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20-year aging study begins

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 By Alison Roach

SFU Surrey-based project will evaluate the effects of age

Beginning in April, the SFU Surrey campus has become home to an extensive study focused on the process of aging. The Canadian Longitudinal Study on Aging (CLSA), the largest of its kind, has set up collection sites at SFU, UBC, and UVIC, and plans to survey 50,000 individuals across Canada in the span of the next 20 years. Twenty thousand participants from across Canada will be followed by phone interview, while the remaining 30,000 participants are to take part in the project’s comprehensive cohort, which will involve being interviewed and evaluated on site. Fifteen-hundred of these individuals live within 25 kilometers of SFU Surrey, and will be evaluated at the new 1,100 square foot lab there. These participants will undergo complete physiological workups, and have data collected on everything from their nutritional habits to their socio-economic status. The aim of the study is to look at how these aging and health factors interact with each other.
The CLSA has received funding from various sources, the majority of which comes from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research. The CIHR has provided $25–30 million to put towards the actual data collection, to be used in the first five years of the study. SFU itself has received over $3 million towards the project. The Canadian Foundation for Innovation has provided all the funding for the data management sites, the repositories, and the equipment. Besides these two foundations, each province has some provincial organizations providing additional funding, with B.C.’s coming from the B.C. Knowledge Development Association.
Dr. Heather Stewart, a research associate in the Gerontology Research Centre at SFU, is the regional manager for the CLSA. She explained: “We’re going to capture data on human aging more or less over the life course that will tell us about biological, physical, and social functioning. We can look to see how these forces interact with each other, for example how someone’s social support, family situation, or work situation may impact their physical function or their risk for getting disease.” Participants of the in-person portion of the study will be evaluated for a large array of variables, such as height, weight, balance, gait, vision, and hearing, in addition to their social and economic situations.
The scale of the survey, the large age range, and the wide time frame all contribute to produce a unique opportunity for insight into the process of aging. Dr. Andrew Wister, chair of SFU’s department of gerontology, is the leader of the study at SFU and said that to gather the kind of information they’re going to be looking for, “You have to have all the measures in one survey, and you have to follow people over time.” Wister was brought into the study for his tremendous expertise and knowledge in the field, and has worked on the development of the study since its inception 12 years ago. Wister cited the baby boomers as a particular personal research interest, and considered understanding the health trajectories of these people extremely important.
Wister also emphasized the interrelatedness of the study. “[The CLSA] is connecting lifestyles to all different aspect of social and emotional life. I think what can come out of this is not only understanding of the causes of health and illness . . . but to be able to articulate and elaborate the way in which these patterns will influence our healthcare system, so that we can make changes,” he said. This project builds on the understanding that all these factors work together in complicated ways to influence the development and trajectory of illness.
The hope is that the enormous amounts of information that will be gathered will yield some insight into possible improvements to our health care system.
“I hope we’ll uncover or discover new information that will have a significant impact on either delivery of health services or reduction of incidents of chronic disease, things that really take a toll on society and really inflate the cost of health care in our country,” said Stewart.

Halo webseries filmed on Burnaby campus?

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By David Dyck

 

Last week, overachieving students who were on campus a week early were confronted with Burnaby Mountain yet again being used as the set for a nerdy television show, this time likely a web series based on the adventures of Master Chief, a character from the popular videogame Halo.

The Peak was unable to get any interviews with workers on set, and have not confirmed that this is what is being filmed, but judging from the photos, videogame experts here at The Peak have confirmed that the Halo rifles both on the mural and the statue make Halo an obvious conclusion. The crew later covered parts of the mural in an attempt to avoid detection.

Online videogame news site Kotaku reported that the university’s official line on the campus restructuring is that, “The film is called ‘Sleeper’, the story of a young man in a futuristic military academy who struggles with his destiny as a soldier — and with an alien invasion.” There is no word on how long the props will be in place.

According to Variety, the entertainment news website, the Halo webseries will air in 15-minute weekly installments leading up to the release of “Halo 4: Forward Unto Dawn” on November 6.

There seems to be something futuristic about concrete, as SFU has been the set for Stargate SG-1, Battlestar Galactica, and more recently, Underworld 4.

First Nations studies granted departmental status

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By Graham Cook
Upgrade means greater financial autonomy and increased enrolment for First Nations studies

Following a recent SFU senate decision, the First Nations studies program has been given department status effective April 1, 2012, to be placed within the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences.

According to its website, the department “offers courses in the study of traditional and contemporary issues involving the aboriginal peoples of North America and Canada in particular,” and is designed for both aboriginal and non-aboriginal students.

