At a Glance

Annamma Joy (Marketing) will chair sessions at the European marketing academy (EMAC) conference in Milan, and at the Marketing and Development conference in Thessaloniki, Greece. She also had article published in the journal Consumption, Markets and Culture. Written with John Sherry, Jr., it was called “Framing Considerations in the PRC: Creating Value in the Contemporary Chinese Art Market.”

Concordia graduate Pierre Lafontaine (BSc Biology 79) has been named Swimming Canada’s new CEO. Lafontaine has worked as a trainer in Montreal, Calgary, Atlanta, Phoenix and Canberra, Australia. More recently, as the head coach of the Australian Institute of Sport, Lafontaine led 10 swimmers from the team to medal results at the 2004 Olympics.

Michael Carney (Management) has been invited to be moderator of a meeting sponsored by the International Civil Aviation Organization and the World Bank, to take place June 6 to 8 at ICAO headquarters in Montreal.

Norman Ravvin (Religion, Canadian Jewish Studies) reviewed The Journals of Yaacov Zipper, 1950-1982: The Struggle for Yiddishkeit, in the Canadian Jewish News recently. The book is an English translation by editors Mervin Butovsky, a Concordia English professor, and Ode Garfinkle. It was published by McGill-Queen’s University Press.

Zipper was an inspirational teacher in the 1950s, a time when, as Ravvin pointed out, clinging to Yiddishism was “a recipe for marginalization, a bit like driving a Studebaker when the neighbours have moved on to Mazdas and Audis.” While Ravvin noted the melancholy tone of much of Zipper’s observations on Montreal’s increasingly prosperous and secularized Jewish community of that era, he pointed to “an increasing interest in the work and outlook of influential Yiddish idealists, writers and educators,” and he paid tribute to “the breadth, intelligence and care applied to Zipper’s journals by their translators.”

Karin Doerr and Sima Aprahamian, of the Simone de Beauvoir Institute, have organized a session June 2 at the Congress of Humanities & Social Sciences, taking place this year at the University of Western Ontario. The session is called “Translated Memory and the Language of Genocide: (Gendered) Responses to Traumatic Histories and Silences.”

One of the guest participants is Verjine Svazlian, a professor from Armenia. Svazlian, who has spent 50 years doing research among survivors of the Armenian genocide. She will be the guest of honour at an informal reception at the Simone de Beauvoir, 2170 Bishop St. on June 16, hosted by principal Lillian S. Robinson. More information about Svazlian’s work can be found on her website, at http://www.geocities.com/vsvaz333/.

Marcia Ledgister, a graduate student in Theology, was presented with a $1,500 award by the Montreal Association of Black Business Persons and Professionals at a banquet on May 14. The selection is made by Concordia’s School of Graduate Studies based on the organization’s criteria, which include academic achievement and community involvement.

Frank Chalk (History/Genocide Studies) was interviewed on last week’s edition of CBC’s Sunday Morning about The Investigator, a fine CBC radio drama of the 1950s satirizing Senator Joseph McCarthy's assault on intellectual freedom in the United States. The play was written for the CBC by Reuben Ship, who had been blacklisted in his own country for “un-American activities,” i.e. left-wing leanings. Professor Emeritus Howard Fink, who pioneered broadcast studies at Concordia, also was interviewed.

Andreas Athienitis (Building, Civil and Environmental Engineering) was scheduled to be interviewed this morning by Global News (This Morning Live) about the Solar Decathlon, an international competition based on sustainable energy use. The Concordia entry is on view on the Loyola Campus.

Geologist Judith Patterson presented a paper, co-authored with colleague Anthony Perl (University of Calgary), entitled “Global Carbon Combustion, Transportation, and the End of Cheap Oil,” at the annual meeting of the Geological Association of Canada, held May 15 to 18 in Halifax.

Ombudsperson Kristen Robillard was asked by the Forum of Canadian Ombudsman to lead two half-day workshops at its conference, held at the University of Toronto from May 15 to 17 with Fiona Crean, ombudsperson at York University. Robillard’s workshops were entitled Effective Interviewing, and dealt with how ombudsmen can best plan an interview, frame key questions, build rapport with clients while remaining impartial, and deal with difficult behaviour both fairly and safely.