Concordia faculty, staff and alumni/ae pop up in the media more often than you might think!

Luggie, a poem by Stephanie Bolster (English) from her collection Two Bowls of Milk, was featured in the Globe and Mail’s “How Poems Work” column on March 17 and given an insightful analysis. She was also quoted in a recent issue of Quill and Quire on the state of Canadian literary magazines.

Personal Visions: Conversations with Contemporary Film Directors, a book by Mario Falsetto (Cinema) was favourably reviewed by the Globe and Mail on March 24.

Chair et Métal, the creation of Ollivier Dyens (Études françaises) was named best literary Web site by La Presse recently. The newspaper’s verdict: “Très << intello avant-garde >>, mais aussi très beau.” Check it out at www.chairetmetal.com. Dyens also works with the publishing house VLB.

Frank Chalk (History) was given a 15-minute profile by alumna Shelley Pomerance on CBC Radio’s All in a Weekend about his research, teaching and publications on genocide. He even got to pick the music played with his interview.

The National Post’s recent series on the “best schools” featured tiny Langley Fine Arts School, in Langley, B.C., and mentioned one of the teachers, Peter Sarganis, as a Concordia Fine Arts graduate. “The most attractive thing about Langley Fine Arts is that the students seem not only purposeful, but happy,” wrote Francine Dubé.

The March issue of Journal Le Monde des Affaires mentioned a study on air quality done in 1999 by Louis Lazure of IRSST and Ted Stathopoulos and Patrick Sailhoff of Building Studies. Les Affaires recently pointed out the uniqueness of Concordia’s Department of Building, Civil and Environmental Engineering.

Fine Arts graduate student Diane Borsato got lots of attention when she set out to make the world’s longest paper-clip chain. It took about 60 people 24 hours to make a chain almost 33 km long, to beat the previous record set in 1999 in Singapore. Borsato made it as part of her thesis exhibition, titled How to Make a Sculpture in an Emergency, and it was on display at the Skol Gallery during April.

Christine Jourdan (Sociology/Anthropology) was a guest on Marie-France Bazzo’s Indicatif Présent (Radio-Canada). She deconstructed the recipes of Quebec authors to see what their culinary tastes said about them.

Dean of Arts and Science Martin Singer was Nancy Wood’s guest on Radio Noon (CBC), talking about strained U.S.-China relations.

Jordan Le Bel (Marketing) was on TVA’s Salut Bonjour, telling host Guy Mongrain about chocolate: how it accounts for $86 million in sales a year, and depends for its obsessive appeal on its seratonin content.

Loren Lerner (Art History) was on CKMI-TV’s First Quebec News, commenting on the search by the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, among others, for the true provenance of works that may have been stolen from Jewish collectors during the Second World War.

Harold Chorney (Political Science) had a letter published in the Globe and Mail. He took federal immigration minister Elinor Caplan to task for saying that protecting private mail correspondence would be impossible.

Eric Shragge (School of Community and Public Affairs) was quoted in The Gazette before the Summit of the Americas: “I think people feel that there is something profoundly wrong with their world. Everything is a commodity.” However, also in The Gazette, business students approached free trade with moderate optimism. Shiraz Syed thought the leaders had their constituents’ interests at heart: “I think we forget to give them the benefit of the doubt that they will act responsibly.”
Air Canada’s negative publicity in the wake of its merger with Canadian airlines evoked comment. Mick Carney (Marketing) told The Gazette’s Sheila McGovern that competitors like West Jet have benefited. For his part, Suresh Goyal (MIS) wrote a letter to the editor defending Air Canada management, and got an e-mail of thanks from Robert Milton himself.

Michel Laroche (Marketing) was the subject of Peter Diekmeyer’s column on marketing in The Gazette, and was highly praised for his accomplishments, including a $550,000 distinguished professorship from the Royal Bank. Diekmeyer pointed out that academics have a lot to offer practitioners in the field.

Jeri Brown (Music) has released another compact disc of jazz vocals, Image in the Mirror: The Triptych (Justin Time). It features the compositions of the late Canadian jazz pianist Milton Sealey, former director of The Platters. The CD was favourably reviewed in the Toronto Star. The Halifax Daily News also noted that she has started the Jeri Brown Youth Choir of Nova Scotia. They made their debut at a fundraiser at the Neptune Theatre on April 21.