[Editor’s note: today we launch “Verbatim,” which will be a regular feature where we provide a transcript of our new podcast series, Listen to This. We’ll put these up on the blog shortly after each podcast goes online.] In the first installation of our new, relaunched podcast series (Oh! And we’re now on iTunes!) Nick […] More »

Christopher Shaw’s day job is professor of ophthalmology at the University of British Columbia, but since Vancouver launched its bid for the Olympics more and more of his time has been spent campaigning against the Games—first as the founder of No Games 2010 and now as lead spokesperson for 2010 Watch. Shaw’s book, Five Ring […] More »

For a playwright from Toronto, creating a play about Canada’s North is a daunting task. How do you talk about a culture that, though Canadian, is as foreign as one from the other side of the world? How do you approach difficult issues like suicide when you’re not just an outsider, but also a member […] More »

Last Wednesday, the following ‘letter to the editor’ appeared in Toronto’s Now Magazine: Disabled stay home I am a person with a disability who does not use Wheel-Trans, as others need it more and my needs have been better met by riding the subway, which is conveniently located half a block down my street. It’s […] More »

When the Sri Lankan army crushed the Tamil Tigers last spring, it was the end of the war. But for four veteran activists, this is just the beginning I can smell chilies and spices in the cool night air. A few Tamil men and women are handing out biryani in Styrofoam containers to protesters gathered […] More »

There’s a scene in the Kenyan dance company Pamoja‘s new ballet, Konkrete City, where all I could feel was the hectic beat of downtown Nairobi, or Vancouver, or Toronto. The dancers—most of them handicapped—depicted the Central Business District, Kenya’s core of business towers and banks, during the rainy season. Walking, running and jumping; swinging arms, […] More »

In November 2005, I travelled to Iraq in violation of a Foreign Affairs travel advisory. It was my third trip. Four members of an international delegation, including myself, were kidnapped and held by Iraqi insurgents for four months. One member of our group, an American named Tom Fox, was killed two weeks before we were […] More »

Marcia Ramírez is in for the fight of her life: suing the Toronto Stock Exchange for listing a company that it knew might cause her harm. In early December 2006, Ramírez was one of some 30-odd residents of the remote Intag valley in northwestern Ecuador who stood in the way of over 50 heavily armed […] More »

Kibera, one of the world’s biggest slums, is a “glaring omission” on Google Maps, says Erica Hagen, member of the Map Kibera team. Indeed, Kibera remains a blank spot in relatively well-mapped and densely populated Nairobi, the economic hub of East Africa. When I first heard of this project, my first thought was of the […] More »

[Writer Laura Trethewey recently travelled across Canada by train, and sent us five postcards on the way, from B.C. to Northern Ontario. The “Prairie Postcard Project” chronicles that leg of her trip and the people she met along the way. Visit her blog for the whole story. Click the postcard images to enlarge.] Dearest This, […] More »

[Writer Laura Trethewey recently travelled across Canada by train, and sent us five postcards on the way, from B.C. to Northern Ontario. The “Prairie Postcard Project” chronicles that leg of her trip and the people she met along the way. Visit her blog for the whole story. Click the postcard images to enlarge.] Dearest This: […] More »