Books by Victoria Kannen
Transforming Bodies: Gendered Stories of Embodied Change provides unique and original research on... more Transforming Bodies: Gendered Stories of Embodied Change provides unique and original research on gendered bodies. It explores the ways that bodies transform and change, and how these transformations relate to the intersections of gender, race, body shape, names, age, dis/ability, activism, performance, and beyond. Combining personal narratives, sociological theories, and artistic representations, this book dives into questions on transformation and change, such as: "How do we understand our bodies as transformative places? What does it mean to exist in a body that is consistently questioned? Are our embodiments always in some state(s) of change?" The book contains original stories on embodied transformation and includes creative engagement by using commissioned art to represent various forms of transformation and change. Each chapter has a comprehensive list of key words and questions for reflection and discussion. Transforming Bodies: Gendered Stories of Embodied Change is an accessible book that will be engaging for both students and scholars, as well as those outside of academia with an interest in body politics, gender, race, disability, and activism.
Routledge, 2023
This collection investigates how our online identities and cultures are embedded within the digit... more This collection investigates how our online identities and cultures are embedded within the digital practices of our lives, exploring how we form community, how we play, and how we re-imagine traditional media in a digital world.
The collection explores a wide range of digital topics – from dating apps, microcelebrity, and hackers to auditory experiences, Netflix algorithms, and live theatre online – and builds on existing work in digital culture and identity by bringing new voices, contemporary examples, and highlighting platforms that are emerging in the field. The book speaks to the modern reality of how our digital lives have been forever altered by our transnational experiences – one of those key experiences is the pandemic, but so too is systemic inequality, questions of digital privacy, and the role of joy in our online lives.
A vital contribution at a time of significant social and cultural flux, this book will be highly relevant to those studying digital culture within media, communication, cultural studies, digital humanities, and sociology departments.
In this unique approach to the field of body studies, author, scholar, and educator Victoria Kann... more In this unique approach to the field of body studies, author, scholar, and educator Victoria Kannen explores what it means to exist in a body that is constantly on display and subjected to public scrutiny. Kannen examines the interplay of many ways our bodies express identity, such as gender, race, body size, sexuality, disability, body modification, and age, and how public scrutiny of those expressions can impact our public and private selves.
Intertwining personal narratives of self-identified “odd and awed” women with theoretical chapters that help to elucidate the role of social power, this volume tackles the stares, comments, and questions that are directed towards bodies in public space through original research, personal narratives, and artistic expression. As readers encounter the narratives and images throughout the book, they will be supported by scholarly chapters on embodiment, identity, resistance, and power to help analyze, reflect on, and critically engage with the content.
Through stories, theory, and art, this timely new resource will engage students and scholars of women’s and gender studies, sociology, critical disability studies, and body studies.
An exclusively Canadian textbook, this collection investigates the relationships between identity... more An exclusively Canadian textbook, this collection investigates the relationships between identity, geography, and popular culture that are produced and consumed in this sprawling country. Expanding beyond the clichés of friendliness and snow, this text provides a fresh perspective on what it means to be Canadian, both nationally and transnationally. Scholars look at historical subjects like Québécois identity and Indigenous self-representation and explore issues in contemporary media, including music, film, television, comic books, video games, and social media. From Drake to the Tragically Hip, Trailer Park Boys to The Amazing Race Canada, and poutine to maple syrup, mainstream icons and trends are studied in the interdisciplinary context of race, gender, sexuality, politics, and patriotism. Contributing to the location of Canadian popular culture, this unique resource will engage students and scholars of communication studies, cultural studies, and Canadian studies.
An exclusively Canadian textbook, this collection investigates the relationships between identity... more An exclusively Canadian textbook, this collection investigates the relationships between identity, geography, and popular culture that are produced and consumed in this sprawling country. Expanding beyond the clichés of friendliness and snow, this text provides a fresh perspective on what it means to be Canadian, both nationally and transnationally. Scholars look at historical subjects like Quebecois identity and Indigenous self-representation and explore issues in contemporary media, including music, film, television, comic books, video games, and social media. From Drake to the Tragically Hip, Trailer Park Boys to The Amazing Race Canada, and poutine to maple syrup, mainstream icons and trends are studied in the interdisciplinary context of race, gender, sexuality, politics, and patriotism. Contributing to the location of Canadian popular culture, this unique resource will engage students and scholars of communication studies, cultural studies, and Canadian studies.
