Researcher and Storyteller
This is a podcast about a game-centered, and creative project based assignment that integrates mobile learning. How can students use mobile technologies in the classroom to enhance project-based learning? Have a listen!
Special thanks to Sian Eatwell, Bensound.com, and Brianna Hugh.
jennleahko ยท Climate Change Scavenger Hunt: A Project-Based Mobile Tech Lesson
Exactly one year ago today, I returned to Ottawa from a research trip in Hong Kong.
Those two-and-a-half weeks were spent lugging camera equipment around the crowded city to interview participants who had something to say about migration, diaspora, and traditional Chinese medicine. That is casting a wide net, as most Hong Kongers have like had experiences and memories–personal or intergenerational–about all three.
On this one year anniversary, I thought I would share some snapshots I took on the trip.
And here is the link to the film I produced as part of my M.A. thesis. I’ll let it speak for itself. Let me know what you think.
This post is Part Four of a five-part series, where I use a blog format to present and elaborate themes less-explored in my M.A. in History thesis.ย
This is a short audio story about the entrepreneurial spirit of Catherine Chambers, soap maker/social worker extraordinaire, that I put together for a job application. She’s the owner of Let’s Make It, a company that offers collaborative experiences and teaches DIY skills. ย On top of being a business owner, Catherine is also a mother and a graduate student at OISE.
Thank you to Catherine for speaking to me on such short notice (1 day!). Thank you to my good friend Alicia, also a future teacher, for introducing me to Catherine.
Thesis procrastination and narrative flexibility on an ice stormy day.
Can you tell what was fact and what was fiction?
This is an excerpt of my final essay for theย Directed Readings Course, Migration, Ethnicity, Diaspora I took in Winter 2017ย with my thesis supervisor, Dr. Daniel McNeil. MAJOR SPOILERS ahead.ย
In his seminal essay, โReflections on Exile,โ Edward Said denounced modern cultureโs attempts to manifest honest representations of exile, calling its objectifications banal and its beneficial claims mute. An exile of Palestine and Egypt himself, Said described the unenviable condition as โthe unhealable rift forced between a human being and a native place, between the self and its true home: its essential sadness can never be surmounted.โ Literary productions originating in such unglamorous suffering can hardly be understood by those who read them enveloped by a sense of belonging. He asks: is it not true that these representations obscure the horrendous? Do such cultural productions not hide exileโs affective likeliness to death, but without deathโs lenient finality?ย The nations of Saidโs eclectic upbringing are similar to the Hong Kong of the following discourse: none exist as they did due to the recidivism of British colonialism and the politics of nation-building. Handover-era Hong Kongโs unique position of in-betweeness situated a cultural space that tried to answer questions on exile, being, and belonging.
Here Iย argue that pre- and post-1997 Hong Kong handover cinema can stand in refutation of Edward Saidโs assertion of the humanistic and aesthetic incomprehensibility of modern cultureโs representations of twentieth-century exile. The dark, comedic โbanalityโ in Stephen Chowโs desires and necessities, and the excruciating โmutenessโ in Wong Kar Waiโs strained romantic encounters are a couple obvious examples of well known Hong Kong directors and their ability to put exile to screen. However, much has been written about the international successes of Steven Chowโs use of glocalization in transnational, transcultural filmmaking success and Wong Kar Waiโs masterful command of time and emotion to convey exile and emptiness. I do not wish to add to that canon of literature. Instead, following ลฝiลพekโs Lacanian analysis, I want to interpret the less-restrained particularities and revelations found in the Hong Kong B-horror fantasy space of Going Home (2002). Unlike the โauteur of timeโsโ manner of speaking in ellipsis that entrances international critics and academics, Peter Chan produces diasporic feelings of exile, loss, and transience in Going Home through fear in the juxtaposition of absurdity and familiarity. The film was the third part of Three (2002), a collaborative horror anthology from Thailand, Hong Kong, and Korea.
