The CAP Conference was a fitting end to the year. With presentations covering almost every topic we studied in our CAP program, it was a great way to wrap up a successful year academically for me, and to say goodbye to all of our CAP friends. All of the presentations were very interesting, but the one that I found most intriguing was the presentation on the UBC Rare Books and Special Collections Library by Antonio, Mielle, Margot, Andrea, and Jay.

I found that Andrea’s points were very interesting regarding the power dynamics and representation in the Chung Collection, and the unique, westernized representation of Chinese immigrants. For example, Andrea pointed out the “dominance of Anglican letter-writing practices” where the paper was written in a predominantly horizontal format rather than a traditional vertical format. Andrea concluded that the Chung Collection reinforces western values and is an indicator of how Chinese-Canadians, a marginalized group, saw themselves at that time. Further, Jay reinforced this point by talking about how documents “preserve social norms”, and thus the Chung Collection preserves the Chinese- Canadian society at the time.

The presentation as a whole was an interesting take on the archives. For some CAP students who did not have the privilege of working in the archives, it was a very intriguing introduction to the works contained in the RBSC, and also provided a different perspective for those who may have already done work in the archives. I think that this presentation shows how far we’ve come in CAP since the beginning of the year. When we first started work in ASTU, we did not have to do much research on our own for our papers. Most of the work was provided and we had a distinct way of interpreting it. When we moved to the second term and starting work in the archives, it was confusing at first. We had so many resources and it was up to us to figure out a topic to write about using sources that are likely to have never been taken up in a scholarly way outside of ASTU before. This was a tough project, however the presenters at the CAP conference took the RBSC to new heights by finding different ways of interpreting the works and presenting their findings. This goes for the CAP conference as a whole, as well. The presentations were very impressive in the way that they took what we have already learned and each provided their own, unique interpretations of the work.

Overall, this year has been a success. The CAP conference showed how unique each student is, and how academically we have come so far since entering our first year of university. The conference provided a bittersweet ending to the academic year, and I know I will miss each and every student in the program.

In this weeks ASTU class, we watched a documentary called Through a Blue Lens. This film depicted the tough lives had by drug addicts in the Downtown Eastside of Vancouver. The stories were told through the perspectives of the policemen who patrol the area, and interact with the addicts on a daily basis. The point of the film was to show kids what happens when you get addicted to hard drugs. The lives of the addicts were very interesting to me, from an outsider’s perspective, it is hard to imagine how hard it is for them to stop doing drugs altogether and get their lives back on track. However, it is much harder for them to quit than many think. The documentary shows how these drugs have essentially ruined their lives, and each day it is harder and harder to turn back around.

As some of you may know, my mother is a local news anchor at CBS 13 in Portland, Maine, where I am from. A few days ago, a special report of hers aired about addicted babies. When a woman who is addicted to drugs gets pregnant, there is a good chance their baby will be born with that same addiction. This means that the baby has withdrawal symptoms just like the mother would, as the addiction has been passed to them prenatally. This issue has been rising recently, as Tufts University Neonatologist Jonathan Davis points out that the number of babies born addicted to narcotics has “roughly tripled in the past ten years.” The number of babies being tested for addiction has risen at an extremely rapid pace over the past decade. In the case of the woman interviewed in this report, she was previously a heroin addict and was taking an opiate replacement drug, in this case methadone. The baby gets addicted to the methadone through the umbilical cord in the womb, and when the baby is born and the umbilical cord cut, their supply is cut off and they go through withdrawal. To combat withdrawal, doctors essentially put the baby back on the drugs, such as morphine and phebobarbital, and then slowly wean them off. This process can take a week, or it can take over a month; however the treatment does not rid the baby of all withdrawal symptoms. Doctors believe these are the “safest” drugs to give the babies, but that is being studied.

I find this issue interesting as it shows another side of hard drug addiction. This adds to the already harsh image of addicts shown by Through a Blue Lens, and brings to light yet another downside to drug addiction. Some people do not realize how their actions affect others, and in this case the addicted mothers pass that addiction on to their children. There are some people with extreme ideas who say that drug addicts should be sterilized and not allowed to have children. However, a human rights issue arises with that. The addicted babies going through withdrawal is completely the fault of the mother, and the baby does not deserve to go through that torture. But on the other hand, everyone should be able to preserve their rights when it comes to having children. With this I ask: Does a drug addict maintain the right to have children? And if so, should child abusers, alcoholics, etc. also have that right?

