When it comes to Africa, it’s all about celebrities. Celebrity campaigns to “save Africa” often play into stereotypes that perpetuate a single homogenous story about what it means to be “African.” Viewers are confronted with Africa as “the dark continent,” writes James Michira in his 2002 essay, “Images of Africa in the Western Media” (PDF), [...]
Provincial Nominee Programs (PNPs) are largely a success but minimum language proficiency standards are necessary to reduce incidents of immigration fraud, Canada’s immigration minster, Jason Kenney, said late last month. PNPs have allowed provinces to nominate immigrants for permanent residence according to regional labour needs rather than relying on federal economic immigration programs, which take [...]
Over one-third — or 7,500 — of America’s military aircraft are drones. Often referred to as “the future of warfare,” “the next generation of combat technology,” and the “stuff of science fiction,” these unmanned aerial spy-crafts have carried out hundreds of strikes against al Qaeda and Taliban commanders in the Middle East and Africa since [...]
Too often we, the media, lower our journalistic standards when we present Africa as a singular entity –- that is, as a country and not a continent. In the fast-paced world of news reporting, we need to stop and think about how we can best represent the more than one billion people who live on [...]
The recent footage coming out of Syria has been brutal. The Syrian regime seems intent on making an example of the Free Syrian Army holed up in Bab Amr, the opposition stronghold neighbourhood in Homs. But it is innocent civilians who are taking the brunt of the punishment. Stories of shelling, shrapnel bombs, snipers and [...]
The Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC) recently sentenced Kaing Guek Eav, alias Duch, to life in prison and in the process, finally granted Cambodians some justice. Duch oversaw S-21, the prison camp where at least 12,000 people were tortured and murdered during the Khmer Rouge regime. He was sentenced to 35 years in [...]
Once upon a summer’s eve in 2010, three cows and their calves grazed their way onto the 3,000-acre Brossart family farm in Nelson County, N.D. Months later, this common rural happenstance resulted in the first known Predator drone-assisted arrests of American citizens. The arrests reflect a growing trend among American law enforcement agencies to use [...]
At the World Economic Forum last week, Prime Minister Harper said that it is a “national priority” for Canada to begin diversifying our trade relationships, i.e. begin exporting oil to thirsty Asian markets. Along with chastising Europe for their egregious financial management and evangelizing about free trade, the underlying message of his bravado was synopsized [...]
The Joint Review Panel’s decision on the Northern Gateway pipeline proposal will reverberate in Canada’s resource policy far into the future. The debate symbolizes a collision of competing paradigms of resource development, each vying for dominance in the collective Canadian conscious. But in the grandiosity of this national conversation, one question has been lost: if [...]
Hundreds of Cambodians working for the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC) recently learned that they will not receive paycheques until April at the earliest. Some staff members have been working for free since October. The tribunal was established in 2006 after almost a decade of negotiations between the United Nations (UN) and Cambodia’s [...]
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