A panel discussion to examine labour in the cultural industries in Canada is the next event in the Global Labour Research Centre’s Global Labour Speaker Series.
“Labour in the Cultural Industries” takes place on March 14 from 1 to 3pm in S802 Ross Building, featuring presentations by Tanner Mirrlees (University of Ontario Institute of Technology), Nicole Cohen (University of Toronto), Derek Hrynyshyn (York University) and Katherine Lapointe (Canadian Media Guild).
Panellists will discuss the political economy of labour in the Canadian cultural industries, organizing freelance media workers, cultural labour and class consciousness, and organizing in digital media.
Recently published books by Mirrlees – Global Entertainment Media: Between Cultural Imperialism and Cultural Globalization (Routledge, 2013) and Hearts and Mines: The US Empire’s Culture Industry (University of British Columbia Press, 2016) – and Cohen – Writers’ Rights: Freelance Journalism in a Digital Age (McGill-Queens, 2016) – will be available for purchase at the event.
Mirrlees is the director of the Communication & Digital Media Studies program at the University of Ontario Institute of Technology (UOIT). His research examines the geopolitical, capitalist economic, and ideological drivers and impacts of the ICT and cultural industries in society. He is also co-editor of The Television Reader (Oxford University Press, 2013). His writing has appeared in scholarly and popular venues.
Cohen is an assistant professor at the University of Toronto and the author of Writers’ Rights: Freelance Journalism in a Digital Age. She is a member of the international collaborative research group Cultural Workers Organize.
Hrynyshyn teaches in the Department of Communication Studies and in the School of Public Policy & Administration at York. He is author of Limits to the Digital Revolution: How Mass Media Culture Endures in a Social Media World from Praeger, which will be in print this month.
Lapointe is an organizer with CWA Canada and the Canadian Media Guild. Her work focuses on supporting media workers in collectively improving their working conditions and ensuring meaningful, sustainable jobs in the industry. She also launched the union’s associate membership program, which provides advocacy, mentorship, training and other supports to interns, students and precarious media workers.
All are welcome and refreshments will be served.
To RSVP, visit glrc.apps01.yorku.ca/forms/view.php?id=16700; for more information, visit the Facebook event page at facebook.com/events/1683802741918052.
The event is co-sponsored by York University’s Departments of Geography, Political Science and Social Science.