The new department offers a major, minor, and joint major with archaeology and linguistics, as well as certificates in First Nations studies research, First Nations language proficiency, and cultural resource management. These programs use over 20 courses that are offered in addition to optional co-operative education.

The director of First Nations studies, associate professor Eldon Yellowhorn, spoke with The Peak about the recognition. He explained that the change from a program to a department meant a higher amount of recognition within the faculty, as the former is usually administrated through the office of the dean of arts and was hosted by the department of archaeology while the latter is more autonomous. As an example, he pointed out that they now direct their own operating budget.

Yellowhorn also outlined the “long, deliberate movement” that led to the achievement of departmental status. They began by offering classes in First Nations studies and then progressed to offering a minor, followed by the joint majors, and finally in 2009 began offering a major. In addition, many of their courses now come with a breadth distinction, which, according to Yellowhorn, has led to increased enrolment.

Along with Eldon Yellowhorn, there are four other core faculty members assisting with the administration of the new department. These four include associate professors Marianne Ignace, Annie Ross, Deanna Reder, and Rudy Reimer/Yumks. They also have ties to faculty in other departments such as sociology/anthropology, history, linguistics, mathematics, and resource and environmental management.

Yellowhorn also hinted that First Nation studies may create a graduate program in the near future. Currently their faculty engages in research but must ‘borrow’ graduate students from other areas. He also expressed hopes that they can continue to heighten the profile of their department within the faculty of arts and social sciences. This, he said, will allow them to further their vision for what the department could be.

Theatre review: Henry and Alice: Into the Wild

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By Ali Omelaniec

Out of their comfort zones and Into the Wild, Henry and Alice return for the sequel to 2004‘s Sexy Laundry

Into the Wild is a comedic take on the woes of unemployment, family conflict, and mid-life crises. The plot is one we’ve all heard before: a married couple is struggling with economic hardship, and are looking to rekindle the spark that was lost somewhere along the way. Despite this, the sincerity of the characters and lifelike descriptions of a marriage on the rocks make the play easy to relate to.

Susinn McFarlen and Andrew Wheeler play Alice and Henry, a couple looking to rekindle their marriage with a holiday in the woods. However, Alice’s image of a cottage retreat or RV trip are replaced by a few days spent in a tent, not an ideal situation for a wife used to a spending her days shopping for designer shoes and buying decor at Pottery Barn.

While the play kept the audience laughing throughout, there were just a few too many stereotypical ‘Men are from Mars, women are from Venus” jokes, from women being obsessed with shopping and designer brands to men and their refusal to ask for help, like when Henry, an obviously unseasoned camper, sets a tent up inside out.

The life of the party is Alice’s little sister: rebellious, leather-clad Diana, who shows up at the campground with her motorcycle to join the couple on their trip, much to Henry’s distaste. Complete with grotesque humour and an exuberant personality, Diana is reminiscent of Bridesmaids’ Megan. As the central source of comic relief and a tool for uprooting deeper family conflicts, she is an audience favourite.

While her spontaneous sister lives on the edge of uncertainty, Alice finds herself questioning her comparably stable marriage and what she wants from life. The humour is broken up by these moments of metaphorical discussion and heartfelt dialogue between the couple. Alice and Henry both deal with their own type of midlife crisis: Henry is stripped bare of his tough, no-funny-business exterior to reveal his inner weaknesses and vulnerability while Alice begins a process of self-discovery. Seeing the inner turmoils of these characters causes the audience to feel sympathetic and become involved in the challenges Henry and Alice are facing.

The saving grace of the piece is the witty banter between the characters, and the time Beverly Elliot spends onstage — occasionally topless. Besides the seen-it-before storyline, this play is overall quite charming and hilarious with a satisfying — albeit expected — conclusion.

SFU Archives release guide to arts and culture records

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By Esther Tung

Subject chosen to draw more attention to the archives as a resource

It seemed unlikely that a deceased English professor’s files would contain the kind of arts and culture records that Paul Hebbard, a staff member at the SFU Archives, was looking for. But when Hebbard delved into Peter Buitenhuis’s collection of documents, he came across letters between Buitenhuis and several renowned authors. In them, he addresses Margaret Atwood by her nickname “Peggy”, and discusses with Tom Wolfe the finer points of dropping acid, no doubt written during the time Wolfe was hashing out The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test.

