Navigating High School

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In grade 10, I transferred from a small French-language public school to Oakwood Collegiate Institute on St. Clair West. In the papers, Oakwood was described as “multicultural;” to me, it was where my dad and uncle passed through after moving to Canada from Jamaica during their adolescence.

My old school was comprised of students whose parents were from Quebec and the Francophonie at large, especially African countries colonized by France. There, I learned that Toronto’s construction of “diversity” was  (to borrow from theorist Raymond Williams’ definitions of community) positive and warmly persuasive.

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The Awesome Diversity In Anna Kendrick's "Cups" Video

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The Awesome Diversity In Anna Kendrick's "Cups" Video

I’ve been watching the video for Anna Kendrick’s “When I’m Gone,” a cover of an internet sensation involving an old folk song and a plastic cup. The song is sweet and short enough to have you wanting more. It makes sense that it’s become a radio fixture, fitting perfectly within the vein of the Lumineers and Phillip Phillips.

The video’s concept involves Kendrick working in a diner and daydreaming while waiting for her biscuits to bake. It was only on a recent viewing that I noticed the diversity of the patrons in the diners: there are white, black, hispanic, and Asian customers all doing the cup routine. You just don’t see this kind of representation in most music videos—it probably helps that the film Pitch Perfect, where Kendrick first performs the song, also had a healthy amount of ethnic diversity, and the film and video share director Jason Moore.

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Innocent Bystanders

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The nightmare that has been Toronto’s political news scene for the past three years seems to have finally reached its awful zenith. With allegations that Mayor Rob Ford may have smoked crack and made homophobic, racist remarks on video, there is no end to the ill effects of this latest head-shaking fiasco: the continued reduction of our municipal political sphere to a never-ending circus; the serious harm done to Toronto’s international image by a man who claims to be raising its business profile; and the simple fact that a city that was finally starting to hit its stride has been seriously set back by its woefully inadequate mayor.

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David Mamet's Race at Canadian Stage

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This is a Toronto blog, and here's my Toronto take on Race: America is weird. After seeing last night's premiere of David Mamet's play (starring, yes, Jason Priestley), my main thought was that we really need to do a Canada vs. USA issue of the Ethnic Aisle, and examine how very differently the two countries experience race and ethnicity

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Hennessy and Enemies: Booze, Brands and "Liquid Bling"

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Hennessy and Enemies: the Toronto Star had some pretty stupid things to say about the link between hip hop, cognac and last summer’s shooting on Danzig Ave. So Denise Balkissoon has some stupid questions of her own.

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