I am tired of the narrative of the Empowered Muslim Woman™. I find it exhausting. As a visibly Muslim woman, a large portion of my daily life involves attending to a strange kind of image management. I’m aware of the stereotypes that might fill the air when I walk into a room, so I take […] More »

When you imagine international hubs for radical contemporary cinema and performance, Regina might not come to mind; but it should—and that’s thanks to Gary Varro. In 1995, Varro was an assistant curator at the Dunlop Art Gallery inside the Regina Public Library. Around that time, the space was displaying an exhibition on Indigenous representation in […] More »

The Premier of Alberta is a Conservative. Every single seat in the province bar one went blue in the last federal election. Despite the severe lack of representation in government, those with leftward ideologies still exist in Alberta. Where can they turn to hear friendly voices? The Alberta Advantage podcast. The bi-monthly podcast was born […] More »

  My first restaurant job was also my last. It was a three-month stint that passed by in a blur of cutlery roll ups, tedious small-talk, and barely-there tips. Like many jobs in the food service sector, my shifts were long and ran late, and my hourly pay was well below minimum wage. Breaks were […] More »

With bare midriffs, tattoos, and mermaid tails—or no clothes at all—Mollie Cronin’s unapologetic characters ride alligators, eat pizza, swim, lounge on cheese, and raise their middle fingers. The Halifax cartoonist distills millennial dating woes, the perils and joys of East Coast living, and the complexities of gender and body politics in her honest and funny […] More »

Mainstream Canadian theatre, put frankly, is a typically white world. Visions of white performers extending their bodies and amplifying their voices across stages and spaces come to mind; a sea of white faces listening in rapture appears just as easily. The popular theatre world reflects our public comforts: comfortable for performers and audiences who fit […] More »

When you are diagnosed with a terminal illness there is a lot of talk about leaving a legacy. Some people write letters to their children. Some record videos. I have a pretty active Instagram account and have blogged for decades and hope my daughters will enjoy looking back on that. Some things older women living […] More »

Kenneth Tynan’s natural hair colour is a warm auburn, the kind that changes with the seasons and reveals copper undertones when it catches the light. He gets it from his mother, an Irish immigrant. He says he’s always liked his hair, but when he dyed it jet black, he tried not to get emotional about […] More »

  After reaching my late-40s, becoming more visibly trans, having a child, and losing most of my employment prospects, I finally became comfortable with myself. A lot of that comfort and acceptance came from a new love affair—with, oddly enough, trapeze. In grad school, my girlfriend went to the gym.  I followed suit, because everything […] More »

  Monday evenings at FreshCo always carry an air of anxiety, but one particular evening was accented by a white couple with Apple watches. They were behind my mother and I in the checkout line, leaning against the conveyor belt and communicating through grimaces. Every time the woman sighed, my stomach tensed. The tension was […] More »

The children raced barefoot alongside us in the muddied street through the shallow pools of water that were left over from the building of mud houses. It didn’t matter if we were in a small village or a sprawling metropolis, on a boat that just landed on their island, or rushing to catch a bus […] More »