extreme weather, and pollution are but a few of the hurdles Keshani has encountered. But he’s driven by a desire to engage Canadians in understanding the world’s creative pasts.

“Canada is a diverse, multicultural society with people who have roots in all parts of the world. In a way,” he says, “it is exploring our own traditions and histories. As Canadians we need to learn about our fellow citizens and be more literate and knowledgeable about places like South Asia and the Islamic world.” Keshani’s key to engaging Canadians may be the movement to digital art history.

Recently, he received a grant for Evolving the Botanical Garden, a research partnership examining the use of mobile technologies for botanical and cultural interpretation at the University of Alberta’s 240-acre Devonian Botanic Garden near Edmonton. The garden will be a place for Canadians to encounter their creative and intellectual pasts.

FCCS FACULTY 21

POSTCARDS FROM HISTORYCole Mash is using a double major to research yesteryear’s literature and writing treasures

A few winters installing heating systems in the Yukon’s “glorious winter” prompted Cole Mash to rethink his passions: books, writing, and literature. A college professor inspired his direction in the arts, but it was FCCS Assistant Professor Karis Shearer who created undergraduate research avenues and helped Mash to professionalize his approach to English and Creative Writing.

Mash wrote The Poetics of Teaching, a biographical research study of influential Canadian poet and former UBC professor Warren Tillman. For that, Mash delved into university archives where he read old letters and postcards by the writers he reveres, discovering their essential authenticity: “Like the rest of us, they had flat tires, and couldn’t write inside the lines, and went on vacations that were too short,” he says. “I discovered a side of writing and literature that I never saw before.”

The study earned Mash a 2013-14 Undergraduate Student Research Award, which led to his work with Assistant Professor Constance Crompton. Mash is writing XML search code for her digital addition of the Devonshire Manuscript. The miscellany of verse compiled by Anne Boleyn’s circle in the 1530s is the first sustained community writing venture that involved English men and women. That writing history includes Cole Mash now, too.

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Cole Mash BA student, English & Creative Writing

FCCS STUDENTS 23

(Imraj) Emmy Chahal BA student, Cultural Studies

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A CULTURAL STUDYEmmy Chahal thinks deeply about morality, power, and privilege—starting with her own

You’re better set to manifest change when you have self-awareness, says fourth-year undergraduate researcher Emmy Chahal. A student ambassador who teaches yoga and is actively involved in campus clubs, she chose UBC Okanagan for its close-knit community. Empowered following a Go Global exchange in post-earthquake Christchurch, New Zealand, Chahal switched majors to study social justice in Cultural Studies, a “seamless fit” with her minor, Women and Gender Studies.

As Chahal ventured to understand her own patriarchal past in relation to global issues of race and gender, Assistant Professor Allison Hargreaves’ Indigenous Literature class became one of the most defining experiences of her life. “We’re all implicated in injustice,” Chahal says. “As a person of colour, international and transnational decolonization is close to my heart.” Recently Chahal’s mentor, Associate Professor David Jefferess, involved her in community research with Grade 5 students, focussing on global education; they conducted workshops on gender equality, literacy, and awareness.

“By investigating what it means to be human, I’ve found likeminded people who share similar passions and visions of a more positive future.” She says she’s become less quick to judge, is more curious, open, nuanced, unlimited by black-and-white thinking. While education cultivates that kind of fluency, “self-growth is just as valuable.”

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GRITTY LITTLE THINGSBreakout author Ashley Little is a Kelowna writer working outside of her comfort zone

“I have faith in you” is sometimes all a writer needs to hear. Especially if that author—accomplished beyond her years—is Ashley Little, her MFA in Creative Writing in hand.

The BC transplant (via Ontario and Alberta) is unstoppable in her trajectory as a successful young novelist. And she’s a contradiction: Little’s serene demeanour disguises a rollicking imagination about misfit youths, gritty byways, and danger. Novels such as Prick: Confessions of a Tattoo Artist and Anatomy of a Girl Gang reveal a touch for the taboo that’s garnered numerous awards. She recently received a Canada Council grant for professional writing.

