LA&PS Research Awards

These awards recognize Liberal Arts & Professional Studies faculty members’ excellent research and the impact that work has on academic and social communities, as well as their commitment to engaging York University students.

Award categories include Distinction in Research Creativity or Scholarship and Distinction in Social Justice Research.

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Natalie Coulter

Department of Communication & Media Studies 
Established Researcher 

Natalie Coulter is an Associate Professor in Communication and Media Studies and Director of the Institute for Digital Literacies (IRDL) at York University, Canada. She is co-author of Media and Communication in Canada (9th ed) and co-editor of Youth Mediations and Affective Relations (2019) and author of Tweening the Girl (2014) She is a founding member of the Girls’ Studies Research Network (GSRN) at York University, and the Association for Research on the Cultures of Young People (ARCYP). 

Carlo Fanelli

Department of Social Science 
Established Researcher (Honourable Mention) 

Carlo Fanelli’s current work revolves around two major projects. The first explores how urban austerity has impacted public services and labour-management relations in Canadian cities and how these experiences differ and/or share parallels with international examples. The second, led by Principal Investigator Bryan Evans (Ryerson University), explores how Canadian and international living wage movements have responded to low-waged and precarious work amid the erosion of social welfare nets and the widening of inequality across diverse social groups. I am also conducting work on the ‘uberization’ of the charter fishing industry on Lake Ontario, including the work-life implications this has had on operators and potential risks this poses for consumers and fisheries. I am also undertaking studies in the areas of unpaid internships and the nonprofit sector. I am happy to supervise student research in these areas and others related to work and labour studies more broadly. Since 2009, I have also been editor-in-chief of Alternate Routes: A Journal of Critical Social Research published by Athabasca University Press. 

Abigail Shabtay

Department of Humanities 
Emerging Researcher

Dr. Abigail Shabtay is an Assistant Professor in the Children, Childhood, and Youth program in the Department of Humanities. She is also appointed to the graduate programs in Theatre, Dance and Performance Studies, Education, Communication and Culture, and Humanities. Dr. Shabtay has received awards for excellence in teaching and research in her field, including the LA&PS Dean’s Award for Distinction in Research (2022-2023), the Humanities Award for Teaching Excellence (2020-2021), the York Student Accessibility Award (2020-2021), and the Ada Slaight Drama-in-Education Research Award (2018-2019). Dr. Shabtay’s research focuses on children’s rights, social justice, child-centred research methodologies, experiential pedagogies, theatre with children and youth, youth activism, and drama-based participatory action research. She is currently the Principal Investigator for multiple SSHRC-funded projects related to children, youth, and the performing arts. She has served on organizing committees for eight academic conferences in her field and is the Chair of the annual “Children, Youth and Performance Conference”. 

Cary Wu

Department of Sociology 
Emerging Researcher 

Cary Wu (PhD, UBC) is an assistant professor of sociology at York University. His research focuses on political culture, race and ethnicity, and health inequality. He has published widely on these topics and often shares his research with the public via national and international TV, radio, and newspaper forums including NPR, CBC, CTV, Washington Post, Toronto Star, Maclean’s, and The Economist. He is currently working on a five-year (2022-2026) SSHRC Insight Grant research project to develop a political sociology of health (PSH) to study social and political trust as essential determinants of health.