Andreae Callanan

It’s been a busy couple of months! I’ve been reading a lot, writing a little (not nearly as much as I’d like to be), and trying to figure out what I want to be when I grow up. I’m starting to apply for academic jobs, which is thrilling and terrifying in equal measure. To give myself a bit of a boost, I’ve been revisiting some old book friends. When I was a little baby social justice teen (back in the late 1900s), Paulo Freire was *the* guy to talk about. Everything at the old St. John’s Oxfam Committee office was Freire this, Pedagogy of the Oppressed that. I didn’t read the actual book until I was in university, and I loved it then, but reading it now is a whole different experience. When I first read it, “the oppressed” were still a group of people I imagined as being somewhere far away from me. Reading it now (times being what they are), “the oppressed” is a much more expansive category of people than what I had understood it to be nearly thirty years ago. Freire, of course, says as much, when he writes,

… the oppressed are not “marginals,” are not people living “outside” society. They have always been “inside”–inside the structure which made them “beings for others.” The solution is not to “integrate” them into a structure of oppression, but to transform the structure so that they can become “beings for themselves.” (p. 55)

Re-reading Freire right now has been both a balm and a reminder of what love looks like in action–and also a call to action, a reminder to be fiery and subversive in whatever ways are available to me as I move through the world, to be always compassionate, and to unite theory and action into one breath. (And also to add “as praxis” to the end of fortune cookie messages, because joy, too, can be revolutionary.)

What else have I been up to?

• I’ve just started reading Higher Expectations: How to Survive Academia, Make it Better for Others, and Transform the University, by Roberta Hawkins and Leslie Kern. I ordered it directly from the publisher, and it got here super quick! This book is the selection for the summer installment of the Maple League Book Club. So far, it looks pretty fiery and subversive, too.
• I finished my Foundational Certificate in Narrative-Based Medicine and now I’m going to miss everyone (I’m hoping some of us can keep in touch, though).
• I learned that an essay I published in Riddle Fence last year has been selected for Best Canadian Essays 2026, and I have mixed feelings about it because obviously I’m well chuffed about being in BCE (a total dream!) but also, it’s a piece about grief, so I can’t really celebrate the way I would if it were about something a little more random, you know? (I’m even more chuffed over the fact that Best Canadian Poetry 2026 will include a poem from Susan White, who is a former student of mine, and from Ozayr Saloojee, who I reached out to after seeing some writing he’d posted on Instagram to ask if he would consider publishing it as a poem in Janus Unbound. He said yes, and it was such an honour to publish that piece.)
• My Big Work Thing I’ve been working on for the last year–a two-day symposium on publicly engaged research and pedagogy at Memorial–was a roaring success. Our very little team put our hearts and souls into this event, lemme tell ya. The keynote was a real treat–especially the candid and impassioned discussion afterward. Dr. Ted Hewitt (president of SSHRC… as in… the SSHRC) was a delight, Dr. Barb Neis was a total superstar (as always), and the audience questions got good and spirited. Adam Walsh was great to work with, too, The video is available on YouTube, if that’s your thing.
• Oh! I registered for a bunch of the webinars from the Labs for Liberation Summer Institute–the lectures are free and open to the public and are full of thinkers I admire so much. Moya Bailey! Imani Barbarin! Leah Lakshmi Piepszna-Samarasinha! Swoon! The first of the webinars was this week, and it was presented by Moya Bailey and Aimi Hamraie, and it was so engaging and thoughtful and substantial… and it was so, so nice to be in an online space where accessibility was cooked into the programming rather than being tacked on as an afterthought. The vibe was excellent. I can’t wait for the rest of the lectures. What a great summer gift!

So, that’s about that! Stay cool, friends.