Wendy Hui Kyong Chun, the Canada 150 Research Chair in New Media at Simon Fraser University (SFU), will be holding a public talk on February 8, 2022 as part of her role as a 2022 Hooker Distinguished Visiting Professor.

Chun is director of the Digital Democracies Institute in SFU’s School of Communication, which uses research in both the humanities and data sciences to explore questions of equality and social justice.

Her talk, “The Digital Democracies Institute and why interdisciplinary work is effective, productive and necessary,” will look at how the work of the Digital Democracies Institute works to combat online misinformation, abuse, radicalization and discriminatory algorithms by encouraging collaboration between different disciplines and sectors.

Chun’s talk is sponsored by the a cross-disciplinary group of departments within the Faculty of Humanities, including:

• Department of Communication Studies and Media Arts
• Department of English and Cultural Studies
• School of the Arts
• Centre for Networked Media and Performance
• Sherman Centre for Digital Scholarship
• Gender and Social Justice graduate program
• Global Peace and Social Justice undergraduate program

The Hooker Distinguished Visiting Professor program began following a $25 million bequest left to McMaster by physician Harry Lyman Hooker in 1979.

The talk will be held on Zoom. The event is free; however, advance registration is required.