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Samir Shaheen-Hussain is a pediatric emergency physician who practices in Montreal and an assistant professor in the Faculty of Medicine at McGill University. He also played a central role in the #aHand2Hold campaign, which won a victory against one aspect of medical colonialism in Quebec in 2018.
Ra’anaa Brown and Shana Calixte are residents of Sudbury, Ontario. Brown is the co-president of Black Lives Matter – Sudbury, and Calixte is the group’s Director of Community Relations. Scott Neigh interviews them about what the struggle for Black lives looks like in northern Ontario and about their conference coming up on February 27 and 28, “Here to Stay Baby”: A Northern Intersectional Caucus.
Daniel Sarah Karasik and Darrah Teitel are participants in a range of movements in Toronto, and they are speaking today as members of the Suppress the Virus Now Coalition, an Ontario-based coalition of community groups, labour organizations, and individuals.
Michelle Stein and Bill Noll are members of Protect Our Waterways – No Nuclear Waste, a group of concerned residents of South Bruce, Ontario, who have come together in opposition to the proposal to put a high-level radioactive waste storage facility in their community. Stein and her husband raise cattle and sheep on their farm, which sits next to the proposed site. And Noll is a retired engineer who lives right across from the site.
Sarah Edo works with a publication called Nuance. pihêsiw is part of the Native Youth Sexual Health Network (NYSHN). In the context of this year’s Sexual and Reproductive Health Week (SRH Week), Scott Neigh interviews them about what it means to centre Black, Indigenous, racialized, and migrant youth in questions of sexual health and rights.
Nick Driedger lives in northern Alberta and has been involved in organizing workers for almost 20 years. He has been part of a number of different unions, including the Candian Union of Postal Workers and the Industrial Workers of the World, and he currently works for the Alberta Union of Provincial Employees. He is also a contributor at Organizing Work, a website with a grassroots focus committed to honest, strategic discussions about the nuts and bolts of organizing.
Claire Bodkin and Sara Alavian are both physicians in Hamilton, Ontario. They are also part of an ad hoc group of health workers from different parts of Canada with an interest in prison abolitionist politics. Scott Neigh interviews them about what it means to think about prison abolition in the context of health care, and about the zine that the group will be releasing on February 1, Caring for People Who Are Detained: A Handbook for Healthcare Workers + Trainees.
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Samantha Smith, Leslie Scott, and Robert Crooks are renters and current or former residents of the West Broadway neighbourhood in Winnipeg. They are also active members of the West Broadway Tenants Committee, a grassroots group of renters. Scott Neigh interviews them about the committee’s work organizing for tenant justice and building tenant power to oppose evictions, excessive rent increases, and abuse from landlords.
[The following is a rebroadcast of an episode of Talking Radical Radio that originally aired in June 2020.
Taylor Maton is the conservation outreach coordinator with CPAWS Northern Alberta, a regional chapter of the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society. In recent months, the main focus of her work has been the Defend Alberta Parks campaign.
Bianca Mugyenyi is a long-time activist in multiple movements and she is currently the director of the Canadian Foreign Policy Institute (CFPI). Yves Engler is also a long-time activist and writer, and he is a fellow at the CFPI. Scott Neigh interviews them about the organization’s work to present a critical challenge to Canadian foreign policy across a broad spectrum of issues.
Terry McDowell has been working as a graphic designer in Winnipeg for the last ten years. He is a member of Strike Poster, a 14-member closed collective of graphic designers and artists of all sorts committed to a range of radical left politics. Scott Neigh interviews him about the intersection of politics and design, and about Strike Poster’s contributions to struggles for justice and liberation in Winnipeg.
Laura Hamilton is a climate activist who lives in Waterloo, Ontario. She began working on climate issues as a co-founder of Divest Waterloo, a group with an initial focus on encouraging divestment from fossil fuel industries. But as their understanding of the climate crisis deepened, the group came to realize that only an approach that centres justice would have a shot at making the kinds of changes that we need.
Cam Scott, Daniel Friesen, and Irene Bindi are community organizers and members of Police-Free Schools Winnipeg. Scott Neigh speaks with them about the struggle to
Angela Marie MacDougall is a Vancouver feminist who traces her ancestry to northern Sweden and to Western Africa, and the executive director of
Rachel Zellars is an African-American academic, lawyer, and community organizer who has lived in Canada for more than a decade and a half, and in Halifax for the last couple of years. Wendie Wilson is an African Nova Scotian teacher, artist, writer, and community advocate whose family has been in the province for at least eight generations. Scott Neigh interviews them about the African Nova Scotian Freedom School that they were part of organizing this past summer.
Renae Watchman, Michael Truscello, and Leah Hamilton are faculty at Mount Royal University, a small undergraduate institution in Calgary. They are also members of the Mount Royal Anti-Racism Coalition, a group of faculty dedicated to a wide range of anti-racist work on and beyond campus. Scott Neigh interviews them about what racism looks like in the academy, and about what it means to oppose it.
Michael Kwag is the director of knowledge exchange and policy development at the Community-Based Research Centre (CBRC). Scott Neigh talks with him about the CBRC's use of research, community-level interventions, and advocacy to promote the health of gay, bi, trans, Two-Spirit, and queer men.