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Join the Media & Materiality Cluster for the second-to-last talk in our series of public talks and discussions on recent media history. In this presentation, Professor and Canada Research Chair in Public History at Concordia, Steven High, will reflect on how visual approaches have shaped his oral history practice over the past 35 years. Focusing on his ongoing research into the structural violence of deindustrialization, High will explore the profound impact on working-class communities since the 1970s, and how industrial ruins are often aestheticized during gentrification.
ABOUT THE SPEAKER:
Steven High is an award-winning historian whose research on the structural violence of deindustrialization has put Canada at the centre of important global conversations about what a “just transition” might look like after past failures. His use of oral history ensures that his interpretation is grounded in the lives of working people. He has published many books and articles on this topic, including Deindustrializing Montreal: Entangled Histories of Race, Residence and Class (2022) and Industrial Sunset: The Making of North America’s Rust Belt (2003). His next book, The Left in Power: Bob Rae’s NDP and the Working Class, to be released in February 2025, considers how social democrats responded to the unfolding industrial crisis. He is currently leading a large transnational project investigating the politics of deindustrialization (see the website: deindustrialization.org).
: February 14, 2025
: 3 – 4:30 PM
: Milieux Resource Room EV 11.705
Register here
