Brandi Bird
Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing (MFA)
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The Faculty of Arts at UBC brings together the best of quantitative research, humanistic inquiry, and artistic expression to advance a better world. Graduate students in the Faculty of Arts create and disseminate knowledge in the Humanities, Social Sciences, and the Creative and Performing Arts through teaching, research, professional practice, artistic production, and performance.
Arts has more than 25 academic departments, institutes, and schools as well as professional programs, more than 15 interdisciplinary programs, a gallery, a museum, theatres, concert venues, and a performing arts centre. Truly unique in its scope, the Faculty of Arts is a dynamic and thriving community of outstanding scholars – both faculty and students.
Here, our students explore cutting-edge ideas that deepen our understanding of humanity in an age of scientific and technological discovery. Whether Arts scholars work with local communities, or tackle issues such as climate change, world music, or international development, their research has a deep impact on the local and international stage.
The disciplinary and multi-disciplinary approaches in our classrooms, labs, and cultural venues inspire students to apply their knowledge both to and beyond their specialization. Using innovation and collaborative learning, our graduate students create rich pathways to knowledge and real connections to global thought leaders.
Research Centres
Research Facilities
UBC Library has extensive collections, especially in Arts, and houses Canada’s greatest Asian language library. Arts graduate programs enjoy the use of state-of-the-art laboratories, the world-renowned Museum of Anthropology and the Belkin Contemporary Art Gallery (admission is free for our graduate students). World-class performance spaces include theatres, concert venues and a performing arts centre.
Since 2001, the Belkin Art Gallery has trained young curators at the graduate level in the Critical and Curatorial Studies program in the Department of Art History, Visual Art and Theory. The Master of Arts program addresses the growing need for curators and critics who have theoretical knowledge and practical experience in analyzing institutions, preparing displays and communicating about contemporary art.
The MOA Centre for Cultural Research (CCR) undertakes research on world arts and cultures, and supports research activities and collaborative partnerships through a number of spaces, including research rooms for collections-based research, an Ethnology Lab, a Conservation Lab, an Oral History and Language Lab supporting audio recording and digitization, a library, an archive, and a Community Lounge for groups engaged in research activities. The CCR includes virtual services supporting collections-based research through the MOA CAT Collections Online site that provides access to the Museum’s collection of approximately 40,000 objects and 80,000 object images, and the Reciprocal Research Network (RRN) that brings together 430,000 object records and associated images from 19 institutions.
Research Highlights
The Faculty of Arts at UBC is internationally renowned for research in the social sciences, humanities, professional schools, and creative and performing arts.
As a research-intensive faculty, Arts is a leader in the creation and advancement of knowledge and understanding. Scholars in the Faculty of Arts form cross-disciplinary partnerships, engage in knowledge exchange, and apply their research locally and globally.
Arts faculty members have won Guggenheim Fellowships, Humboldt Fellowships, and major disciplinary awards. We have had 81 faculty members elected to the Royal Society of Canada, and several others win Killam Prizes, Killam Research Fellowships, Emmy Awards, and Order of Canada awards. In addition, Arts faculty members have won countless book prizes, national disciplinary awards, and international disciplinary awards.
External funding also signifies the research success of our faculty. In the 2020-2021 fiscal year, the Faculty of Arts received $34.6 million through over 900 research projects. Of seven UBC SSHRC Partnership Grants awarded to-date, six are located in Arts, with a combined investment of $15 million over the term of the grants.
Since the 2011 introduction of the SSHRC Insight Grants and SSHRC Insight Development Grants programs, our faculty’s success rate has remained highly stable, and is consistently higher than the national success rate.
Schools / Departments
School
Department
Graduate Degree Programs
Research Supervisors in Faculty
or browse the list of faculty members in various academic units. You may click each unit to view faculty members appointed in that unit. View the full faculty member directory for more search and filter options.