Papers by Victoria Kannen
Routledge eBooks, Feb 17, 2023
Routledge eBooks, Feb 17, 2023
This collection investigates how our online identities and cultures are embedded within the digit... more This collection investigates how our online identities and cultures are embedded within the digital practices of our lives, exploring how we form community, how we play, and how we re-imagine traditional media in a digital world. The collection explores a wide range of digital topics – from dating apps, microcelebrity, and hackers to auditory experiences, Netflix algorithms, and live theatre online – and builds on existing work in digital culture and identity by bringing new voices, contemporary examples, and highlighting platforms that are emerging in the field. The book speaks to the modern reality of how our digital lives have been forever altered by our transnational experiences – one of those key experiences is the pandemic, but so too is systemic inequality, questions of digital privacy, and the role of joy in our online lives. A vital contribution at a time of significant social and cultural flux, this book will be highly relevant to those studying digital culture within media, communication, cultural studies, digital humanities, and sociology departments.
This qualitative study focuses on students and instructors who study, teach, and learn critical c... more This qualitative study focuses on students and instructors who study, teach, and learn critical concepts of identity, such as gender, race, and dis/ability. The participants’ reflections on these university classroom experiences are examined in order to explore the ways they understand their encounters with privilege and power. In classes that take up discussions of identity – critical identity classrooms – the intention is often to teach, study, and learn how (our) identity or identities manifest in social life, how these manifestations can be problematized, and how these explorations can lead to social change. Often, these courses centre on discussing identity in terms of oppression, rather than investigating the intersections of privilege and oppression. A major contention of this study is that a lack of discussion about privilege in the academy enables the pervasive invisibility of many unearned social advantages to remain under-theorized and ‘invisible.’ This study questions ho...
The Journal of Fandom Studies, 2020
The ideas of outspoken feminist celebrities are met with scepticism. This scepticism is rooted in... more The ideas of outspoken feminist celebrities are met with scepticism. This scepticism is rooted in the idea that, while celebrities have a platform for expression, they are not academics and their role in education should therefore be limited. This article explores the role of Jameela Jamil, a British, queer actor, and analyses her use of Instagram and Twitter as platforms for education and social change. I argue that she uses social media to teach and learn from her followers regarding body acceptance, racial and sexual inclusivity and queer representation. This work also explores the realities of clapbacks, cancel culture, mistake-making, shame culture and affective solidarity via her use of language, such as through the vulnerable phrase 'I want to delete this tweet so much, but…'. In positioning Jamil as more than simply a celebrity feminist, and beyond what is considered a normative public intellectual, I assert that she embodies the role of a celebrity feminist educator. This role is unique as it creates space for Jamil's online feminist activism, her accessible use of language and her desire to teach and learn from her followers to be made meaningful within the context of feminist education and celebrity studies.
This paper begins from the premise that humour in popular culture is an excellent pedagogical str... more This paper begins from the premise that humour in popular culture is an excellent pedagogical strategy for teaching about the complexities of sexism, racism, and ageism to students in higher education. In specific, the 1980s American television sitcom, The Golden Girls offers the possibility to explore the subjects of gender, sexuality, whiteness, mixed race, interracial relationships, “blackface,” age, class, and familial relations. This paper analyzes one episode of The Golden Girls entitled “Mixed Blessings” in order to consider the ways in which an older/unfamiliar representation fosters critical dialogue in the classroom, which can enable oppression and privilege to become tangible and discussable subjects, while also encouraging learning to be joyful.