Sources: http://www.wgme.com/news/features/top-stories/stories/addicted-babies-treating-growing-problem-maine-21192.shtml#.UxE7YfldWLV

And my Mom.

Earlier this week, our class visited the TRC exhibit at the UBC Museum of Anthropology. While the TRC is a topic we discussed in the beginning of the academic year, it is an entirely different discussion this time around. After learning about marginalized groups and silence, I was able to see the victims of residential schools in a completely different way. The struggles that the students endured while attending residential schools are unimaginable, and the most shocking part about them is that this atrocity is virtually unknown outside of Canada.

While we were at the exhibit, I read a story told by an aboriginal man about his childhood. His older siblings were sent to residential schools when they were very young, and when they were gone his father got sick. Since there was no one else besides the mother, he was forced to become the man of the house and help care for his father and take over his father’s jobs. Eventually, he was sent to a residential school too, away from his family for a very long period of time. His experiences there traumatized him beyond repair, and when he was released he often turned to alcohol to cure his problems. Him and his other friends from residential school became alcoholics, and his alcoholism eventually almost led to his death.

From my understanding, this story seems to be along the lines of the majority of other victims of residential schools. The issue I have is that this happened many decades to over a century ago. Why did the apologies only start coming in the 1990’s? This ties into our learning of marginalized groups. Carter’s article talks about how the powerful often try their best to keep the marginalized groups from having voices in archives (Carter, 222). This can be seen in residential school students being kept silent for so many years, and how there has not been an international outcry. As an American student, it surprised me that I had never heard about residential schools. Canada plays an integral part of our country’s history, and especially as our neighbour one would think American students would learn about this in school. However, it is relatively unknown outside of Canada.

Although the history of residential schools has mostly been silent, the TRC exhibit at the MOA is a great way of breaking that silence and making the voices of the victims heard by a large audience. Former students are finally telling their stories for everyone to understand the trauma these aboriginal people went through as children. The archives are trying to include this marginalized group to preserve their stories for as long as the archives exist.

A few weeks ago, our ASTU class watched the documentary “Between: Living in the Hyphen”. This documentary depicted the stories of several multiracial Canadians who have dealt with discrimination and have trouble fitting in. These people are struggling to identify with one race or nationality and are constantly judged based on their genealogy.

Similarly, in Fred Wah’s Diamond Grill, the term “faking it” is frequently brought up. This is the idea that immigrants such as Wah “fake” their identity to fit in to a new culture. In doing so, however, they abandon their previous culture and give in to their new society. If they didn’t “fake it”, they would be judged by the general population. Wah and his family were afraid of the consequences of maintaining their previous culture, so they forced themselves to embrace a new culture. The problems faced by these Canadian citizens was troubling to me as I, like most people with knowledge of Canada, see Canada as a country that accepts and promotes all races without discrimination. However, this is clearly not true as the experiences of these people have proven.

I decided to further research into the racial issues that emerge in Canada and I stumbled across an article in the Toronto Star from 2012, titled “The Persistence of Racial Inequality in Canada” by Grace Edward Galabuzi, Amy Casipullai, and Avvy Go. In this article, it is stated that 32%, or almost 1/3 of Canadians, “believe that racism is a significant problem in Canada”. This alone is shocking. As a majority (55%) of Canadians believe we have overcome racism, there is still a significant amount that believe it is an issue. Further reading reveals that there is a significant difference in pay based on race. According to the article, “racialized Canadians earn an average of $30,385 per year compared to $37,332 for other Canadians, or 81 cents to the dollar”, and “the effect of these inequalities in the labour market is that racialized Canadians are three times more likely to live in poverty than other Canadians”.

This raises a serious concern for Canadians. Immigrants and non-white Canadians are afraid to show their true identity and thus resort to “faking it”. They do this because they are judged by fellow Canadians based on where they are from or what they look like. This impacts them emotionally and financially, as they receive less opportunities for less pay, and are forced to rid themselves of their native identities.

