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 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.

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
Glassman, James Francis Department of Geography Development Geography, Third World Urbanization, Economic Geography, Political Economy, Political Geography, Southeast Asia, Pacific Rim
Goetz, Friedrich Department of Psychology Psychology, social and behavorial aspects; Geographical psychology; Causes and consequences of regional personality differences; Mobility and migration; Wanderlust; Courage; Entrepreneurship; Personality development; open science
Gordillo, Gaston Department of Anthropology Space and violence, affect, ruins and ruination, critical theory and continental philosophy, object-oriented ontologies, resistance to agribusiness, Latin America, Argentina, the Gran Chaco
Gramling, David Department of Central, Eastern & Northern European Studies Humanities and the arts; Social sciences; Medical, health and life sciences; multilingualism / monolingualism; Literary Theory; lgbtq queer studies; labour migration; applied linguistics; health communication; translation; Turkish literature; German studies
Green, David Vancouver School of Economics Antibiotic Resistance,  Infectious Disease, Epidemiology, Determinants of the wage and employment structure bridging between macro labour and micro labour identification issues
Griffin, Michael Department of Ancient Mediterranean and Near Eastern Studies, Department of Philosophy Greek philosophy, Ancient philosophy, Plato, Aristotle, Plotinus, Proclus, Neoplatonism, Ancient logic
Gu, Xiong Department of Art History, Visual Art & Theory Fine Art. Transcultural identity and hybridity. Through the critical angle of visual art, my work encompasses other elements such as sociology, geography, economics, politics, literature; and finally, the dynamics of globalisation, local culture and individual identity shifts. These shifts do not merely constitute a simple amalgamation of two original subjects, but instead, seek to create an entirely new space., Installation, painting, drawing, photography, contemporary art theory
Guerin, Ayasha Department of English Language and Literatures
Gusterson, Hugh Phillimore Department of Anthropology, School of Public Policy and Global Affairs
Guy-Bray, Stephen Department of English Language and Literatures Renaissance poetry
Hall, Kathleen Department of Linguistics Linguistics; Phonology; Phonetics; Laboratory Phonology
Hall, David Geoffrey Department of Psychology Lexical and conceptual development, semantic development, language acquisition
Hallensleben, Markus Department of Central, Eastern & Northern European Studies Transcultural Studies; Artistic and Literary Theories; Literary or Artistic Works Analysis; Migrations, Populations, Cultural Exchanges; German Language Cultures and Literatures; Transnational Literatures; Visual Arts and Literature; European Studies; Literature and Sciences; Literature and Migration; Narratives of Belonging
Hamel, Keith School of Music Music composition; Composition; Interactive Computer Music
Hamlin, Kiley Department of Psychology Psychology and cognitive sciences; Cognitive development; Moral Judgement and Duty or Obligation Morals; Infant / Child Development; Foundations of Religious, Mystical, Mythical and Moral Thoughts; Infant moral cognition; infant social cognition
Hamm, Corey School of Music Piano and Chamber music
Hammerly, Christopher Department of Linguistics Syntax & Morphology; Psycholinguistics; Anishinaabemowin (Ojibwe)
Handy, Todd Department of Psychology aging and cognition, aging and exercise, cognitive neuroscience, attention, migraine, fMRI, Cognitive neuroscience, neuroimaging, attention and its impairment in clinical populations, mind wandering, and real-world human behaviour
Hanser, Jessica Department of History Early Modern Britain; Economic History; Great Divergence; Drugs in History; China and the West; Qing China; Slavery; British Empire; Microhistory; Global History
Hanser, Amy Department of Sociology Work and employment; gender; consumption/consumerism; contemporary Chinese society, Culture and markets, inequality, gender, consumption, service work, China
Hansson, Gunnar Department of Linguistics Linguistic structures (including grammar, phonology, lexicon and semantics); Cognitive sciences; theoretical phonology; morphology-phonology interface; phonological typology; historical linguistics (language change); locality relations; Icelandic
Harris, Mark Institute for Gender, Race, Sex and Social Justice Indigenous rights; land claims; the stolen generations; intellectual property; criminal justice issues; Cultural Heritage; postcolonial legal theory
Harrison, Kathryn Department of Political Science Canadian politics, environmental politics, environmental policy, climate change, global warming, climate change policy, Canadian public policy
Hassan, Marwan Department of Geography Social and economic geography; Geological and Geomorphological Processes; Channel Stability; Fluvial geomorphology; Landscape evolution; Sediment transport; Surface hydrology
Hayat, Zahra Department of Anthropology Pharmaceutical pricing; Quality and intellectual property

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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

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
2022 Dr. Benjamin investigated the psychological underpinnings of support for democratic values and practices. She studied how individuals react to information about democratic backslides, and what dispositions and contexts explain their reactions. Doctor of Philosophy in Psychology (PhD)
2022 Dr. Levere examined the relationship between social support types, self-efficacy, and well-being in stressed dyadic couples. He found that receiving different types of support can impact health and relationship satisfaction depending on the recipient's self-efficacy. This research illuminates when and why support from a partner may be unhelpful. Doctor of Philosophy in Psychology (PhD)
2022 Dr. Reddon studied experimental Indigenous literature in relation to global modernist writing and anti-colonial thought. Her work argues that Indigenous modernisms are coeval with other avant-garde traditions and that these texts offer us powerful examples of the expression of Indigenous sovereignty. Doctor of Philosophy in English (PhD)
2022 Dr. Sung examined the use of everyday objects and bodily actions in the art of Korea between 1960 and 1980. She demonstrated that the objects and actions as new materials and methods enabled participation of artists and art in the modernization, development, and decolonization of the country in the postwar time. Doctor of Philosophy in Art History (PhD)
2022 Dr. Vanzella Yang investigated how different socioeconomic resources shaped the mental health of Canadian adults. He found that resources in adulthood mattered more than parental resources earlier in life. His findings suggest that interventions in adulthood can potentially mitigate socioeconomic inequalities in psychological distress. Doctor of Philosophy in Sociology (PhD)
2022 Dr. Moscoso-Garay studied the literature of the Rubber Extraction Time in the Amazonia (1879-1914). He examined how the industrial modernization helped to perpetuate stereotypes of gender and nature in the Amazon. His research challenges assumptions about discourses of modernity in the Amazonia Doctor of Philosophy in Hispanic Studies (PhD)
2022 Dr. Lachance analyzed how campaign information influences voters in Canada, U.S. and Germany. Her research shows that policy matters for voters, even when affect plays a significant role in their decision. In sum, her work shows that campaigns give voters the information they need to choose the alternative that will best represent their interests. Doctor of Philosophy in Political Science (PhD)
2022 Dr. Chewinski examined rural people's participation in environmental politics following the 2014 Mount Polley mining disaster. He focused on how meaning-making processes, emotions, and cultural contexts produced inequalities in public consultations and incited community mobilization in response to mounting environmental risks. Doctor of Philosophy in Sociology (PhD)
2022 Dr. Inniss researches complex forms of provocative humour in recent avant-garde, decolonial, anti-capitalist, and feminist poetry. Focusing on three poets who write from different social locations, he argues that the textual-political value of such aggressively humorous poetics lies in its ability to destabilize dominant notions of social identity. Doctor of Philosophy in English (PhD)
2022 Dr. Ritchie's research provided new archaeological evidence and perspectives for better understanding how the ancestors of the Sts'ailes - Coast Salish lived and related to other people and the land around them, how this changed over time, and how it continues to influence contemporary territoriality and identity. Doctor of Philosophy in Anthropology (PhD)

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