Gender, Place & Culture: A Journal of Feminist Geography , 2013
This article questions the transformative potential of women and gender studies classrooms throug... more This article questions the transformative potential of women and gender studies classrooms through a discussion of student experiences of privilege and oppression in these spaces. Using in-depth interviews with 22 undergraduate students from two contrasting Canadian universities, this article explores how women and gender studies classrooms function as heterotopias or ‘other places’ – sites that challenge ‘regular’ places outside of the academy. Critically analyzing student experiences illustrates how the intersections of space/location, power, and identities inform notions of privilege and oppression within these classrooms. Analysis of the participants' reflections points to how it is through these ‘other places’ that students are able to recognize identities that were once unknown to them, become conscious of their embodiments via feelings of worry and discomfort, and question their sense of place in the classroom. It is because of these findings that this research functions as a call to instructors regarding the need to prioritize student experiences, so as to be able to critically reflect upon the social and academic significance of women and gender studies classrooms.
Journal of Gender Studies, 2013
The appearance of bodies in social space is a theoretically rich subject for discussion. The stud... more The appearance of bodies in social space is a theoretically rich subject for discussion. The study of bodies and identities is a personally complex endeavour as researchers are often implicated in their own subject of investigation. This article explores one researcher's engagement with issues of power and identity; while undertaking a study on gender, race, and ability in the critical identity classroom (i.e. Women and Gender Studies), I, the researcher, became part of the study as my age and non/pregnant body began to emerge as crucial to the study itself. In this paper, I examine how my body became intertwined with notions of the ‘right and wrong’ pregnant body, the ‘good and bad’ mother/academic/feminist/researcher, and the ‘insider and outsider’ within academic hierarchies.
Teaching in Higher Education, 2012
The dynamics of instructor embodiments and their relation to notions of power are explored in thi... more The dynamics of instructor embodiments and their relation to notions of power are explored in this paper. Informed by feminist poststructural theory, the author argues that, in classrooms where the focus of study is on conceptions of identity such as gender and race, the body of the instructor becomes an explicit pedagogical example. Through interviews with eight instructors who teach these ‘critical identity courses’, issues of ‘bodies in power’ and the instructor as both powerful and powerless are explored. The author concludes that thinking of power relations in the university classroom as productive – rather than as a binary of powerful versus powerless – points to the temporality and fluidity of the classroom space and the bodies that are found within it.
This qualitative study focuses on students and instructors who study, teach, and learn critical c... more This qualitative study focuses on students and instructors who study, teach, and learn critical concepts of identity, such as gender, race, and dis/ability. The participants’ reflections on these university classroom experiences are examined in order to explore the ways they understand their encounters with privilege and power. In classes that take up discussions of identity – critical identity classrooms – the intention is often to teach, study, and learn how (our) identity or identities manifest in social life, how these manifestations can be problematized, and how these explorations can lead to social change. Often, these courses centre on discussing identity in terms of oppression, rather than investigating the intersections of privilege and oppression.
A major contention of this study is that a lack of discussion about privilege in the academy enables the pervasive invisibility of many unearned social advantages to remain under-theorized and ‘invisible.’ This study questions how it is that we come to understand concepts of identity to be one-dimensional, rather than understanding privilege as dynamic and situated. Using in-depth interviews with 22 undergraduate students and 8 instructors from 2 contrasting universities, this study explores 3 main questions: (1) How do students in higher education who are engaged in critical identity studies interpret privilege, both for others and themselves? (2) How do the participants understand their experiences inside and outside the classroom to be related to notions of privilege and oppression that often arise in critical identity classrooms? (3) How does using a multi-site approach to study critical identity classroom experiences extend the ways in which students’ understandings of privilege can be explored?
Using these research questions, the intersections of space/location, power, and identities as they inform notions of privilege and oppression are demonstrated. The participants’ reflections expose how questions of belonging, safety, and ‘place’ contribute to the silences around the study of privilege. The study suggests that understanding privilege and oppression as located within the same network of relations, rather than as binary opposites, will aid in making privilege more accessible as a topic of study in critical identity classrooms.