| Name | Academic Unit(s) | Research Interests |
|---|---|---|
| Dixon, Joy | Department of History | History of gender, sexuality, and the body, history of religion, history of the social and human sciences, history of empire |
| Doberstein, Carey | Department of Political Science | Political science and policy administration; Agencies and arms-length bodies in Canada; Public servant behavior in Canada; How citizens engage with government as part of local consultations and public engagement; Homelessness (politics, governance, policy); Local government or governance |
| Dollinger, Stefan | Department of English Language and Literatures | English language; Language Contact and Linguistic Changes; Linguistic Variation and Society; Lexicography and Dictionaries; Language Interactions; Language Rights and Policies; Bilingualism and Multilingualism |
| Donner, Simon | Department of Geography, Institute for Resources, Environment & Sustainability, Institute for the Oceans and Fisheries | Atmospheric sciences; Oceanography; Other media and communication; Climate Science; climate change impacts; Climate policy; Coastal Ecosystems; Marine Environment; Climate modelling and prediction; Science communication; Net-zero emissions; Coral reefs |
| Douglas, Jennifer | School of Information | Personal recordkeeping and archives; Community archives; Person-centred archival theory and practices; Grief and recordkeeping and archives; Emotions and recordkeeping and archives; Archival arrangement and description |
| Drelichman, Mauricio | Vancouver School of Economics | Economic history, Spain, Argentina |
| Drljaca, Igor | Department of Theatre & Film | Creative writing; Documentary; Film Production; Screenwriting |
| Ducharme, Michel | Department of History | Social Organization and Political Systems; Political Ideologies; Canadian History before Confederation; Quebec History; Liberalism and Nationalism in Canada and Quebec; Canada and the Atlantic World |
| Duffy, Kay | Department of Asian Studies | Asian history; Literary or Artistic Works Analysis; Literary or Artistic Work Dissemination or Reception Contexts; Social Determinants of Arts and Letters; Arts and Cultural Traditions; Early Medieval China; Premodern Chinese Literature; Sinographic Sphere |
| Dunn, Elizabeth | Department of Psychology | Happiness, money and spending decisions, self-knowledge |
| Earle, Bo | Department of English Language and Literatures | British Romanticism, Critical Theory, Philosophy and Literature |
| Echard, Sian | Department of English Language and Literatures | English language; Literary or Artistic Work Analysis; Literary or Artistic Work Dissemination or Reception Contexts; Modes and strategies of dissemination; Poetry; Media Types (Radio, Television, Written Press, etc.); Anglo-Latin literature; Arthurian literature; History of the Book; John Gower; Manuscript studies; Medieval literature |
| Effros, Bonnie | Department of History | Humanities and the arts; History of archaeology; Antiquarianism and collecting in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries; Late antique and early medieval history and archaeology; Gender history and archaeology |
| Ellermann, Antje | Department of Political Science | Political science; Migrations, Populations, Cultural Exchanges; Migratory Flows; Public Policies; Identity and Transnationality; Role of Governments and Institutions; Comparative Public Policy; Migration and Citizenship |
| Emberson, Lauren | Department of Psychology | Learning, Perception (audition, vision, crossmodal or multisensory), Language development, Face/object perception, Impacts of premature birth, Neural connecitivty, fNIRS, Neonatal and Infant development , Early adversity / Risk and resilience , Increasing diversity and representation in the neurosciences , Naturalistic neuroimaging recordings |
| Enns, James | Department of Psychology | Behavioural neuroscience of reward and motivation; attention; action kinematics; social perception; perceptual development |
| Evenden, Matthew | Department of Geography | All other social sciences, n.e.c.; Historical studies; Environmental History; Historical geography; Rivers; Water; Hydro-electricity |
| Everhart, Avery | Department of Geography | Health geography; Population geography; Geographic information system (GIS and GPS) applications; Health and community services; Bioinformatics, n.e.c.; Social and cultural geography; Sex and gender-based analysis; Ethical, legal, and social issues in health, health systems and health research; Gender and health relationship; Health information systems (including surveillance); Geographic Information Science; Medical Geography; Demography & Population Studies; Critical Data Studies, Critical GIS & Digital Geographies; Transgender Studies; Intersectionality in Empirical Social Science; Health Services Research & Access to Healthcare; Community-Based Participatory Research; Feminist & Queer Theories; Measuring & Combatting STructural Racism |
| Fabris, Michael | Department of Geography | Gender, Race, Class, Power, Colonialism, Justice, Indigenous jurisdiction within Canadian cities, Piikani Nation’s attempts to challenge the construction of the Oldman River Dam |
| Farinha Luz, Vitor | Vancouver School of Economics | Microeconomic Theory, |
| Fernandez Utrera, Maria Soledad | Department of French, Hispanic & Italian Studies | Peninsular contemporary literature and culture |
| Ferraz, Claudio | Vancouver School of Economics | governance and accountability in developing countries; how politics affect public service delivery; the effects of electoral rules on political selection; the role of the state in high crime and violence environments |
| Firkins, Jacqueline | Department of Theatre & Film | costume design |
| Fisher, Alexander | School of Music | Music, n.e.c.; Christianity studies (including biblical studies and church history); musicology; music; Sound Studies; History; religious history; european history |
| Fisher, Kevin | Department of Ancient Mediterranean and Near Eastern Studies | Prehistoric archaeology; Anthropology; Archaeological theory; Archaeometry; Archeological Data Analysis; Archeological Excavation Methods and Techniques; architecture; built environments; digital archaeology; Dynamics of Social Transformations; Mediterranean archaeology; Near Eastern archaeology; power; Social Life / Societal Life; social interaction; Urban Spaces and Urbanity; urbanism |
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Graduate Student Stories
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Recent Publications
This is an incomplete sample of recent publications in chronological order by UBC faculty members with a primary appointment in the Faculty of Arts.
