Critical Conversations

Dr. Myrle Ballard is a Canada Research Chair in Weaving Indigenous Science and Sustainability Science and Associate Professor in the Dept. of Earth, Energy, and Environment at the University of Calgary. She stood-up the new Indigenous Science Division at Environment and Climate Change Canada. Anishinaabe from Lake St. Martin First Nation, Dr. Ballard’s research explores Three-eyed seeing and how her fluency in Anishinaabe mowin can transform approaches to water resource management using Anishinaabe mowin baseline indicators.  Dr. Ballard also serves on a number of committees and working groups, with a recent appointment as Chair, World Water Quality Alliance. She was also appointed as a Scoping expert for the second IPBES global assessment of biodiversity and ecosystem services; and Expert for the IPBES task force on Indigenous and local knowledge. Her other research interests include but are not limited to, climate change, and sustainability of flooding/displacement.  

Dr. Az Klymiuk, an assistant professor and Indigenous Scholar in Science at the University of Manitoba, is an autistic, two-spirit, first-generation Cree Métis and Slavic citizen of the Métis Nation of Alberta.  Klymiuk grew up in subsistence-dominated lifeways in Treaty 8 Territory in northern Alberta, near the confluence of the Peace and Notikewin rivers.  They remain deeply connected to this land, and Indigenous ways of relating to other-than-human kin.  At the University of Manitoba, Klymiuk conducts research into plant mycobiomes, and is currently investigating how plant-fungal partnerships can be utilized to support Indigenous-led initiatives for manômin (wild rice) conservation, restoration, and food sovereignty.  Their work is supported by NSERC-CRSNG, SSHRC-CRSH’s New Frontiers in Research Foundation, and the University of Manitoba’s Collaborative Research and Fieldwork Support programs. 

Assistant Professor/Indigenous Scholar at the University of Manitoba since July 2019. I hail from Naranjal, a small town in the countryside of Ecuador. I did my undergraduate in Ecuador in Marine Biology. I migrated to the USA in 2005 to pursue graduate studies in Aquatic Ecotoxicology and Molecular Microbial Ecology. I was a postdoctoral fellow and Senior Research Associate for ~8 years at the University of British Columbia and British Columbia Centre for Disease Control. My current research focuses on anthropogenic activities and their impact on water quality and aquatic ecosystems. I use culture independent approaches such as function and sequenced based metagenomics, quantitative PCR, bioinformatics and statistical tools to study diversity, abundance and dynamics/interactions of microbiomes particularly the resistome. 

Ayush is a professor in the Department of Microbiology and Associate Dean-Strategic Initiatives in the Faculty of Science at the University of Manitoba. A Fellow of the Royal Society of Biology, he was President of the Canadian Society of Microbiologists (2021–22). His research focuses on multidrug resistance in Gram-negative bacteria, including antibiotic resistance mechanisms, environmental factors, and genetic tools. His group also studies water quality in First Nation communities in Manitoba. 

Jeffrey Ansloos, Ph.D., is Associate Professor of Indigenous Health and Social Policy and is the Tier II Canada Research Chair in Indigenous Studies of Health and Environmental Justice. His ongoing SSHRC Insight research project investigates the effects of extractivism, neoliberalism, and climate change on suicidal distress among First Nations and Inuit populations. As the founding director of the Critical Health and Social Action Lab, Ansloos oversees a Canada Foundation for Innovation-funded research center that supports community-based action research aimed at promoting health, social, and environmental justice. He is the theme lead for the Indigenous suicide prevention and complex crisis response stream within the Ontario Network Environment for Indigenous Health Research through CIHR. He is the author of The Medicine of Peace: Indigenous Youth Resisting Violence and Decolonizing Healing and Thunder and the Noise Storms, with forthcoming titles including Indigenous X: Networks of Relations and Resistance During and After Twitter and Against Annihilation: Indigenous Struggles for Inhabitable Worlds and Livable Lives. Ansloos is a Member of the College of New Scholars, Artists, and Scientists in the Royal Society of Canada. Dr. Ansloos is Cree and English and a citizen of the Fisher River Cree Nation (Ochekwi-Sipi; Treaty 5).  

Born and raised in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Rick Harp is part of the Peter Ballantyne Cree Nation in what’s currently known as northern Saskatchewan. First bit hard in the 90s by the radio bug at campus/community station CKCU-FM in Ottawa, Harp’s 30-odd-years in media includes national and regional stints at CBC Radio, NCI-FM, and the Aboriginal Peoples Television Network (APTN), along with 350+ episodes as host/producer of the MEDIA INDIGENA podcast.