The film is opened in a sea of subjectivityโa young girl in a bright red coat stands amidst dozens of foggy, sepia-toned portraits in a dingy, phthalo green photo studio.ย A cop, Chan Kwok-wai (Eric Tsang) and his son, Cheung move into a battered, near-vacant apartment complex slated for demolition. Chan learns that only other residents are Yu (Leon Lai), his paralyzed wife, Haiโer (Eugenia Yuan)โboth introverted doctors trained in traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) from the mainlandโand their young daughter. Cheung catches the girl in the red coat leering at him through windows and behind doors, is unsure why he is afraid of her, but the two become friends and he follows her to the photo studio to play. Upon returning home, Chan cannot find Cheung and accuses the only other resident, Yu, of kidnapping his son. Chan breaks into Yuโs apartment, but stunned to find Haiโer unmoving, breathless and submerged in a bathtub of herbal medicine, he is caught and rendered unconscious. Yu takes the cop hostage because Chan has learned his secrets: his wife Haiโer is dead; he is attempting to bring her back to life with Chinese medicine; and he talks to her every day. Strange, but kind, Yu tells Chan the couple never had a daughter, but aborted their child when Haiโer was diagnosed with a fatal cancer. He plans to release Chan when his wife revives in three days, when they will depart home to Changsha home in the mainland.
In those three days, Chan learns that Yuโs necrophilia and mystical dedication to reincarnation does not make him evil. The two experience intimate moments of friendship while Chan is bound and restrained, and Yu even attempts to find Cheung. On the third day, exactly three years from the day Yu strangled his wife to death to begin the healing process to cure her cancer, and the day of Haiโerโs supposed reincarnation, Chanโs police colleagues arrest Yu and collect his wifeโs body. Just as Haiโerโs fingers begin to twitch, Yu escapes from the police and is hit by a passing car and killed. After, Chan watches a video recording of Haiโer speaking to her husband as she uses the same traditional healing process to revive Yuโs dead body. Going Home ends with Cheung leaving the photo studio and Yu, Haiโer, and the girl in the red coat posing to get their photo taken.
In Going Home, Chineseness is embodied in Yu, Haiโer, and their dedication to traditional Chinese healing practices. Directer Peter Chan envelops the couple in otherness by contrasting myth/science, traditional/modern, Chinese medicine/Western medicine. Yuโs repetition of the same memoryโthe moment he met his wifeโboth speaks her personality into her expressionless corpse and reinforces their shared Chinese identity. In Mandarin Yu lovingly says to his wifeโs body, โDo you remember when I first took your pulse?โ When the cop yells back from the corner of the room, tied up, that his wife is dead, Yu switches to Chanโs Cantonese dialect with ease: โYes, Western medicine says she is deceased, but her tumours will be dispelled if I immerse her in Chinese herbs every day. Sheโll revive and all will be well.โ Their exchange creates the divide between insane Chinese captor and sane Hong Kong captive, but also accentuates the cultural connections through the menโs linguistic fluency. Yu masterfully flits between the dialects and while Chan does not choose to speak Mandarin, he understands it. The language of both are Chinese, but the manner of speaking them are named Mandarin and Cantonese. The โIโ speaks language and it is imperative to representation of the self through expression. But language also speaks the โIโ, in that words shape subjective identities through their inherent histories. Therefore Chan can be read as a defiant Hong Konger, hearing his captorโs tongue but speaking his own Cantonese. Yu can be read as fluidโadapting to the dialect of this different, but similar land.
In his aptly named personal essay, โOn Not Going Home,โ literary critic James Woods writes that his โsofter emigrationโ is not quite the same as Saidโs โdesert of exile.โ Is the โunhealable riftโ finally patched in death? Or does death connote a more permanent desolation? If Said considered exile to be deathโs less merciful cousin, were Yu and his family graced by a kinder fate? Although Chan lives, he remains in the desolate complex. His son is nowhere to be found and he remains captive in Yuโs story. Chan seems unable to cross the threshold into a temporality and spatiality can begin its march anew. Earlier in the film, Cheung is afraid of the empty rooms and screams into each one, but only forgotten photographs hear him. He is screaming at walls that do not move, and he is likewise unable to move. Father and son continue to struggle. Perhaps both men are migrants: Yu is not going home and Chan is in exile. In the characterโs exploration of being and belonging, it would seem that the former feels the softness of knowing his home, and the latter is left with the discomfort of an untethered identity.ย
ยฉ Jenn Ko and jennleahko.wordpress.com, 2017. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this siteโs author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Jenn Ko and jennleahko.wordpress.com with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.
