This Magazine

Progressive politics, ideas & culture

Menu

profile

November-December 2020

The perfect blend

Pantayo mixes traditional Filipino music with contemporary pop and rock

Rosie Long Decter

We were teaching ourselves something that we didn’t know,” says Kat Estacio, co-founder of Toronto’s Pantayo, a quintet blending traditional Filipino kulintang music with Western pop and rock styles. That’s partly why it took eight years between the ensemble’s first practice in 2012 and the release of their self-titled debut earlier this year. As with […] More »
March-April 2018

Meet Canada’s organ transplant advocate for those living with addiction

After her husband died in 2010, Debra Selkirk made it her mission to help those deemed ineligible for transplants

Carine Abouseif

One Friday in late January, a photo on Facebook had Debra Selkirk in tears. Weeks earlier, she’d received a desperate email from a woman in the U.S. The woman’s 30-year-old sister needed a new liver, but she had to be alcohol-free for six months before she could get a transplant. The question was: Did she […] More »
January-February 2018

Shyra Barberstock’s online venture brings together Canada’s First Nations, Métis, and Inuit communities

A look inside the Indigenous-led Okwaho Network

Sohini Bhattacharya

Shyra Barberstock was 21 years old when she met her Anishinaabe birth mother and finally gained Kebaowek status. Until then, she was unaware of her Kebaowek First Nation roots, having grown up with her nonIndigenous adoptive family. “As you can see I’m very fair skinned,” says Barberstock. “Had I not met her, I may never […] More »
November-December 2017

Inside Canada’s first coding truck, bringing digital literacy to communities across Ontario

Ladies Learning Code's Melissa Sariffodeen is pioneering the Code Mobile

Allyson Aritcheta

In her bright turquoise van adorned with purple lightning bolts, Melissa Sariffodeen resembles a digital era Ms. Frizzle—travelling the country, expanding the minds of bright-eyed students in new and exciting ways. This is the Code Mobile, Canada’s first coding truck led by Sariffodeen, the CEO of Ladies Learning Code. Sariffodeen was inspired to start the […] More »
September-October 2017

How to provide a safe haven for those struggling with mental health challenges

Inside Percy Sacobie's Take a Break Lodge

Maverick Canterville@mavjaycee

“You have to stay here with me ’cause I don’t want you to be responsible for me,” insists a visitor to Percy Sacobie’s cabin in the woods behind his mother’s house. “You’re responsible for what you do to yourself,” Sacobie replies. He stops by the cabin every morning and every evening, but beyond that, its […] More »
July-August 2017

Meet the man tackling the over-incarceration of Indigenous people in Canadian prisons

On Mark Marsolais-Nahwegahbow and his Gladue reports

Kyle Edwards@kylejeddie

Nearly every day, Mark Marsolais-Nahwegahbow hears stories from Indigenous men and women that they’ve often never told. The exchange usually begins at the Ottawa-Carleton Detention Centre, within which Indigenous people accused of various crimes are awaiting trial. Their stories are turned into a Gladue report, a document that outlines their personal history and how they were […] More »
May-June 2017

Meet the woman combatting sexism in Canada’s STEM fields

Eden Hennessey’s #DistractinglyHonest exhibit explores the realities for women in STEM fields

Sohini Bhattacharya

When Nobel Laureate Tim Hunt said, at a science conference in 2015, that the trouble with women in labs is they cry and fall in love, the scientific community reacted with a barrage of vituperations from both sides. For doctoral candidate Eden Hennessey, one hashtag became a call to action. Under the banner #DistractinglySexy, female scientists […] More »
March-April 2017

This Alberta animal-assisted therapy takes an inventive approach to mental health care

Eileen Bona's Dreamcatcher Nature-Assisted Therapy Association uses animals to put Canadians back in touch with nature

Laura Eley

Photo by Stephanie Willis, Falling Leaves Photography Thirty minutes due east of Edmonton, where the traffic signals turn from streetlights to stop signs, is the town of Ardrossan. Here, you’ll find the Dreamcatcher Nature-Assisted Therapy Association, perched on 40 acres of lush, tree-lined, and trailed land. Founded in 2003 by psychologist Eileen Bona, Dreamcatcher has […] More »