Under Western Skies:

Climate, Culture and Change

in Western North America

October 13-16, 2010

Mount Royal University 

Calgary, Alberta, Canada.

This interdisciplinary and cross-cultural gathering welcomes presentations on the environmental challenges now faced by diverse populations, both human and nonhuman, in the Western lands of Canada, the United States, and Mexico.

Academics and other stakeholders from the wider community are invited to participate in this urgent and compelling dialogue.  The conference invites academics from the humanities, social and natural sciences, as well as activists, businesses, artists and others to speak across the boundaries that conventionally divide them.

Since both the geographical and critical terrains at issue are considerable, a wide array of topics and time periods is welcome. The shared concern will be the interaction between humans and the natural environment in the context of Western history, geography, climate change, and commercial/sustainable development of lands and resources.

Possible directions may include, but are not restricted to, the following:

Confirmed Keynote Speakers

Maude Barlow

Maude Barlow is the National Chairperson of the Council of Canadians and chairs the board of Washington-based Food and Water Watch. She is also an executive member of the San Francisco-based International Forum on Globalization and a Councillor with the Hamburg-based World Future Council. Maude is the recipient of eight honorary doctorates as well as many awards, including the 2005 Right Livelihood Award (known as the "Alternative Nobel"), the Citation of Lifetime Achievement at the 2008 Canadian Environment Award, and the 2009 Earth Day Canada Outstanding Environmental Achievement Award. In 2008/2009, she served as Senior Advisor on Water to the 63rd President of the United Nations General Assembly. She is also the best selling author or co-author of 16 books, including the international best seller Blue Covenant: The Global Water Crisis and The Coming Battle for the Right to Water. 

Maude Barlow est la presidente nationale du Conseil des Canadiens. Elle est presidente du conseil de Food and Water Watch de Washington, fait partie de l'executif d'International Forum on Globalization de San Francisco et est conseillere du World Future Council de Hambourg. Maude Barlow a recu huit doctorats honorifiques ainsi que de nombreux prix dont le prix Right Livelihood de 2005 (surnomme le Nobel alternatif), le Prix Hommage 2008 des Prix canadiens de l'environnement, ainsi que le prix de la realisation environnementale exceptionnelle du Jour de la Terre 2009. En 2008/2009, elle etait conseillere principale en matiere d'eau aupres du president de l'Assemblee generale des Nations Unies. Elle signe et cosigne 16 livres dont le best seller international Vers un pacte de l'eau. 

Andrew Nikiforuk
For the last two decades, Andrew Nikiforuk has written about energy, economics and the West for a variety of Canadian publications including The Walrus, Maclean's, Canadian Business, The Globe and Mail's Report on Business, Chatelaine, Georgia Straight, Equinox and Harrowsmith.

In the late 1990s, he investigated the social and ecological impacts of intensive livestock industries and the legacy of northern uranium mining for the Calgary Herald. His public policy position papers on water diversion in the Great Lakes (2004) and water, energy and North American integration (2007) for the Program on Water Issues at the University of Toronto's Munk Centre sparked both discussion and reform.

Nikiforuk's journalism has won seven National Magazine Awards since 1989 and top honours for investigative writing from the Association of Canadian Journalists. His dramatic Alberta-based book, Saboteurs: Wiebo Ludwig's War Against Big Oil, won the Governor General's Award for Non-Fiction in 2002.  Pandemonium, which examines the impact of global trade on disease exchanges, received widespread national acclaim. His latest book, The Tar Sands: Dirty Oil and the Future of the Continent, examines the world's largest energy project, and is a national best seller. It recently won the 2009 Rachel Carson Environment Book Award and was listed as a finalist for the Grantham Prize for Excellence In Reporting on the Environment.

Nikiforuk and his wife and three sons, Aidan, Keegan and Torin, live in Calgary, Alberta. Whether speaking or writing about melting glaciers, educational shams, peak oil, or the destruction of the boreal forest, Nikiforuk has earned a reputation as an honest and provocative voice in Canadian journalism.

Richard White, American Historian and author of

The Organic Machine: The Remaking of the Columbia River (1996)

The Frontier in American Culture: An Exhibition at the Newberry Library, August 26, 1994 - January 7, 1995, with Nelson Patrick Limerick (1994)

"It's Your Misfortune and None of My Own": A New History of the American West (1991)

The Middle Ground: Indians, Empires, and Republics in the Great Lakes Region, 1650-1815  (Pulitzer Nominee Finalist, 1991)

Conference Contacts

Dr. Robert Boschman                                                Dr. Mario Trono
Associate Professor                                                   Associate Professor
Department of English                                                Department of English
Mount Royal University                                             Mount Royal University 
Calgary, Alberta                                                        Calgary, Alberta
CANADA T3E 6K6                                                 CANADA T3E 6K6  
(403) 440-6456                                                        (403) 440-6451
<rboschman@mtroyal.ca>                                         <mtrono@mtroyal.ca> 

Submitting Proposals

Proposals of 250 words (attached to an email as a .doc or .docx file) can be sent to either Robert Boschman  or Mario Trono .

Deadline for submissions: January 15, 2010