Personal correspondence is one of the juicier parts of archival material, but because fonds (an archival term, ‘collection’ in French) are catalogued by creator and prominence, rather than subject matter, researchers have to rely on serendipity to discover such material if they are not explicitly looking for it. Part of an archivist’s work is to make the records more accessible, and so guides to special areas of interest are created. “CREATIVE British Columbia” is SFU Archives’ latest effort, released just two weeks ago, and Buitenhuis’s letters are some of the many listed in it.

“The guide is essentially an annotated bibliography of all the relevant records we found,” says Hebbard, who sifted through the archives’ thousands of boxes over the course of a year with the help of volunteer Jennifer Zerkee, a recent UBC archival studies graduate. Some fonds, which can also include video reels, old building plaques, and artwork, immediately came to mind, such as past issues of The Peak, and Press Gang Publications, a feminist paperback printing press. Others were less obvious, like the holdings of Mark Winston, a biology science professor who specializes in apiculture, but his bee-wrangling expertise had landed him behind-the-scenes roles on film sets. “Archival research is a lot of detective work,” says Hebbard.

There are several other compilations of records by topic. Richard Dansey, another staff member at the archives, created a handbook for files relevant to women’s activism at SFU, which range from meeting minutes of the Women’s Centre in the ‘80s to the documents accumulated by SFU’s first female dean, Letty Wilson.

“One of the things we want to do is reach out to students and faculty on campus, and let them know how the archives may be relevant to them. Because archives have a unique way of maintaining material, it’s not always obvious to students that the archives might have something relevant to their research interest,” says Hebbard. Another reason for low awareness of the archives is their location: they are squirreled away at the very bottom of the Maggie Benston Centre, next to Career Services.

Archives are collected from various university departments year-round with new documents coming in every week, and a third of records come from private or individual donors. Because of this constant influx of material to sort through, there are no plans to update existing guides nor to digitize records.

Censorship of controversial art sparks cultural dialogue

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By Taylor Rocca (Thompson Rivers University)

KAMLOOPS (CUP) — Sooraya Graham is a normal student at Thompson Rivers University. She goes to class and does her assignments, just like any of her classmates. But she never realized that with her most recent assignment she would start such a controversial cultural discussion that ultimately saw her art being damaged and improperly removed from a class display.

Coming from northern B.C., Graham is a Canadian Muslim and a fourth-year fine arts student. Like many other artists, all she wanted to do was foster discussion using her artwork.

With the events that have transpired since she first displayed her work, Graham has people talking not only at TRU, but also throughout Kamloops. “People think I am so foreign, so different and they can’t relate to me somehow,” Graham said. “But at the same time, I’m just like an every-other-day Canadian girl. I do the same things, I wear the same things just underneath [the veil].”

Graham’s art depicts a Muslim woman holding a bra. The woman in the piece is wearing a niqab, the traditional veil or cloth that many Muslim women adorn to cover their face.

“With my artwork, I was trying to create a discussion point for Muslim women, for veiled women, and to kind of show light of how we are just normal women,” Graham said. “I wanted to have an image that displayed something that every woman could relate to.”

Graham completed the class assignment, and with the help of professor Ernie Kroeger, she displayed her work alongside other classmates’ assignments within the fine arts department on TRU campus. Shortly after the work was put on display, it came to Graham’s attention that the piece had been removed from the wall upon which it was hung.

“We’re always told that our voice is important and that we can say something with our art,” Graham said. “It is shocking when someone tries to silence that.”

After contacting the chair of the fine arts department, Lloyd Bennett, Graham was informed that a business card had been left behind in place of the art. The card belonged to a staff member at TRU World, and she was shocked at that revelation. “I did not expect to hear that,” Graham said. “I thought maybe [it was] someone who would not understand [the artwork] versus someone who is expected to show a different type of behaviour.”

According to TRU administration, the artwork was not taken down in an official capacity. “There was an individual that was offended and she took the artwork down,” said Christopher Seguin, vice-president of advancement for TRU. “That TRU World staff member was acting on an individual basis.”

The artwork was eventually returned to Graham, though not unconditionally.

“The person [who removed the art] had gotten in contact with Lloyd and they had my image,” Graham said. “They weren’t willing to give it to me if I was going to put it back on the wall. They were holding it hostage, I guess you could say.”

In an ironic twist, this development was right in line with the motivation that Graham had when she was initially inspired to create the piece. “With art, there is always going to be a little controversy,” Graham said. “You can dislike it, you can argue about it, but to physically get in contact with an art piece and rip it down and destroy it, that is such an invasion of my personal space as an artist — to have someone censor what I can do.”