“It was a real turning point for me,” Little says. “It’s such an honour to have the support of my country’s arts funding body and to know that they believe in my future.”

Little’s thesis became the forthcoming novel Niagara Motel from which “I learned a lot about managing my time in order to prioritize my creative writing.”

Professors Anne Fleming, Nancy Holmes, and Matt Rader were instrumental in providing critical advice. They taught Little to thrive beyond her comfort zone—“no sugar-coating,” she says—and proved to be faithful listeners that would “snap you out of worry so you can get back to work.”

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Ashley LittleMFA student, Creative Writing

FCCS STUDENTS 27

CLOSE-KNIT CAMPUSAt UBC’s Okanagan campus, students join a close-knit learning community where open dialogue reaches across disciplines and departments, cultivating bold new ways of thinking.

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CAMPUS CULTURE

STUDENT-FACULTY RATIO

20:1 UNDERGRADUATE CLASSES WITH

FEWER THAN 30 STUDENTS

46%

STUDENTS IN ABORIGINAL ACCESS STUDIES PROGRAM SINCE 2007

223

STUDENTS LIVING ON CAMPUS

1,676

OK ANAGAN CAMPUS EXPERIENCE 29

A PLACEFOR EVERYONE

From nature trails and coffee spots to comfortable student collegia, UBC’s Okanagan campus continues to add spaces that support well-being.The workout and studio space in the new Hangar Fitness Centre complement athletic courts, fitness stations, and the Nonis artificial turf sports field.Such vibrant environments in our UBC community are places to learn, work, and play.

ATHLETICS AND RECREATION

GYMNASIUM SQ.M.

1,561 VARSITY ATHLETICS

TEAMS

12STEPS TO NATURE TRAILS

100

30

LIBRARY

SEATS

674 STUDY ROOMS

14COMPUTER

WORKSTATIONS

114

OK ANAGAN CAMPUS EXPERIENCE 31

waiting content and photo

Nishat TasnimMaster’s student

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CONNECTING THE WORLDUBC master’s student Nishat Tasnim is an International Leader of Tomorrow

How do pop culture, feminist science fiction, and biology intersect? During her undergraduate degree at UBC’s Okanagan campus, Nishat Tasnim teased out connective threads between such disparate subjects. “Taking a range of courses deepened my interest in science by situating me in a vast matrix of knowledge,” she says. “My task was to figure out my place in that matrix. In science, the ability to examine and challenge thoughts is essential to learning; it requires the kind of creative thinking Critical Studies asked me to develop.”

Born and raised in Dhaka, Bangladesh, Tasnim dreamed of studying in Canada; UBC’s International Leader of Tomorrow award made it a reality. “Smiling faces and signs with my name greeted me at the airport. On campus, I met other international students experiencing the same emotions.” Programs such as Campus Life, Community Service Learning, International Programs & Services, RezLife, and more became Tasnim’s community. “They gave me opportunities in leadership, volunteering, and research.”

Now poised for master’s-level research in biology, Tasnim is grounded in the processes of transformation and self-actualization. “I feel empowered and supported as I continue to ask questions and learn about my place in the world,” she says. “I am proud to represent UBC Okanagan in that quest.”

GLOBAL COMMUNITY

PERCENTAGE OF GRADUATE STUDENTS

THAT ARE INTERNATIONAL

29%

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UBC’s Okanagan campus is situated between Kelowna’s lively city centre and stunning mountains, lakes, and trails of the Okanagan Valley. Embark on a trail adventure, savour the freshest produce at farm-to-table restaurants, take part in the thriving arts scene, and enjoy year-round access to the great outdoors.

OASIS IN THE VALLEY

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SUMMER WARM AND DRY

25C

WINTER COOL AND CLEAR

-1C

2,000 hours of sunshine annually4 seasons of outdoor recreation: skiing, golfing, hiking, and water sports5 of Canada’s largest ski resorts within 3 hours135 km length of Okanagan Lake30 beaches, 200 freshwater lakes

OK ANAGAN VALLEY 35

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