Projects

New Project: “Reel Lives: Madness, Addiction and Crime in Canada One-Day Workshop”

Through a one-day workshop, this project aims to foster critical dialogue about Canadian documentary films representing madness, addiction and crime. The workshop will bring together academic experts, documentary filmmakers & film producers, individuals with madness and/or addiction and/or criminalization experiences and their advocates as well as service providers. The main aims of the workshop are to continue to build upon previous seed-grant projects by gaining new knowledge in an under-explored area of research; to move critical analyses toward a gender and social inequities lens; and to explore the use of documentary film as a tool for community engagement and social change. The workshop will be open to CGSM members, with a limit of 75 participants, including speakers & team members.

Ongoing Research: “Addiction and Drug Crime: Radio Documentaries, 1920-1969”

The objectives of the “Addiction and Drug Crime: Radio Documentaries, 1920-1969” project is to build on an earlier CGSM seed grant project: “Media Representations on Madness, Addiction and Crime/Criminalization: A Preliminary, Intersectional Analysis of Documentary Films Used for Public Education in Canada.” That project created the foundation for a complimentary pilot project on addiction and drug crime radio documentaries.

The pilot project goals are:

  1. Conduct a systematic search and compile a chronological bibliography of radio shows about illegal drugs used for public education in Canada from 1920 to 1969 (even if they were originally produced elsewhere (e.g. the U.S. or Britain);
  2. Develop a literature review on radio educational/documentaries, time line, and investigate and track historical reports and discursive shifts in legislation and broadcasting;
  3. Listen to, transcribe and analyze a small sample of radio documentaries;
  4. Prepare a coding manual and a coding sheet for a thematic, intersectional analysis of the larger radio sample;
  5. Organize two researcher-run focus groups at Vancouver Area Network of Drug Users (VANDU) to listen to and discuss the themes that emerge from select documentary/educational radio shows;
  6. Review and analyze newspaper/magazine coverage of the radio documentaries in the sample and their reception;
  7. Analyze study guide materials for each documentary (if available).

The project findings will be disseminated at several public gatherings, CGSM, referred articles in appropriate academic journals, and professional conferences.

Ongoing Research:  “Media Representations of Madness, Addiction and Crime/Criminalization:  A Preliminary, Intersectional Analysis of Documentary Films Used for Public Education in Canada, 1920-1969”

The Criminal Justice System, Mental Health and Substance Use research team started their first seed project in May, 2010.

The proposed research is the first of a two-part project that will provide the foundation for a more comprehensive analysis of documentary films on madness, addiction and crime/criminalization used for public educational purposes during the period from 1920 to 2010.  We will look at films that focus on madness and addiction alone or in tandem and in relation to the presence or absence of a link to crime/criminalization.

Our goals are: (1)  to examine depictions of and investigate linkages between madness, addiction and (violent) crime in educational media;  (2)  to track historical and discursive shifts in perspectives on madness, addiction and criminalization; and (3)  to analyze the gender dimensions of the above in relation to race, class, and other social relations.

At the May 2011 Critical Inquiries Workshop the project team presented a project poster and handed out project pamphlets that contain the most up to date material currently available on this project.