Relying mainly on Michel Foucault's conceptions of bodily politics, ethics, and bio-political und... more Relying mainly on Michel Foucault's conceptions of bodily politics, ethics, and bio-political understandings of the self, this article provides a rethinking of Noel Ignatiev and John Garvey's (1996) identity category 'race traitor'. Here, race traitor is understood as a way in which to distance, subvert, and reimagine one's whiteness in order to disrupt the power that whiteness maintains. By exploring identity transgressions or, more specifically, identity 'treason', race traitor is presented as a relation of power, an act of betrayal and/or emancipation, and a social relation in order to explore the usefulness that identity treason offers to anti-oppressive work. As socio-spatial conceptualisations of whiteness also complicate other forms of identity transgressions, the analysis then shifts to a construction of 'traitor' in relation to other identities, such as queer disability. The author concludes by arguing that notions of treason can be used to disrupt the 'privileged versus oppressed' binaries that predominate in identity discourses. Exposing the ways in which privileged identities are constructed (i.e. whiteness, able-bodiedness, heterosexuality, etc.) elucidates how resistance to oppressive identity categories is possible.
As attention to social, cultural and physical diversities among student populations is steadily i... more As attention to social, cultural and physical diversities among student populations is steadily increasing in elementary/primary classrooms, the way in which teaching about those diversities is done necessitates a critical discussion. As most of the research on teachers' responses to classroom diversity is conducted in big-city, multicultural settings, this article departs from the norm by examining perspectives of teachers in a predominantly white community with mostly white students. The authors locate their exploratory research project in a Northern Ontario city and, using qualitative methods, consider the impact of teachers' understandings of their own and students' identities on their approaches to diversity. For these teachers to incorporate a diversity-related topic into their teaching requires them to label it as an issue, which in turn is usually related to the presence or absence of certain identities in the classroom. The teachers struggle with the same/different conundrum and frequently turn their pedagogical dilemmas into pedagogical silences.
Chapters by Victoria Kannen
Women in Popular Culture in Canada, 2020
The Spaces and Places of Canadian Popular Culture, 2019
Schitt's Creek is a Canadian comedy. It's also the fi rst Canadian comedy that I have connected w... more Schitt's Creek is a Canadian comedy. It's also the fi rst Canadian comedy that I have connected with in a very long time. It has pretentious cosmopolitan characters with a fl air for the dramatic who are generally astounded by rural sensibilities. Th ese are all things that I, a somewhat pretentious, overly dramatic woman living in a northern Canadian city, can identify with. Th is is a show about loving and loathing. Th e main characters love wealth, excess, and themselves when we meet them in the pilot, while they loath the "trashiness" of the townspeople and the smallness of the town they fi nd themselves thrown into. By the fourth season, however, these characters show the depth of themselves and their belonging to the town, and the town (and viewers) love them back. Th is chapter grapples with the emotional elements of love and disdain that the show vacillates between, and how its creators use these ideas to address fundamental notions of identity, humour, and nation.
The Fat Pedagogy Reader Challenging Weight-Based Oppression Through Critical Education
Book synopsis
Over the past decade, concerns about a global «obesity epidemic» have flourished. ... more Book synopsis
Over the past decade, concerns about a global «obesity epidemic» have flourished. Public health messages around physical activity, fitness, and nutrition permeate society despite significant evidence disputing the «facts» we have come to believe about «obesity». We live in a culture that privileges thinness and enables weight-based oppression, often expressed as fat phobia and fat bullying. New interdisciplinary fields that problematize «obesity» have emerged, including critical obesity studies, critical weight studies, and fat studies. There also is a small but growing literature examining weight-based oppression in educational settings in what has come to be called «fat pedagogy». The very first book of its kind, The Fat Pedagogy Reader brings together an international, interdisciplinary roster of respected authors who share heartfelt stories of oppression, privilege, resistance, and action; fascinating descriptions of empirical research; confessional tales of pedagogical (mis)adventures; and diverse accounts of educational interventions that show promise. Taken together, the authors illuminate both possibilities and pitfalls for fat pedagogy that will be of interest to scholars, educators, and social justice activists. Concluding with a fat pedagogy manifesto, the book lays a solid foundation for this important and exciting new field. This book could be adopted in courses in fat studies, critical weight studies, bodies and embodiment, fat pedagogy, feminist pedagogy, gender and education, critical pedagogy, social justice education, and diversity in education.
