This is part of an ongoing collaborative, student-led seminar series hosted by T-RUST (Transformative Research in Urban Sustainability Training) at WSU and GLIER (Great Lakes Institute for Environmental Research) at the University of Windsor. The seminar series is titled Transformative Change in Environmental Sustainability and occurs biweekly on Fridays at 10am.

Title: Centering Public Scholarship for Transformative Environmental Studies Research: Ongoing Lessons from the Detroit Water Stories Project

Speaker: Dr. Rahul Mitra, Wayne State University

When: Friday, October 9, 10am

Where: Virtually on Zoom, register here: http://bit.ly/WindsortoWayne. The Zoom link will be sent to the email used for registration two days before the seminar.

Abstract: Perhaps in no other field of study is it more vital for scholars to engage and partner with local communities and lay audiences than in Environmental Studies. Nevertheless, public scholarship remains devalued or grossly misunderstood, or practiced as an after-thought to the “serious” work of research. Yet, research, I argue, can only be truly transformative and consequential when it takes into account the concerns and lived experiences of impacted stakeholders. In this talk, I draw from ongoing lessons from a multi-year collaborative ethnography and oral history project, to outline new ways of approaching public scholarship. The Detroit Water Stories project gathers, shares, and analyzes stories of water insecurity and resilience from key stakeholders involved in the city’s ongoing water affordability crisis. In this talk, I review three critical communicative principles—listen, collaborate and amplify—to actualize what Monica Lewis Patrick of We The People of Detroit terms “deputization.” The model of deputized scholarship I advance in this talk is especially geared toward “wicked problems” that demand our attention to complex and overlapping social, structural and environmental issues. It is a grassroots centered approach to scholarship that blends research, service learning and community engagement, blurring boundaries between public and “basic” scholarship.

Rahul Mitra (PhD, Purdue University) is an Associate Professor at Wayne State University, whose research is at the intersection of organizational and environmental communication, focusing on environmental organizing, sustainability and corporate social responsibility, and meaningful work discourses. He is a critical-interpretive scholar, and uses primarily qualitative methods, such as ethnography, interviews, focus groups, discourse analysis, and arts-based research. At WSU, he directs the Resilient Institutions & Sustainable Environments (RISE) Lab, and his research has appeared in numerous peer-reviewed publications such as Environmental Communication, Management Communication Quarterly, Human Relations, Communication Theory, Public Relations Review, and Journal of Business Ethics. Learn more about Dr. Mitra and his work on his website www.rahulmitraphd.com and at www.detroitwaterstories.com

This is the first installment of a collaborative, student-led seminar series hosted by T-RUST (Transformative Research in Urban Sustainability Training) at WSU and GLIER (Great Lakes Institute for Environmental Research) at the University of Windsor. The seminar series is titled Transformative Change in Environmental Sustainability and occurs biweekly on Fridays at 10am.

Title: Bridging the gap between science and management: A decade of research, experience and reflection

Speaker: Dr. Vivian Nguyen, Carleton University

When: Friday, September 25, 10am

Where: Virtually on Zoom, register here: http://bit.ly/WindsortoWayne. The Zoom link will be sent to the email used for registration two days before the seminar.

Science has always been portrayed as molecules, beakers, lab coats and math symbols. We often don’t think about how people actually interact with scientific information, and where the ‘science’ goes after it’s done in the lab or field. Today, most research is funded by public money, so it is fair to expect that the work will eventually benefit society and people. Sadly, this is not always the case, and the reasons why are not always clear. This mystery is often called the ‘science-action’ or ‘knowledge-action’ gap. We know the traditional way of communicating science through peer-review and hoping it is picked up and used is not working. But, why is that? what has worked? how can researchers maximize the benefits of their work to relevant users? Dr. Nguyen will discuss some of these questions in the context of how new knowledge generated by fish telemetry technology (i.e. remote tracking of fish) has or has not informed fisheries management. Lessons learned will be discussed based on almost a decade of research, experience, observations and reflections.

Vivian Nguyen is an Assistant Professor at the Institute of Environmental and Interdisciplinary Science and the Department of Biology at Carleton University. Her research focuses on the interface of science, society and policy within the themes of environmental change, natural resource management, and food insecurity. Dr. Nguyen also has expertise in the human dimensions of environmental issues and mobilizing ecological knowledge into decisions, policy, and practice. Learn more about Dr. Nguyen’s research here: https://viviannguyen18.wixsite.com/serac

Announcing our new seminar series in partnership with the Great Lakes Institute for Environmental Research (GLIER) at the University of Windsor!

For the first time ever, two sister graduate programs – GLIER (University of Windsor) & Transformative Research in Urban Sustainability Training (T-RUST, Wayne State University) – are partnering to deliver a virtual seminar series entitled: Transformative Change in Environmental Sustainability. Seminars will be every 2 weeks starting on September 25th!

The seminar series will be co-run between the graduate student groups at the University of Windsor (GLIER, School of Environment) and Wayne State University T-RUST and will be focused on connecting our virtual graduate student and early-career research communities. Invited speakers reflect a shared commitment to amplifying diverse Black, Indigenous and People of Colour voices and perspectives, and to broaden perspectives through a range of traditional seminars, break out groups for graduate students, special topic panels and global examples of impactful science, practice and policy.

We are excited to announce our first five speakers:

Dr. Vivian Nguyen, Carleton University 

Dr. Rahul Mitra, Wayne State University

Dr. Janani Sivarajah, Brock University 

Dr. Helen Jarvie, University of Waterloo

Dr. Erin Dunlop, Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources and Forestry

All are welcome! Please register to attend our first seminar here: http://bit.ly/WindsortoWayne