Forum explores assumptions, barriers to learning

The University of Victoria’s eighth annual Provost’s Diversity Research Forum will look at the concepts of differences that can create challenges to learning in all its forms. Titled Privilege & Prejudice: Assumptions in Learning, the forum will present sessions that look at how perceptions of various factors—gender, social class, sexuality, ethnicity, mental health, and many others—may impact how people learn or teach.

“Through forums such as this, as well as the wide range of research on diversity that takes place at UVic, we welcome courageous conversations on what can be difficult topics,” says conference chair Grace Wong Sneddon, Advisor to the Provost on Equity and Diversity. “This is a wonderful opportunity for our campus and the broader community to come together to network and learn more about diversity and our work here.”

The forum runs on Jan. 29 and 30, and will feature writer Drew Hayden Taylor (Motorcycles & Sweetgrass) as the keynote speaker. Other sessions include:

• Cognitive Diversity: Different Ways of Thinking, exploring the diversity of human cognition from the perspectives of four unique individuals
• Navigating Gender and Sexual Diversity in Learning Environments, where individual experiences will be shared and discussed by panelists
• More than a Matrix: Intersectional Approaches to Inequity and Difference, examining oppression and discrimination, the operation of power and privilege and the ways in which they are inextricably linked
• No More Stolen Indigenous Sisters: A Renewal of Hope, addressing missing Indigenous women in Canada

The diversity forum opens with a reception and performance in First Peoples House, as well as Taylor’s keynote address and the presentation of the annual Diversity Writing and Spoken Word Awards.

The diversity forum is free to attend, and everyone is welcome to register. For a complete list of sessions and times, please visit www.uvic.ca/diversityforum.

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