The now notorious Maclean’s article “’Too Asian?’” from the magazine’s 2010 campus issue has spar... more The now notorious Maclean’s article “’Too Asian?’” from the magazine’s 2010 campus issue has sparked a national furor about race in Canadian higher education. Since the founding of the federal policy of multiculturalism, Canadians have prided themselves on their ability to integrate diversity into a broader multicultural environment, but the often heated discussions about race point to fissures in this national project. This collection uses the controversy about the Maclean’s article as a flashpoint to interrogate issues about race and representation on Canadian campuses and what it means for students and learning across the country.
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Books by Victoria Kannen
The collection explores a wide range of digital topics – from dating apps, microcelebrity, and hackers to auditory experiences, Netflix algorithms, and live theatre online – and builds on existing work in digital culture and identity by bringing new voices, contemporary examples, and highlighting platforms that are emerging in the field. The book speaks to the modern reality of how our digital lives have been forever altered by our transnational experiences – one of those key experiences is the pandemic, but so too is systemic inequality, questions of digital privacy, and the role of joy in our online lives.
A vital contribution at a time of significant social and cultural flux, this book will be highly relevant to those studying digital culture within media, communication, cultural studies, digital humanities, and sociology departments.
Intertwining personal narratives of self-identified “odd and awed” women with theoretical chapters that help to elucidate the role of social power, this volume tackles the stares, comments, and questions that are directed towards bodies in public space through original research, personal narratives, and artistic expression. As readers encounter the narratives and images throughout the book, they will be supported by scholarly chapters on embodiment, identity, resistance, and power to help analyze, reflect on, and critically engage with the content.
Through stories, theory, and art, this timely new resource will engage students and scholars of women’s and gender studies, sociology, critical disability studies, and body studies.
Papers by Victoria Kannen
A major contention of this study is that a lack of discussion about privilege in the academy enables the pervasive invisibility of many unearned social advantages to remain under-theorized and ‘invisible.’ This study questions how it is that we come to understand concepts of identity to be one-dimensional, rather than understanding privilege as dynamic and situated. Using in-depth interviews with 22 undergraduate students and 8 instructors from 2 contrasting universities, this study explores 3 main questions: (1) How do students in higher education who are engaged in critical identity studies interpret privilege, both for others and themselves? (2) How do the participants understand their experiences inside and outside the classroom to be related to notions of privilege and oppression that often arise in critical identity classrooms? (3) How does using a multi-site approach to study critical identity classroom experiences extend the ways in which students’ understandings of privilege can be explored?
Using these research questions, the intersections of space/location, power, and identities as they inform notions of privilege and oppression are demonstrated. The participants’ reflections expose how questions of belonging, safety, and ‘place’ contribute to the silences around the study of privilege. The study suggests that understanding privilege and oppression as located within the same network of relations, rather than as binary opposites, will aid in making privilege more accessible as a topic of study in critical identity classrooms.
Chapters by Victoria Kannen
Over the past decade, concerns about a global «obesity epidemic» have flourished. Public health messages around physical activity, fitness, and nutrition permeate society despite significant evidence disputing the «facts» we have come to believe about «obesity». We live in a culture that privileges thinness and enables weight-based oppression, often expressed as fat phobia and fat bullying. New interdisciplinary fields that problematize «obesity» have emerged, including critical obesity studies, critical weight studies, and fat studies. There also is a small but growing literature examining weight-based oppression in educational settings in what has come to be called «fat pedagogy». The very first book of its kind, The Fat Pedagogy Reader brings together an international, interdisciplinary roster of respected authors who share heartfelt stories of oppression, privilege, resistance, and action; fascinating descriptions of empirical research; confessional tales of pedagogical (mis)adventures; and diverse accounts of educational interventions that show promise. Taken together, the authors illuminate both possibilities and pitfalls for fat pedagogy that will be of interest to scholars, educators, and social justice activists. Concluding with a fat pedagogy manifesto, the book lays a solid foundation for this important and exciting new field. This book could be adopted in courses in fat studies, critical weight studies, bodies and embodiment, fat pedagogy, feminist pedagogy, gender and education, critical pedagogy, social justice education, and diversity in education.