According to Seguin, it was more miscommunication than censorship that resulted in Graham’s work being removed from the wall. “In no way did TRU at any point want to censor an artistic piece of work,” Seguin said. “We honestly thought it was a poster being tagged up on a board that we had to investigate.”

The only question involved with that assertion is that Graham’s artwork is much larger than the size of a standard U.S. letter-sized poster and was hung as a part of a class display of visual arts assignments. The question remains as to how it could be mistaken for a poster to begin with. The TRU World staff member responsible for removing the artwork was unavailable for comment.

Graham wears the niqab as a personal choice. She believes that some people in Canada have the misconception that women who wear the niqab are somehow oppressed or forced into doing so. That is a part of what motivates her art. “In a lot of Western media, you often see the veiled woman as oppressed, or as a fundamentalist, or this pacifistic woman,” Graham said. “And that’s not the case. I think it’s something that needs to be broken as a stereotype.”

The wearing of the niqab started as a Bedouin tradition, originally being more of an upper class, Middle Eastern tradition as opposed to just an Islamic tradition. In general, the niqab is not enforced — it is merely a choice, part of what Graham wanted to shed light on. “I am a huge activist for niqabi rights. I think it should be a choice for any individual,” Graham said. “I don’t think women should be forced to wear the veil, but I don’t think women should be forced not to wear the veil either.

“I’m just saddened that individuals decided that they did not like this discussion and that they did not want to participate in this discussion,” Graham said. “They wanted to take it right off the table, or the wall.”

Graham explained she uses her art to try to give a voice to the Muslim woman. “That’s part of being Canadian; it’s to create a discussion point. If we stopped talking about things just because we don’t like it or it makes us feel uncomfortable, we would get nowhere,” she said. “This is such a multicultural country and I had pride seeing that veiled woman up on the wall because it did create discussion in my classes, and I was able to explain more about the veil and the history of the veil.”

As of April 2, Graham’s artwork had been returned to the display in the TRU Art Gallery.

Schools Building Schools not the only answer

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By Benedict Reiners

Last semester, SFU students passed a referendum increasing student fees to allocate funding towards the charitable organization Schools Building Schools, which aims to build schools in Africa. The referendum managed to gain approximately 64% support from voters, something that may seem less impressive when you consider the fact that only 11% of eligible SFU students voted. However, if we ignore the voter turn out, and focus instead on the support that it gained in the election, one can see that there is at least some will to aid developing nations. But, perhaps if we were serious about trying to help, we should have considered more deeply how we were going about doing so.

Schools Building Schools is not unique in its purpose. In fact, its aim is one of the most popular goals amongst western charities: building things, and more specifically, schools. It is undeniable that there is a need for such developments in areas like those targeted by Schools Building Schools. However, when one looks at the number of charities developed specifically for the very same purpose, one must begin to question whether the funding targeting such projects is proportional to those bent towards funding other issues, such as the hiring of teachers, and the purchase of school supplies for the students who are supposed to be learning in these new buildings.

This disposition towards building projects is in part due to our society’s desire to see a visceral return on our investments. This desire is understandable, particularly since it gives us proof that we have done something and made some sort of difference. The problem is that education doesn’t work like that. There is no way we can viscerally see the education, or the improvement in quality of life that other kinds of work or donationscan establish and sustain, which tends to make us less enthusiastic about contributing to such developments. Yet this fact is evident in a variety of ways, not just through Schools Building Schools, whether it be what we do with our money or the mission trips that we send our kids on, in which they provide work as either unskilled labourers or under-qualified teachers, only to leave a few weeks later.

As a society, we shouldn’t stop helping with projects like those of Schools Building Schools. But we must put a premium on other projects as well, particularly those that will actually improve the communities in these developing areas. While we just keep building schools, many children cannot go, as they are needed to aid in supplementing their family’s income. If we are to improve education in developing nations, we must strive to ensure that it is fully and universally accessible, and that doesn’t end when we finish a building. This includes ensuring that families have enough of an income that they not only don’t need their child to participate in work, but that they can also afford school supplies, and ensuring that there will be teachers with a secure income ready to teach the children there.

In the end, the best thing we can do to help developing nations is to not oversimplify their plight. When we know that we’re contributing to building new schools, we cannot forget that the work is not yet done. On that note, there are few who are more in tune with the problems of a nation than those in a nation itself, and as such, it’s important that we work alongside people in these areas, and never assume that we have all the answers.

