Academic Research
In September of 2020, I began my PhD at the University of Toronto's Faculty of Information, co-specializing in Sexual Diversity Studies (with the Mark S. Bonham Centre for Sexual Diversity Studies) and Knowledge Media Design (with the KMDI Institute). After achieving candidacy in December of 2022, I am now at work on my doctoral practice-based research and dissertation writing.
My dissertation project is provisionally titled "Feeling Between Bodies: The Politics and Poetics of New Media's Queer Embodiments." My supervisor is Dr. Patrick Keilty, and my committee consists of Dr. Jasmine Rault (Faculty of Information), Dr. T. Nikki Cesare-Schotzko (Centre for Theatre, Drama, and Performance), and Dr. Zach Blas (Daniels Faculty).
My academic research troubles the intersections of queer and feminist critical theories and philosophies with contemporary arts practices through a reciprocal pursuit of academic and practice-based artistic research. My dissertation project examines ways in which queer and feminist creators are using emerging technological tools and techniques within contemporary arts praxis to resist dominant (cisheteropatriarchal, colonial-capitalist) frameworks of viewing and experiencing. Engaging diverse archives of theory and practice, my research endeavours to understand how these technologies are somatically engaging the polylithic experience of queer embodiment.
This work comes generously funded by a SSHRC Joseph Armand Bombardier Canada Graduate Scholarship - Doctoral (CGS-D) Award.
My academic and critical writing has been published in the International Journal of Performance Arts and Digital Media (IJPADM), the Interdisciplinary Digital Engagement in Arts and Humanities (IDEAH) Journal, the Journal of Literary and Intermedial Crossings (JLIC), ArtMonthly, Canadian Theatre Review, and TDR: The Drama Review. I have also presented my work at a number of international interdisciplinary conferences, including the Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI), Society for Social Studies of Science (4S) Annual Meeting, International Conference on Human-Robot Interaction (HRI), Digital Humanities Summer Institute (DHSI), Canadian Communication Association (CCA) Annual Conference, and the Ammerman Centre Symposium on Art and Technology. For a complete list of publications and conferences, please refer to my Full CV.
In my time at the University of Toronto, I have worked as a Research Assistant with the Sexual Representation Collection, McLuhan Centre for Art and Technology, and Bell University Labs Chair. I have also designed and taught my own Senior Seminar course at the University of Toronto Scarborough's Department of Arts, Culture, and Media, and have worked as a Teaching Assistant within the Faculty of Information at the St. George (Downtown) campus.
Prior to my work at the University of Toronto, I undertook my Master of Arts degree in Performance Practice as Research at the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama in London, United Kingdom, funded by an Embassy Postgraduate Scholarship. I also completed my postgraduate degree in English Language and Literature and Theatre Studies at Western University's Faculty of Arts and Humanities, where I was the recipient of over ten academic scholarships and bursaries for academic and extracurricular achievement.