Thursday, November 11, 2021

Today, Waterloo remembers

The University of Waterloo community will join the rest of the country in pausing for a few moments today to remember Canada's war dead.

"Remembrance Day is an important day of reflection in Canada and many countries around the world," says President Vivek Goel in an official statement to the University community. "On this day we remember and honour all the individuals who have and continue to serve in Canada’s Armed Forces through times of war, armed conflict and peace."

"As we commemorate Remembrance Day, it is important to reflect on the many diverse communities who have served and sacrificed for our country since the First World War," President Goel says. "Canada’s Indigenous, Black and other racialized soldiers served this country bravely while also facing discrimination at home. Over the decades, the diversity of our veterans has continued to evolve. This year marks the 30^th anniversary of end of the Gulf War, the first conflict in which women served in combat roles for Canada’s Armed Forces." 

2021 also marks the 100^th anniversary of the adoption of the poppy as a symbol of remembrance, and the centenary of the establishment of Armistice Day, to be observed annually on the Monday of the week of November 11, the anniversary of the day in 1918 when the guns fell silent at the end of the First World War. This act of Parliament was amended in 1931, 90 years ago, to formally enshrine November 11 as Remembrance Day. Much of the imagery we associate with Remembrance Day is connected to the First World War, including the poppies, sold by the Royal Canadian Legion and worn on lapels, that recall the wildflowers that grow in the fields of Flanders, in north Belgium, as mentioned in the famous poem by Lt.-Col. John McCrae that is read at many Remembrance Day commemorations.

In accordance with the University's flag guidelines, flags will be lowered from 11:00 a.m. to 12:00 noon on campus today. "I encourage you all to take a moment at 11:00 a.m. to reflect and remember," President Goel's statement concludes.

The ongoing pandemic continues to affect the way that our campus and community are marking today's solemn occasion. There are no in-person events planned on campus today, and there will be a scaled-down ceremony at the Waterloo cenotaph beginning at 10:30 a.m. today that includes physical distancing and mandatory masks. There will be no veteran's parade, reviewing stand, or cenotaph vigil, and the ceremonial wreaths, 16 in total, will be placed at the cenotaph ahead of time. Similar ceremonies will be taking place in Kitchener, Cambridge, and Stratford. 

The CBC will be covering the national Remembrance Day ceremony in Ottawa.

An alumnus uncovers his grandfather's harrowing story of war

By Geoff Keelan (MA ’10, PhD ’15). This article was originally published in the fall issue of Waterloo Magazine.

On April 21, 1941, the SS Nerissa pulled out of the port of Halifax to begin a journey across the Atlantic Ocean to England where Canadians soldiers were preparing for the invasion of Nazi-occupied Europe.

On board was a 21-year-old RCMP officer, my grandfather Gerry Keelan. Nine days and 4,000 kilometers later, my grandfather and some of his fellow officers were finishing a game of bridge around midnight when a terrific blast threw them out of their chairs.

Thankfully, my grandfather’s cabin was the last one on the stern which meant he and his cabin mates were able to jump in a nearby lifeboat.

From this lifeboat, they spotted a Nazi submarine just 15 meters away. Then a second and third torpedo passed under their lifeboat, hitting the Nerissa at the same time — tearing the ship in two and sinking it within seconds.

Baling water in a leaking lifeboat

For the next nine hours, it rained as my grandfather and the other conscious survivors baled water from their leaking lifeboat. Constantly battered by the high waves of the Atlantic Ocean, it was 8 a.m. when a destroyer finally pulled up alongside them just off the coast of Ireland.

Twelve were still alive in the boat when they were finally pulled out of the rocking seas. Seven others had died in the night.

Only 84 of the 290 passengers and crew of the SS Nerissa survived in the single largest loss of Canadian troops en route to England during the Second World War — 62 Canadian servicemen died that night.

My grandfather survived and arrived in England safe and uninjured, where he was stationed at Aldershot, Hampshire with the 21^st Army Group as a member of the Military Police. Soon after, he met Irene Trott, an English schoolteacher and my grandmother.

I never heard any of these stories from my grandfather, or even from my father. Grandpa Gerry did not talk much to any of his children or grandchildren about the war before his death in 1998. Or, I was just too young to listen.

Eventually, I studied Canadian history at the University of Waterloo with History Professor Whitney Lackenbauer, beginning my doctoral studies 70 years after the Nerissa sunk.

Searching for my grandfather's story

Although my work did not focus on the Second World War, my experience with Library and Archives Canada eventually helped me get a job there as an Access Archivist. With closer and easier access, I finally took the time to dive deeper into the holdings. I searched, not for my grandfather’s service records, but for records around the ship he had been on. 

I discovered that he was interviewed for the Court of Inquiry regarding the sinking, but even still his words cover less than a page. One of the Provost Corps soldiers who roomed with him wrote a much more complete record of the event, which is how I now know of this harrowing night and his brush with death.

