For OCAD U photography students Malcolm McEwan and Bo Vanderstarren, the COVID-19 pandemic that swept the globe was an “extraordinary and life-changing moment in history.”
“We were unable to attend school, removing physical access to learn and be around the people we aspire to be… everything we’ve been working on or planned for the immediate future has been postponed or cancelled.”
In their photo essay, “Covid-19: Our History Through the Lens,” the two second-year students took to the empty streets of Toronto and Niagara Falls to document the beginning of the lockdown in March 2020.
This photo essay is just one of twelve published pieces in the inaugural issue of The Arts and Science Review, Writing in Extraordinary Times: Selected Student Work in Liberal Arts and Sciences and the School of Interdisciplinary Studies (LAS/SIS), a digital publication that originated with the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic when the university went entirely online.
The publication was organized and the twelve student papers selected by an editorial committee composed of Maria Belén Ordóñez, Assistant Professor of Anthropology, Kathy Kiloh, Associate Professor of Philosophy, and Dot Tuer, Professor of Visual and Critical Studies, from the Faculty of Liberal Arts and Sciences. The editorial committee’s goal was to highlight the unique public showcase of writing in the Arts and Sciences at OCAD University. “We wanted to celebrate student scholarship in a public way and underscore collaboration between faculty and students.”
The essays were selected from submissions nominated by LAS/SIS professors for assignments completed during the 2020 Winter semester. Those chosen for publication share a concern to address the lack of equity in society and the precarity that many face, as well as the need for systemic change. The Editorial Committee notes that “we found that the most compelling papers explored themes of contagion, pleasure, consumption, queerness, equity, social justice, and Indigeneity. We think that the backdrop of the pandemic motivated a lot of this critical reflection.”
As the editors of the publication, Professors Ordóñez, Kiloh and Tuer were able to work closely with students – a collaboration that encourages students to keep developing their writing skills and their commitment to thinking about contemporary issues critically, through art history, the humanities and social sciences. With the onslaught of the global pandemic and its social distancing measures, the digital publication also offers an opportunity for students to engage and stay connected in a time of social crisis.
Plans are in the works to produce future digital issues to provide students with further opportunities to showcase their writing skills and publicly celebrate the incredible writing, research and thinking of students in their Liberal Arts and Science courses. For this inaugural issue, the editorial committee “congratulates those students whose papers were selected; their work demonstrates creativity and resilience in the face of adversity.”
Note: Professors Ordóñez, Kiloh and Tuer would like to thank the Web designer for the Arts and Science Review, Nicole Vella, an undergraduate Digital Futures student who worked closely with both IT and the Committee and was invaluable to the realization of the publication. They are also grateful for funding received from LASSIS (prize awards for three students in the collection), and the VPA office, IT, and the Center for Emerging Artists and Designers for financially supporting the production of an external facing website.