2012 Peter McGregor Lecture to Be Delivered February 9

Posted: 2012-02-03

Journalist Kathy Dobson to speak about “Poverty and Transformative Social Change”

(SAULT STE. MARIE, ON - February 3, 2012): The Department of Community Development and Social Work of Algoma University, in partnership with Algoma Family Services, invites everyone to attend the 2012 Peter McGregor Lecture on Thursday, February 9 at 7:00 pm. The lecture will be delivered in the Shingwauk Auditorium at Algoma University.

Kathy Dobson

Kathy Dobson

Kathy Dobson is a journalist whose work has appeared in the Globe and Mail, National Post, Ottawa Citizen, Montreal Gazette, and more. She has produced several short documentaries for CBC Radio, including one with hockey legend Bobby Orr. She lives in Waterloo, Ontario.

Dobson will be basing her lecture, “Poverty and Transformative Social Change”, on her recently released book With a Closed Fist: Growing up in Canada’s Toughest Neighbourhood. It is a gutsy, no-holds-barred, coming-of-age story about growing up in poverty in Montreal.

In the Point St. Charles of the author’s childhood people move for one of two reasons: their apartment is on fire, or the rent is due. Starting in 1968, eight-year-old Kathy Dobson shares her early years growing up in “the Point”, an industrial slum in Montreal. She offers a glimpse into life in extreme poverty, giving an insider’s view into a neighbourhood then described as the “toughest in Canada.”

When student social workers, community organizers and medical students from McGill University invade the Point, Kathy and her five sisters witness their mother transform from a defeated welfare recipient to an angry and confrontational community organizer who joins in the fight against a city that has turned a blind eye on some of its most vulnerable citizens. When her mother wins the right for Kathy and her two older sisters to attend schools in one of Montreal’s richest neighbourhoods, Kathy is thrown into a foreign world with a completely different set of rules, leading to disastrous results.

Dr. Linda Savory Gordon, Algoma University’s Dept. of Community Development and Social Work, describes Dobson’s book as “a surprisingly clear expose through a child’s eyes of what it is like to live in poverty. Her language rings true as it portrays lives of people struggling every day and night with the physical economic, emotional and political assaults of poverty and its constant humiliations. The book also shows how people who are engaged with community organizers and anti-oppressive social workers become empowered in their efforts to transform their everyday world.”

This lecture will inspire and inform!

Admission is free.

 

About Algoma University
Algoma University is committed to offering an undergraduate education experience unlike any university in Ontario, offering a wide variety of program options. Algoma University also offers accelerated diploma-to-degree programs in Business Administration in Brampton, and two degrees, including a Bachelor of Social Work, in Timmins. As a partner with Shingwauk Kinoomaage Gamig, Algoma U is committed to respecting Anishinaabe knowledge and culture. To learn more about Algoma University, visit www.algomau.ca.

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Media Contact:
Kevin Hemsworth
Divisional Director of External Relations
Algoma University
705.949.2301 ext. 4120
kevin.hemsworth@algomau.ca