The collection explores a wide range of digital topics – from dating apps, microcelebrity, and hackers to auditory experiences, Netflix algorithms, and live theatre online – and builds on existing work in digital culture and identity by bringing new voices, contemporary examples, and highlighting platforms that are emerging in the field. The book speaks to the modern reality of how our digital lives have been forever altered by our transnational experiences – one of those key experiences is the pandemic, but so too is systemic inequality, questions of digital privacy, and the role of joy in our online lives.
A vital contribution at a time of significant social and cultural flux, this book will be highly relevant to those studying digital culture within media, communication, cultural studies, digital humanities, and sociology departments.
Intertwining personal narratives of self-identified “odd and awed” women with theoretical chapters that help to elucidate the role of social power, this volume tackles the stares, comments, and questions that are directed towards bodies in public space through original research, personal narratives, and artistic expression. As readers encounter the narratives and images throughout the book, they will be supported by scholarly chapters on embodiment, identity, resistance, and power to help analyze, reflect on, and critically engage with the content.
Through stories, theory, and art, this timely new resource will engage students and scholars of women’s and gender studies, sociology, critical disability studies, and body studies.
A major contention of this study is that a lack of discussion about privilege in the academy enables the pervasive invisibility of many unearned social advantages to remain under-theorized and ‘invisible.’ This study questions how it is that we come to understand concepts of identity to be one-dimensional, rather than understanding privilege as dynamic and situated. Using in-depth interviews with 22 undergraduate students and 8 instructors from 2 contrasting universities, this study explores 3 main questions: (1) How do students in higher education who are engaged in critical identity studies interpret privilege, both for others and themselves? (2) How do the participants understand their experiences inside and outside the classroom to be related to notions of privilege and oppression that often arise in critical identity classrooms? (3) How does using a multi-site approach to study critical identity classroom experiences extend the ways in which students’ understandings of privilege can be explored?
Using these research questions, the intersections of space/location, power, and identities as they inform notions of privilege and oppression are demonstrated. The participants’ reflections expose how questions of belonging, safety, and ‘place’ contribute to the silences around the study of privilege. The study suggests that understanding privilege and oppression as located within the same network of relations, rather than as binary opposites, will aid in making privilege more accessible as a topic of study in critical identity classrooms.
Over the past decade, concerns about a global «obesity epidemic» have flourished. Public health messages around physical activity, fitness, and nutrition permeate society despite significant evidence disputing the «facts» we have come to believe about «obesity». We live in a culture that privileges thinness and enables weight-based oppression, often expressed as fat phobia and fat bullying. New interdisciplinary fields that problematize «obesity» have emerged, including critical obesity studies, critical weight studies, and fat studies. There also is a small but growing literature examining weight-based oppression in educational settings in what has come to be called «fat pedagogy». The very first book of its kind, The Fat Pedagogy Reader brings together an international, interdisciplinary roster of respected authors who share heartfelt stories of oppression, privilege, resistance, and action; fascinating descriptions of empirical research; confessional tales of pedagogical (mis)adventures; and diverse accounts of educational interventions that show promise. Taken together, the authors illuminate both possibilities and pitfalls for fat pedagogy that will be of interest to scholars, educators, and social justice activists. Concluding with a fat pedagogy manifesto, the book lays a solid foundation for this important and exciting new field. This book could be adopted in courses in fat studies, critical weight studies, bodies and embodiment, fat pedagogy, feminist pedagogy, gender and education, critical pedagogy, social justice education, and diversity in education.
Presented at Gender and Education Association Conference. Middlesex University, London, June 22, 2017