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Greetings from the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences (FASS) at 91探花平台!

The 2024-2025 academic year has been an incredibly busy one for faculty, staff, and students. FASS had a dynamic presence at the third in-person Dalhousie Open House since 2019 and hosted several incredible lecture events, among them the 2024 Stanfield Conversation on the US election and democracy鈥檚 global fate, the 2024-25 MacKay History Lecture, which explored the Underground Railroad as a form of Afrofuturism, and the annual lecture presented by Dr. Eva Mroczek, the Spatz Chair in Jewish Studies, this year on 鈥淗oly Fakes: Jews, Christians and Biblical Forgeries.鈥� I would note that the annual Stanfield Conversation had the biggest audience yet, with guest speakers Dr. Debra Thompson and Doug Saunders, and guest moderator CBC鈥檚 Piya Chattopadhyay. The conversation was recorded for rebroadcast on . . Planning is in progress for the 2025 Stanfield Conversation - keep an eye on your inbox in early fall for details about the next event!

Pictured left to right are several of the folks that were involved with the 2024 Stanfield Conversation: Dr. David Black, Professor of Political Science, Lester B. Pearson Professor of International Development Studies and Dal alum; Dr. Rachael Johnstone, Assistant Professor of Political Science, Stanfield Fellow and Dal alum; Piya Chattopadhyay, the host of CBC's The Sunday Magazine;聽the Rt. Honorable Joe Clark, Friends of the Stanfield Conversations co-chair; featured panelists Dr. Debra Thompson and Doug Saunders; George Cooper, Stanfield Conversations champion and Dal alum; and Dr. Jennifer Andrews, Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences.

The Fountain School of Performing Arts held a rich and extraordinary slate of events both in its new performance space, the Joseph Strug Concert Hall, and across the faculty; these performances 鈥� including operas, plays, and concerts 鈥� demonstrate the depth and breadth of FSPA鈥檚 talented students, faculty, and staff.

FASS held celebrations for student, staff and faculty award winners (learn more at this link). And I attended a wide array of events that honoured excellence in a variety of programs and departments. I am especially delighted to announce that Dr. Liesl Gambold from the Department of Sociology and Social Anthropology is this year鈥檚 recipient of the university-wide 2025 Dalhousie Alumni Association Faculty Award of Excellence for Teaching and was one of our two Convocation speakers!

I was also thrilled to see so much amazing research, publications and creative output from our faculty members. Several of these were highlighted in a Dal News story that was published in the fall term: "Light and dark themes on display at this year's FASS publications and performances showcase". Keep an eye out later this fall for the recap of FASS's research and creative works that were released over the 2025 year.

I was happy to be among the faculty members that hosted conferences at Dalhousie this past year. In October, I hosted聽a two-day conference for twenty graduate students and faculty members from across Canada at Dalhousie called 鈥淢aking Exceptions, Taking Refuge: Canadian and American Border Crossings.鈥澛� Funded by a SSHRC Connections Grant, the event featured plenary speakers, four panels of academic papers, a workshop on podcasting, and a workshop on how to turn a conference paper into a publishable article or essay. Additionally, I hosted a mentorship breakfast which paired graduate students with faculty members to create meaningful new professional connections.The ultimate aim of this gathering was to publish an edited collection of essays with a major Canadian academic press, accompanied by podcast episodes to promote the monograph.

In April, Dr. Isaac Saney, Coordinator of the Black and African Diaspora Studies program at Dalhousie, along with聽Claudine Bonner, Canadian research chair in Racial Justice and African Diaspora Migration in Atlantic Canada,聽 organized a first-of-its-kind symposium on Black communities in Atlantic Canada. The symposium, held on Dal's Studley campus in Halifax, was a huge success with close to 100 registrants who gathered to learn from one another through important conversations, engagement opportunities, and keynote speeches. .

Additionally, works by a couple of our faculty members in the Fountain School of Performing Arts were recognized with East Coast Music Awards.聽Congratulations聽to Fountain School of Performing Arts composition professor J茅r么me Blais, whose聽2024 JUNO-nominated album 鈥渕ouvance鈥�聽was honoured with a聽聽to soprano Suzie LeBlanc in the category Classical Release of the year, for the song 鈥減our une Am茅rique engloutie鈥�.聽Congratulations聽also to part-time instructor in the Fountain School Eileen Walsh, who plays clarinets on the album.