Family histories and wartime struggles

On Remembrance Day, when we are meant to remember those who were lost and those who survived, I always consider myself lucky to have even a small part of my grandfather’s story. If I had taken a different career path, my family likely never would have thought to look for anything other than a service file, or known where to look for it. 

I reflect on this story whenever I give public or classroom lectures about the war, or when I have a chance to speak with a veteran. For many of us, our family histories are intertwined with wartime struggles, good and bad, but few ever get the chance to see written transcripts of something their grandparents endured.

Most can only imagine their stories in our larger history of the wars, imagining what triumphs and failures they endured and the dark times through which they lived.

All of these stories have the same common thread, whether they be found deep in the archives or told over a glass of wine late at night decades later. There is one reason, above all else, to find and tell these stories: They are meant to be remembered.

Geoff Keelan is an archivist at Library and Archives Canada.

New Waterloo-based Collaboratory for Digital Equity Research launches

Professor Diana Parry and Professor Corey Johnson.

Co-directors Professor Corey Johnson and Professor Diana Parry from the Department of Recreation and Leisure Studies have founded the Collaboratory on Digital Equity Research (CODER), which aims to mobilize research in the digital humanities and social sciences to inform public culture, policy, practice, and everyday social relations to create a more equitable and just society.

Other team members include Stefanie Duguay, assistant professor in the Department of Communication Studies at Concordia University, Professors Eric Filice, Luc Cousineau and Harrison Oakes, and Ph.D. student Jasmine Nijjar from the University of Waterloo.

CODER has recently conducted several projects related to geo-social networking applications, otherwise known as dating apps, such as Tinder, Grindr, and Bumble. Among other things, they have looked at the networking application’s cultural impacts and influence on gender identities, sexual practices, public and private spaces and users’ quality of life.

The group is also involved in multiple industry and non-profit partnerships. In collaboration with Bumble, CODER studied how dating experiences are affected by spaces that are structured around principles of justice and social equity. CODER has also partnered with the Sexual Assault Support Centre of Waterloo Region (SASC) to understand the role that dating apps play in sexual violence online.

CODER is engaged in a multipronged knowledge mobilization strategy to disseminate their research to academics, policy makers and interested members of the public. Recently they have recruited the assistance of a video production agency to produce a series of digital shorts synthesizing participant stories of GSNA use, accessible on CODER’s YouTube Channel. For information on past and current projects visit the CODER website or contact Professor Johnson via email at corey.johnson@uwaterloo.ca.

Thursday's notes

Information Systems and Technology has announced that the fall 2021 issue of the IST Newsletter is now available. Read about the Mass Email Management project, WatITis conference, alumni email migration, campus Wi-Fi improvements, WCMS 3 training, and more on the e-newsletter website.

Renision University College and the Waterloo Public Library are co-hosting a virtual panel discussion entitled The Future of Public Education: Lessons from the Pandemic on November 16 at 7:00 p.m.

"The COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted education systems in unprecedented ways," says the event description. "The crisis exacerbated long-standing inequalities, revealed the limits of technology, raised questions about learning loss and recovery, heightened concerns about corporatization, exposed the value of teaching, and much more. There is an urgent need to envision the future of public education for a post-pandemic world. What lessons have we learned from the pandemic for public education systems in Canada?"

The event features panellists Vidya Shah of York University's Faculty of Education, Beyhan Farhadi, postdoctoral fellow at York University and TDSB teacher, Joel Westheimer, University Research Chair in Democracy and Education at the University of Ottawa, and jeewan chanicka, director of Education at the Waterloo Region District School Board. Social and Development Studies Professor Kristina R. Llewellyn will moderate this session.

Register on Eventbrite.

The University of Waterloo Art Gallery and the Department of Fine Arts are presenting MFA alumni Amanda Rhodenizer in conversation with Emma McKay discussing the artist’s series of paintings O’er the Western Hills on Thursday, November 18 from 7:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. Register for the event on Eventbrite.

Amanda Rhodenizer holds an MFA from the University of Waterloo and BFA from the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design. Emma McKay is completing a PhD at McGill University and works with physicists to spread radical critiques of the way we do science now, focusing on how modern science is connected to the military, extraction, and colonialism, and how educational community building around diversity can help. Ivan Jurakic, the director/curator of the University of Waterloo Art Gallery will moderate the conversation.

O’er the Western Hills was conceived by the artist in collaboration with her subjects, including students, temp workers, teachers and retirees, who are actively engaged in work from a range of specialized STEM fields including fire safety, water quality, wetland conservation, site remediation, regenerative permaculture, ethics and justice, accessibility and outreach, and astrophysics. Despite their many professional accomplishments, the lived experiences of these members of the science community remains largely dominated by masculinity, whiteness, hetero-cis-normativity, and other forms of privilege. Rather than acting as a recruitment for Women in STEM, the thirteen paintings in the exhibition are intended as a collection of portraits of female and non-binary workers sharing their experiences.

O’er the Western Hills is on display until December 8. For more info or to book a viewing please visit the UWAG website.