Media Advisory
Media are invited to take advantage of two opportunities, one on Friday and one on Saturday, to interview the following speakers and presenters:
Friday, May 8
Who: Tim Gill, one of Britain’s foremost experts in child play and an advocate of child-friendly communities
What: Gill has watched children’s outside worlds shrink. The places they can go by themselves have dwindled to the point where some eight- and nine-year-olds are not allowed outside their front doors by themselves. Gill says both physical and cultural changes have contributed to these narrowing horizons. The structure of neighbourhoods, more working parents, dependence on automobiles and a climate of fear and anxiety have contributed to today’s situation.
More information is available at rethinkingchildhood.com.
Who: Dr. Katie Hinde, Human Evolutionary Biology, Harvard University
What: Hinde, a professor in the Department of Human Evolutionary Biology, Harvard University, has been investigating mothers and infants for more than 15 years to unlock the complexities of breast milk.
In her presentation, Hinde will talk about how milk is abundant at the local grocery store in the form of dairy products and infant formulas. This ubiquity of homogenized milk in our modern environment has the potential for the general public, and even researchers, to think of milk unidimensionally. Milk is not just food, however, but is also medicine and signal. Hundreds, possibly thousands, of other milk “bioactives” affect the infant. Hinde will present emerging research that addresses the magnitude, sources and consequences of inter-individual variation in mother's milk including that the "recipe" for milk can be different for sons and daughters. Moreover, milk does not just grow the body, but shapes the mind and the behaviour of infants in ways researchers are just beginning to understand.
More information is available at Katie Hinde, PhD.
Where: Markin Hall Atrium
When: 2 p.m.
Saturday, May 9
Who: Wallis Kendal and Brianna Olson, iHuman Youth Society, Edmonton
What: Founded in 1997, iHuman is a non-profit organization that develops programs for traumatized and at-risk youth and uses the arts as a positive engagement tool. Their program involves crisis interventions, arts mentorship and life skills. Youth will be telling their own stories through a dramatic interpretation called ‘Uncensored’ as part of the workshop. They have also agreed to do interviews following their presentation.
More information is available at ihuman.org
Who: Dr. Karen Wells, Department of Geography, Environment and Development Studies, Birkbeck, University of London.
What: Dr. Karen Wells is Programme Director for International Childhood Studies and a lecturer in International Development. She is the author of Childhood in a Global Perspective and has published widely on children and visual culture. Her current research focuses on the life history narratives of children who have been fostered into the United Kingdom from overseas in collaboration with Children and Families Across Borders.
Visit www.bbk.ac.uk for more information.
Where: Markin Hall Atrium
When: Noon
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Contact:
Caroline Zentner, public affairs advisor
403-394-3975 or 403-795-5403 (cell)
caroline.zentner@uleth.ca