We also continued to see our students excel in their academic research and projects. The essays received for this year鈥檚 FASS Essay Competition proved example of this, and we were thrilled to award prize amounts of $7000 to the winners of each category of this year鈥檚 competition. You can learn more about these annual prizes, read this year鈥檚 winning essays, and watch the video recordings of the winners鈥� presentations on the聽FASS Essay Competition鈥檚 聽website. I strongly encourage you to watch the video presentations to get an idea of the amazing research that students are doing in FASS, and to hear, as told by Dr. George Mencher, the story behind the Irving and Jeanne Glovin Award 鈥� an annual research award established by the Oskar Schindler Humanities Foundation. You can find the links to the video recordings of the presentations here:

FASS Essay Competition winners Clarisse Paron, James Dixon and Grace Alberts.

More than 370 FASS students received their degrees as part of the 2025 Dalhousie Spring convocation activities. On June 10, two convocation ceremonies were held for the graduates of the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. As mentioned above, FASS faculty member Dr. Liesl Gambold was the convocation speaker at our first ceremony of the day, and we were delighted to welcome FASS alum Caroline Blair-Smith (BA'93), VP Human Resources for Nova Scotia Power, to deliver the convocation address at our second ceremony of the day.

FASS Dean Jennifer Andrews with alum聽Caroline Blair-Smith.

In between the two ceremonies, FASS held a celebratory reception in the Student Union Building. It was a pleasure and a privilege to see the graduating students, their families, and friends take time out of their busy schedules to recognize their achievements, both at the ceremonies and at a superbly well-attended reception, complete with FASS spelled out in mini cupcakes!

As Dean I am especially proud to note that the early afternoon FASS ceremony marked the graduation of the first student to graduate with a major from the Black and African Diaspora Studies 聽program. James Dixon, (who also won this year鈥檚 Mushkat Essay Prize) graduated with a Bachelor of Arts with double major in Black and African Diaspora Studies and Philosophy. Read about James鈥檚 journey to the stage in this Dal News story and hear James talk about this experience with Dal FASS alum and CBC radio host Portia Clark.

We are so proud of all of our graduates. You can watch the recordings of the two FASS convocation ceremonies:

I encourage you to watch these videos to share in the experience of our newest alumni joyfully celebrating and being celebrated.

Several of the new Dal grads were featured in the聽Dal News Spring Convocation Storytelling聽and among them were:

• Meaghan De Adder, BA with Combined Honours in Political Science and International Development Studies
• Uihyeok Jung, BA with Combined Honours in Sociology and History
• Sophia Maskine, Bachelor of Music with a concentration in vocal performance
• Liam Oko, BA in Theatre (Acting)

Read about some highlights and see some photos from the FASS convocation and reception here.

I invite you to follow FASS on our social media channels, including , and . On these channels, you'll find advice to new students shared by current students and alumni, announcements of FASS events, news, updates, and more.聽

Reflecting on this past year and looking forward to the next one, I鈥檓 proud of our ongoing work to continue to support our students with new and valuable opportunities; these include welcoming to the Halifax campus the students from our first cohort of FASS students who participated in the聽Truro Start Program聽last fall and the start of a larger group of new BA students to begin their Dal journey at the Agricultural campus in Truro this fall, as well as increasing our funding resources and financial support for both undergraduate and graduate FASS students and researchers.

The Marion McCain Arts and Social Sciences Building, which has been the home of the faculty for over two decades, has been undergoing significant repairs. We are very excited to see this construction completed in the Fall of 2025, which will give us new communal spaces, both inside and out, and make the building more welcoming for faculty, staff, and students.

To our supporters - We are so very grateful for your help and appreciate you for thinking of us when considering your choices of where to donate your time, energy, resources, and financial contributions. We cannot thank you enough for your support and understanding of the importance of education in the Arts and Social Sciences.

To our friends, community members and organizations who support our faculty and students (including prospective, current and past) 鈥� Thank you for continuing to show up for us (both in-person and virtually); for reading and telling our stories; for supporting our research; and for attending our performances, lectures and panel events. Thank you for employing our students and alumni and for fostering learning and work experiences. Thank you for valuing our people and our work.

To our alumni - We hope to hear about where your path post-Dalhousie has taken you. If you have a career or professional update, an exciting personal milestone, or details about any of your travels, we鈥檇 love for you to share this with us by聽submitting a Class note聽or by sharing your updates and any interest in engaging further with the Dal FASS community by emailing聽fass@dal.ca. You could be the next alum featured in our Alumni News and Spotlights.

We hope you鈥檒l take some time to read through the content we鈥檝e pulled together for this year's聽聽which features several of our faculty, staff, students and alumni. If you have any feedback or ideas for stories to be featured in future newsletters, please email聽fassnews@dal.ca听.

All the best and have a wonderful summer.

Sincerely,
Dr. Jennifer Andrews
Dean, Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences
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