Within theย ephemeral solution of atemporality, storyteller Nerdwriter1 posesย an important question in about the way historians and their audiences interact with narratives of the past. Why does it feel like we are moving away from what we once accepted as truth? A clear, pixelated proponent ofย modern technology, the YouTuber pins a global, growing malaise surrounding theย academic history on a greater dissemination of different forms of knowledge due toย “the network.”
I believe Public History couldย and should be created within this network. Around minute 4 he slowly annunciates, “We. Have. Access.” Access for the people to material evidence and an ever-expanding wealth of writing have revolutionized history and historiography, but it also hightlights an tension within the field. How do we create “coherent narratives” within such a chaotic space?
Some people might think media labour disputes, sports contract negotiations, and upper-level managerial disagreements are boring and make poor subjects for a full-length book. Those people are wrong. The gun-slinging Richard Stursberg will revel in proving them so.
The Tower of Babble is a manโs recount of the business and politics in his six stormy years as the head of English services at the CBC. Stursbergโs mission was to stop the CBCโs slide in market share and lift it from irrelevancy. His commentary explains his controversial moves in power: the axing of high-arts shows; the implementation of โedgy, amateur-drivenโ entertainment โworking within understood narrative traditions;โ and the reimagining and diversification of โFort News.โ
His memoir reads like a Martin Scorsese film about the CBC and Stursberg is the bold, brilliant Wolf on Mean Streets Goodfella you canโt help but root for.
Itโs a personal retelling of one manโs uphill battle against an endless queue of frenemies to save Canadaโs public broadcaster from obscurity. As the former head of CBCโs English services, Stursberg clashed with the Corporationโs president, its board of directors, Senate Committees, CTV, TSN, its own news department, newspaper columnists and more. The book is a crimeless power drama: shots were fired (yeah, he is looking at you, Hubert Lacroix), valuable sports properties were stolen (by Ivan Fecan of CTV) โ through it all, Stursberg had a vision and he was not afraid of who he might offend on his path to achieve it. Like Scorseseโs high flyers, he also has a consistent taste for expensive restaurants.
With the framing of a skilled director, Stursberg adds distinctive wit and undeniable flair in detailing his reign at the CBC. Events, characters and conversations are seen through his executive lens, leaving an entertaining โ but distorted โ reality for the readers to decipher themselves.
For dedicated viewers and listeners of the CBC, Stursberg shines a stage light onto the mysterious business of television and radio. Youโd be surprised how riveting the ins and outs of advertising revenue, the scrambled politics and technicalities of running a public broadcasting corporation can be.ย But what is the role of a public broadcaster? What should or shouldnโt the people-owned CBC be? Underneath his questionable and argumentative recollections, Stursbergโs personal tirade against the stoic, staid, old and boring echoes a broader and more important issue.
What do Canadians truly want from their national public broadcaster โ and does it really matter what they want?
Stursberg backed now-cancelled shows like Little Mosque on the Prairie, Battle of the Blades, and Being Erica, which were lauded as โdumbed-down,โ โAmericanizedโ entertainment by his opponents. Yet they attracted bigger audiences than any of the CBCโs previous productions.
Canadians were watching these situational comedies and reality elimination shows in droves and ignoring the Corporationโs venture into high-arts television programming, but still Stursberg found himself at loggerheads with the president and board. The latter wanted a mandate of โculture and democracyโ while the former wanted to fight the anti-noble fight for the future. After six long years and nine short chapters, Stursberg claims he was fired for his incoherent vision.
News consumers no longer want to hear the stoic Voice of God on the radio. They donโt want to see him sitting behind the staid, big desk with a four-by-four inch photo next to the right ear of his old, precious, silver-haired head.
Audiences definitely donโt want to sit in front of the television for the two-hour special Scotiabank Giller Prize event. What are the Gillers? They will ask. Who cares? They will answer.
Still, there is something to be said for quality arts programming. The CBC is charged with being the lone soldier in a cultural struggle against its closest neighbour and greatest ally. It is Canadaโs most important cultural institution โ shouldnโt it try to distinguish itself from the American media monster? Shouldnโt Canadians be moved to read Andrรฉ Alexisโ impassioned Fifteen Dogs?
