Sarit Okun and Karine Bellerive are awarded ACT doctoral student bursaries

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ACT is pleased to announce the recipients of the ACT Student Bursaries, which are awarded annually to students enrolled in master’s or doctoral programs in ACT partner universities, and who are conducting research on the intersections of ageing, communication and technologies as part of their thesis projects.

Sarit Okun is a doctoral student in the Department of Communication Studies at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Israel, working under the supervision of Galit Nimrod. She was born on a religious kibbutz to the south of Israel, and raised in an orthodox Jewish society that observes a Torah and Halacha. Thus, the religious environment has always been a significant and central part of her way of life. Okun’s current research, entitled “Online Spirituality in Later Life,” seeks to understand whether and how online religious activity contributes to the lives of seniors. For this study, a Participatory Action Research (PAR) program with 26 religious elders is being conducted, with plans to share the results in a new website built for the purposes of the study. As Okun writes:

“I believe that PAR with an adult group is an excellent way to learn deeply about the positive and negative contribution of online religion to the older population. I wish to take this opportunity to thank ACT wholeheartedly for the award, and hope that my research will be useful and will help theoretical and practical aspects of ACT research.”

The other recipient of the student bursary is Karine Bellerive. Bellerive is a doctoral student in the Department of Communication at the Université de Montréal, under the supervision of Line Grenier. She is particularly interested in self-writing practices and their value as modes of knowledge production, as well as issues related to memory and ageing. Her thesis project is entitled, Exploration de la force performative des écritures de soi-s par une recherche-création féministe : vieillissements et devenirs (roughly translating as Exploration of the performative strength of self-writing through a feminist research creation project: aging and becoming). She explores writing through writing, and questions what can emerge from self-writing processes. Karine is also a lecturer in the Department of Letters and Communications at the Université de Sherbrooke, where she has been teaching theories of communication and writing since 2008, and where she has been involved in various educational committees. As Bellerive reflects, “I would like to say that it is an honour for me to have been awarded this scholarship and to formally integrate the ACT research group, whose projects and mission are really inspiring.​ I hope that my contribution will be as inspiring for the other members”.​

We’re collecting stories about the predatory sales practices of Canadian telecom providers

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Complaints from Canadians about the practices of phone, television and internet providers have increased by 73% in the last year. Media reports relaying situations of abuse, including tactics of overselling and upselling, are also multiplying. Who, exactly, is winning from a system that profits from abusive practices and consumer confusion?

As ACT’s Kim Sawchuk, Constance Lafontaine and Kendra Besanger recently argued in an op-ed published in the Montreal Gazette, seniors, especially those living their later years in situations of financial precarity, are placed at a marked disadvantage.

In collaboration with the Public Interest and Advocacy Centre (PIAC), ACT has set up a phone line to collect stories from older Canadians about dealing with service providers. Call us at 1-800-835-1979 and leave us a short message as well as contact information so we may call you back. 

 

Call for applications: ACT Research Assistantship at Concordia University

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ACT is seeking a Concordia University undergraduate or graduate student to join the ACT team as a research assistant for a 5 to 10-hour per week contract for three months, with the possibility of renewal in the fall. The salary will be commensurate with the student’s academic level and current TRAC rates.

Over the past few years, Concordia RAs have been involved in various projects, from coordinating and facilitating digital arts workshops with seniors, building relationships with community organizations, researching and writing articles, and creating videos, podcasts and other knowledge translation tools. You can see what ACT has been up to lately by browsing through our website, and if you’re interested in working with us, we want to hear from you!

We are looking for someone who is enthusiastic and hard working. Experience with small group facilitation, digital media skills, proficiency in French, and interest in aging studies are assets for this position. To apply, please send a brief email cover letter and a CV to application@actproject.ca by June 1,  2018. Any question pertaining to this position can be sent to Constance Lafontaine at admin@actproject.ca.

Portraits of Alzheimer’s and Dementia: Reimagining discourses on ageing.

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If you google Alzheimer’s and dementia, you will find articles on “the ticking time bomb” of dementia and the socio-economic costs of Alzheimer’s. You’ll encounter videos of scientists speaking authoritatively on our inevitable cognitive decline and perhaps, most alarmingly, you’ll read messages explaining that we reach our intellectual peak at 25 years of age and it’s all just a sad descent from there.

Read more →