Recent Thesis Submissions
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The Arthur of the March of Wales (ENGL - PHD)
Doctoral Citations
A doctoral citation summarizes the nature of the independent research, provides a high-level overview of the study, states the significance of the work and says who will benefit from the findings in clear, non-specialized language, so that members of a lay audience will understand it.
| Year | Citation | Program |
|---|---|---|
| 2024 | Dr. Duan developed a quantitative method to identify people's valuation for commuting costs, with implications on workers' job search and residential location choice. His research illuminates the frictional nature of local labor markets. This framework is subsequently applied to study firms' and workers' responses to tax policies. | Doctor of Philosophy in Economics (PhD) |
| 2024 | Dr. Gooderham examined whether physical activity, diet, and sleep habits were associated with intraindividual cognitive variability, subjective cognitive function, and metacognition. He found that young adults with healthier lifestyles report enhanced cognitive functioning, which may be leveraged to support cognitive functioning in this population. | Doctor of Philosophy in Psychology (PhD) |
| 2024 | Dr. Sembi studied the Suraj Prakash (1843), a pivotal historical narrative on the lives of the Sikh Gurus. The study revealed how precolonial Sikh scholars were engaged with diverse transreligious philosophical and mythological currents, contributing to the understanding of Sikh history and its methods prior to colonial influence. | Doctor of Philosophy in Asian Studies (PhD) |
| 2024 | Dr. Bonomo studied issues related to health and political economy consequences of environmental deterioration in the context of a developing country to see whether public healthcare can play a role in mitigating adverse effects, and the effectiveness of social policies aimed at poor pregnant women such as prenatal care and financial support. | Doctor of Philosophy in Economics (PhD) |
| 2024 | Dr. Ze examined Sino-Korean relations in the late nineteenth century as seen through case studies involving Chinese merchants on the Korean peninsula. By analyzing a series of case studies, her research provided insights into the transition of regional order from a tributary system to the world order of international law in the late nineteenth century. | Doctor of Philosophy in Asian Studies (PhD) |
| 2024 | Dr. Neels examined the relation between full and partial belief. He concluded that what we rationally believe depends on which questions we are asking. This research aids in understanding how statistical evidence should be used in legal contexts and how we evaluate belief in conspiracy theories. | Doctor of Philosophy in Philosophy (PhD) |
| 2024 | Dr. Tomm studied the psychological consequences of poverty. He found financial scarcity affects attention and impairs financial decision making. He also found that perceived scarcity, objective scarcity, and scarcity relative to others can affect numerical perception in different ways. His work marks a new awareness of the experience of poverty. | Doctor of Philosophy in Psychology (PhD) |
| 2024 | Dr. Russell conducted translational research to examine individual susceptibility to the risk-promoting effect of cues on decision making among those in the community with and without problematic gambling involvement. By using an animal model of decision making, she investigated the underlying neurobiological processes these cues may use to potentiate decisional risk. | Doctor of Philosophy in Psychology (PhD) |
| 2024 | Is a baseline expectation for "regularity" essential to one’s aesthetic experience of musical phrases? Dr. Sawatzky argues that it isn't, and describes musical phrase structure as emergent from the interaction of multiple different ways of hearing how notes and events become grouped, independently of clock-time and supposedly regulative prototypes. | Doctor of Philosophy in Music, Emphasis Theory (PhD) |
| 2024 | Dr. Shahnaz employed an ecological momentary assessment methodology to explore the short-term temporal associations and contexts of Eating disorders (ED) behaviours and suicidal thoughts. | Doctor of Philosophy in Psychology (PhD) |