Daily Snooze: Mantis Sex

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By Jacob Samuel at The Daily Snooze

Vancouver Bucket List: Summer Edition

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By Ljudmila Petrovic
So, you’re stuck in Vancouver again while your friends jet off to Prague and New York. Fear not! Here’s a handy-dandy list to get you through:

MOUNTAINS AND OCEANS, OH MY!

For the three months of the year that Vancouver is not submerged in rain, it is an exquisite city. We have both the mountains and the ocean, so why not spend the day being an iron man? Take a hike up any of the surrounding mountains around Vancouver, or sprint up the Grouse Grind, then head to the beach for some laps. Or — let’s be a little more realistic — take the gondola up Grouse Mountain and have an overpriced beer, then meander down to the beach, lie in the sand, and tan that gut with pride.

TOP OF GROUSE MOUNTAIN

Speaking of mountains, spending some time at the top of Grouse Mountain is a day trip in itself. There are hikes at the top as well, which are less strenuous and more scenic than the Grind. After that, there’s the chalet, which provides a variety of food with a beautiful view. Alternatively, there are stands at which you can grab a delicious beaver tail (of the deep-fried pastry variety) and head over to lumberjack shows that showcase manly competitions, including saw racing. There are plenty of other tourist attractions as well, such as the birds of prey show and the bear habitat

FESTIVAL TIME!

Summer is Vancouver’s prime festival time, wherever your interests may lie. There’s the Jazz Festival in June, for one, with lots of free shows and other entertainment (read: beer garden). The Folk Festival at Jericho Beach draws an eclectic crowd, from aging hippies to curious yuppies. A lesser known summer festival is the European Festival, which showcases the traditional dances and foods of most European countries. Take your pick from perogies, schnitzel, or kebabs.

SUMMER MUNCHIES

The downtown core is filled with carts and stands of every imaginable food, from pulled pork sandwiches to Japadogs to burritos. Grab something to go and stroll around, or snag a place in the sun to enjoy your meal. More often than not, the quality of food is comparable to that of a sit-down restaurant, but it’s more affordable and less of a hassle.

NIGHT MARKET SHOPPING

Warm summer evenings are perfect for outdoor night markets. The biggest one is in Richmond, but Vancouver’s Chinatown also hosts a night market that runs from late May until the beginning of September. They are a great place to find cheap — granted, often tacky — trinkets, clothes, snacks, knock-off bags, you name it. Even if you’re not on the hunt for a “Pradda” bag or “Dolce and Cabbana” sunglasses, nothing fills the early evening like a stroll through the bustle and buzz of a night market.

OUTDOOR THEATRE

Enjoy some outdoor theatre. For those who consider Shakespearean soliloquies to be the makings of a good night, Bard on the Beach presents a selection of Shakespeare’s plays in tents overlooking the beach. For the more musically-inclined, Theatre Under the Stars might be another theatre festival to consider: every summer, two musicals are chosen and performed in Stanley Park after sunset. Bring a blanket and picnic snacks, and get your jazz hands out. Go ahead, it’s dark outside.

KAYAKING

Go out for a little kayaking excursion. There are several places to rent kayaks for a few hours (or for the day) including at English Bay and Jericho Beach. Kayaking is a great summer activity for a number of reasons: it provides an excellent workout, it’s a relaxing way to enjoy the outdoors, and curious Vancouver seals are friendly enough to swim up close to your kayak.

OUTDOOR POOLS

Not a big fan of sand in your clothes? Can’t handle the temperature of the ocean? Not a problem. There are plenty of outdoor pools open in the summer that promise a dip in chlorinated paradise. A personal favorite is Second Beach Pool in Stanley Park (the turtle-shaped water slide is a life-changer), with Kits Pool being another popular choice.

STANLEY PARK

Stanley Park is one of the best places to go in Vancouver during the summer. For the lazier days, you can choose to have a picnic or go see some marine life at the aquarium. For higher-energy days, pick your mode of transportation and run/walk/rollerblade/bike around the seawall. There’s also access to several beaches from Stanley Park, not to mention the Second Beach Pool and the water park by the aquarium.

AMUSEMENT PARKS

The PNE and Playland are definitely crowded in the height of summer, but there’s plenty to do if you’re willing to wait in lines. There’s a plethora of rides requiring varying levels of courage, not to mention cotton candy, games, and live shows.

GRANVILLE ISLAND

Head out to Granville Island: hit the public market for some fresh — albeit pricey — snacks, sit in the sun and listen to live buskers, hit the water park, go to the Kids Market. (Make sure to through the “Kids” front door, and not the full-sized adult one. It’s more fun that way.)

Petter Watch: May 6th

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