As we wrap up yet another exciting year of programming, the Narratives Group in the UBC Centre for Migration Studies expresses its gratitude for our collective continued enthusiasm for and intellectual engagement with narratives of migration and decolonization. Narratives of human experience in the face of emerging toxic migration policies, ongoing and new kinds of forced displacement, and escalating xenophobia feel more critical than ever, so we wanted to take this opportunity to share some of our successes this academic year.
Over the past 8 months, we have hosted five speakers and collaborated on over a dozen events.
Our most rewarding event was the launch of the Xwémalhkwu Hero Stories: A Graphic Novel (2024), which has since led to an application for ISI funding to expand the project to other First Nations across British Columbia and a Wall Foundation funding application to deepen our work with the Homalco First Nation. It’s also under review for a number of international prizes prizes for comics and graphic novels.
Moreover, our participation in co-sponsoring the Pop Culture Cluster’s Games and Social Justice Public Lecture Series (you can find the re-cap here) helped to ensure its visibility. Energized by its success, the Pop Culture Cluster will launch the UBC Critical Play Lab this fall, an intellectual space for critical play, creative game design, and transformative and engaged research and pedagogy. Reach out to pop.culture@ubc.ca if you’re interested in being part of it!
Finally, we are thrilled to announce that our SSHRC Partnership Development Grant application for “Visual Storytelling in the Indigenous North” was successful! Bringing together Indigenous and settler scholars, artists, knowledge keepers, and cultural organizations across six countries, this arts-based, trauma-informed, and Indigenous-led three-year project connects storytelling practices across Canada, Kalaallit Nunaat (Greenland), Sápmi (spanning Norway, Sweden, and Finland), and Denmark to reimagine truth and reconciliation through comics and popular media. Together, this project aims to amplify the lived experiences and knowledges of First Nation, Métis, Inuit, and Sámi peoples through stories of resilience, resurgence, renewal, revival, and resistance.
For 2025-2026, we will continue to focus on community building and sharing research on narratives of migration at UBC and beyond. Please email biz.nijdam@ubc.ca if you’d like to present your work and/or join the CMS Narratives Group mailing list.