This in turn raises a question for all of us. Is Canada truly the accepting nation it is thought to be? The answer is apparently no. Racialized Canadians are belittled by the people in the country they have embraced, so much so that they are afraid to show their origins. We must ask ourselves what we can do to change this. A country that calls itself “glorious and free” must live up to that claim.

The first term of university has been a roller coaster. Arriving at UBC as an international student, I didn’t quite know what to expect. Initially, I was nervous about finding my way in a new setting, let alone a new country. However, these concerns were soon slipped away after meeting other students and professors. Everyone was so welcoming and made me feel at home, and this allowed me to get the most out of my education at UBC.

I’ve found the courses to be challenging yet interesting, and I think I’ve grown as a student and a person over the past term. Coming into university, I didn’t view myself as the strongest writer, and my courses have really tested my ability and forced me to improve my writing skill.

ASTU has not only given me opportunities to better my writing skill, it has allowed me to become a scholarly writer. I had not thought about using abstractions to reinforce my points in my writing before coming here and participating in this course. Throughout this first term, I’ve seen my writing improve and I notice it mimics more of the scholarly writings that we’ve read than my writing had before.

Furthermore, I have learned how to find useful peer-reviewed sources to support my ideas and opinions. ASTU has taught me how to implement this valuable research that other scholars have done into my own scholarly writing. The ability to do so has increased the value of my work and it gives more validity and truth to my arguments. The method of having these scholarly writers converse in a literary review really helps me convey what they are trying to say individually.

The combination of having new scholarly writing skills and implementing research in my writing will be very useful in the future. I am looking forward to the second term and having the ability to rely on these skills I have developed as well as learning new skills to further improve my writing.

I have been a Facebook user for about seven years. When I first joined, it was because everyone else was, and they told me I should get a profile. It seemed like a cool new thing to do, and a neat way to stay connected with friends. I rarely checked my profile, and I didn’t even use my real name. However, as I got older, I started spending more and more time on the site. Eventually, it became my primary means of communication with my friends whom I didn’t see every day. It was also a way for people to present themselves to each other through the use of photos, status updates, and likes. However, many people nowadays are getting most of their news from Facebook.

Eli Pariser pointed out in his Ted Talk, Beware online “filter bubbles” the ways that Facebook and Google are filtering information that is tailored towards the individual user. In essence, a user who expresses interest in certain topics, through things such as the device used or search history, will begin seeing updates and results that are more related to those subjects. The point in this is so people who are using the internet will see things pop up that they are more interested in. In a society that is becoming more and more reliant on these sites for information, this could be dangerous.

It is scary to think that everyone’s web experience is filtered. Pariser proved his “filter bubble” by telling two friends, one who lives in America and another who lives in Egypt, to search the word ‘Egypt’ on Google. As this was during the Arab Spring, the American got results all about the turmoil in Cairo. However, the friend from Egypt did not receive any results that related to the Arab Spring, but rather travel information. This means that some people may not be receiving the whole truth to the topic they search.

The internet was created to be open-source and free from moderation. However, Eli Pariser directed our attention to proof that this is not the case. Facebook, the most visited website on the internet, is going against the foundation of the web and is moderating its content. It is not allowing users to gain new insights and new information, but rather making it so they see only things they agree with and already know.

The filtering done by these sites is harmful to society. We develop certain views and for society to function these views must be challenged. Facebook and Google are taking away differing views, and thus the ability to challenge is diminished. It is important for users of these sites to keep this filter bubble in mind when browsing and to not become shortsighted.

God Grew Tired of us is a documentary that follows the lives of three “lost boys” from Sudan. The film depicts the struggles the boys went through as they escaped from a civil war in Sudan to Ethiopia, and eventually to a refugee camp in Kakuma, Kenya. By listening to their stories, viewers can understand the struggles they went through in their lives and how hard it is for them to move on. From initially losing their family and homes to losing their friends while traveling, the pain the boys went through is inconceivable to us in Western Society.

Eventually, the three boys were invited to live in the United States and start new lives away from the struggles they had been experiencing. Viewers witness their confusion as they transition from their third-world culture to a modern society. Some of them are treated poorly by Americans at some point, and that makes their transition even harder. What many Americans don’t realize is what kind of trauma these refugees are escaping. Most Americans have never, and will never, experience something as severe as one day in the lost boys’ lives.