Cultural elitism is one factor of many that has contributed to the doom and gloom of todayโs news industry. Journalists and news organizations want to educate and enlighten their audiences on politics, industry, and important cultural arts โ and the audiences are turning away. They have been for decades. Stursbergโs opponents at the CBC need to cut through the blither blather of elitist programming and look for a balance of quality arts and accessible entertainment to draw Canadian eyeballs back to Canadian programming.
As a book, the movie analogy still works. It is one man’s symphony blasted and blaring at his former foes rather than a fair account of his turbulent years at the Corporation. More of a block-blunder action than an Oscar-worthy documentary.ย Tower of Babble is an entertaining memoir with more blister than balance. All in all, it is worth the read.
On a crisp November morning, sunlight warmed the faces of tens of thousands of Canadians who gathered in Confederation Square to remember the men and women who have fallen for their country.
Not far from where Cpl. Nathan Cirillo fell three weeks ago, Gov. Gen. David Johnson rededicated the National War Memorial for the second time in the name of all who have died in the service of Canada.
No one will soon forget the attack on the capital. Heightened security was poignant in the square. All major roads surrounding the monument were blocked off and heavily patrolled. Watchful guns topped the roofs of nearby buildings and loudly accompanied the sides of roaming personnel in both caution and confidence: nothing bad will happen here today.
But while security froze in chilly memory, spectators warmed to the sight of a sea of uniforms. For one Canadian history high school teacher, who has attended the ceremony for twenty years running, it was a new and nostalgic experience. โEveryoneโs a bit on edge this year, after what happened. But it still means the same thing. We all just have more to be grateful for,โ said David Leduc from Montreal.
Cirillo was on every mind, in every heart.
Monica Brown and her fiancรฉ Marc Gallant travelled to the nationโs capital from Halifax, Nova Scotia just for the ceremony today. She wanted to take the time and effort to โstop and pause and remember the amazing things.โ For Brown, it was impressive to see the sheer numbers of veterans and their families, and to stand amongst them.
Allan Cohoon, an active member of the Canadian Army stationed here in Ottawa, doesnโt see Remembrance Day as a solemn one either.
Icy hands clapped and clapped for the veterans of Canada who have served in wars past, present and future. This year marks one century since the beginning of the First World War. First dedicated for the Great War in 1939, months before the start of the Second World War, the National War Memorial now represents all Canadians in every war that has and hasnโt happened.
Unofficial estimates range from 30,000 to 80,000 in attendance. People stood on the streets, climbed up stairs and onto ledges, and even watched from their office windows.
Johnson said Canada will continue to remember the sacrifices. โToday we stand as one, in silent tribute, not only to keep the vow made long ago but also to rededicate this symbol of that promise.โ
What follows is archival evidence from my firstย weeks in j-school. I chose to leave the awkward word choice. Warning: it is painful to read. Did I really applaud Jennifer Connelly for being pretty? Mighty pen!? *Face palm*
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Why journalism? ย This question has haunted every conversation I’ve partaken in since the day I accepted Carleton’s offer.
I want to be a journalist because I was never meant to be one. ย I was not one of those students with a natural affinity with the written and spoken word; both reading and speaking were arduous tasks . However, soon after I was introduced to J.K Rowling’s claim to fame, I drowned myself in pages of print. With aย newfound reading habit, I slowly taught myself to love books, leading me to love and practice the written word. Journalism allows me to pursue this passion in all aspects of my life.
I want to be involved and in the know. I want to meet interesting people and see interesting things. I have always had a thirst for knowledge; looking at everything with inherent curiosity. Journalism can give me the opportunity to never stop learning about the world we live in.
I want to travel the globe and expand my worldview. For most, it was Leonardo DiCaprio that made Blood Diamondย an immediate favourite. ย For me, it was Jennifer Connelly and her character as the pretty, persistent investigative reporter that forced me to watch the movie four times. As with every aspiring journalist, I dream to sweat and bleed in a faraway continent writing a world-changing exposรฉ.
My parents, who once dreamedย every parent’s dream, were more than disappointed with my choice of the mighty pen over the road to medical school, so I told them a few of the many strings that pull me to the newsroom. Hearing my passion, they have since pushed that dream into my younger brother. Maybe we can both grow up to save lives.
Jenn Leah Ko 