What struck me the most about the documentary, however, is how these boys persevered in a new society that wasn’t entirely welcoming. They were entirely grateful for the opportunity to live in America and start new lives, and they did everything they could to help out their family and friends back home. They did not forget who they really were. They were essentially working not for themselves, but for those that were left behind in the midst of trauma in Kakuma and Sudan.

I live outside of Portland, Maine, and we have a large refugee population. In my free time for the past three years before coming to university, I helped these refugees by moving donated furniture into their homes and helping them organize their belongings. I learned so much about their culture and was able to witness how they were transitioning into American society. I noticed, as God Grew Tired of Us highlighted, how grateful they were for all the help they were receiving. All of them offered me something in return, such as coming over and helping me at my house or cooking dinner for me and my family. A few families would not let me refuse and gave me tea or a meal. Even though these families were living in complete poverty in an entirely new world, they found room to thank those who helped them in their transition.

What disgusts me is that there are some people who think these people are mooching off the system. That there is some way for them to turn their lives around instantly upon arriving in the States and make money like everyone else. These people do not understand what the refugees have endured in their previous lives, and how hard it is for them to start anew. These experiences make me look at life differently. Not everyone lives the same lives. Some people go through unimaginable events that they may never fully recover from. It is almost impossible for them to escape the trauma they endured, and there are some people who make their lives even more miserable. It is important to consider what the lost boys went through, and what all refugees are going through when they come to a new society straight from places with trauma that any Westerner could not imagine.

As an international student coming from Maine in the United States, I never really learned about Canadian history. When we learned about Maine history, we briefly talked about the French and British dispute over the Maine/Canada border, but never really learned about the Canadian side of the argument. I feel as if this contributes to the stereotype of Americans being ignorant. My Canadian friends all know about slavery, and many other details of American history, but I know almost nothing about the history of the country I am currently living in.

When I learned about the residential schools in Canada, I was astonished that I had never heard of it before. It seems like such an important part of world history, and especially North American history. I felt it was my obligation as a global citizen to educate myself about what happened at the residential schools. The Truth and Reconciliation Commission event in Vancouver was a great opportunity for me to learn more about this tragic part of Canada’s history. I initially went to the Belkin Gallery’s ‘Witnesses: Art and Canada’s Indian Residential Schools’ just to gather some information for my assignments, but I ended up staying much longer than I expected after seeing the heart-wrenching first hand accounts of the residential schools.

While every piece in the gallery was touching in its own way, my favorites were the works by Gina Laing. They each depicted her experiences as a child at a residential school. She drew the events as she remembered them in her head, so many of them are abstract and exaggerated. They were presented in a series of four pieces each, with separate explanations for each of their meanings. She often featured eyes in her paintings as she “felt [she] was always being watched”. The abuse that she went through at the residential school is unimaginable and disgusting. The most disgusting part was that it was not a one-time occurrence, but rather a “normal” thing that happened all the time. She constantly went through mental, physical, and sexual abuse while she attended the school.

What touched me the most about Laing’s paintings was her willingness to share those dark, personal stories. It is impossible to forget that kind of torture, and most people who go through that would never want to talk about it ever again. But Laing told her story, through paintings and explanations, to inform the greater public about what really happened at these residential schools. Her story is one of many, and she has provided a great example of why these schools were an enormous tragedy. To quote Laing from the ‘Witnesses’ catalogue, she is showing these pieces “because I want people to understand what happened to me, and to witness my story through my art.”

The fact that innocent children went through this kind of torture at residential schools disgusts me. It disgusts me that white people thought they were superior to aboriginal people, that they forcibly took children from their families to “educate” them, and that this went on for 150 years. The Truth and Reconciliation Commission events held throughout Vancouver over the past week have helped inform myself and every other person who participated about how the aboriginal people have suffered so much. Gina Laing’s bravery helped open the nation’s eyes, and we can now see first-hand how residential schools have ruined lives and destroyed communities. It is now our duty as global citizens to never forget what happened in the past, and work towards creating a better and more equal future.

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