Students vocalize their safety concerns as danger arises on campus

By: Aliya Karimjee

Outside photograph of a TMU building — The atmosphere in Kerr Hall East is gloomy as students feel uneasy since the sexual assault on Oct. 26, 2022. (CanCulture/Aliya Karimjee)

Trigger/Content Warning: This story contains content on sexual assault

Marginalized communities at Toronto Metropolitan University (TMU) are taking their safety into their own hands with the Wen-Do women’s self-defence workshop following a string of sexual assaults at Kerr Hall East.

TMU has since implemented “security enhancements” in the form of security guards and initiated a partnership with the Toronto Police Service to increase officer presence on campus.

However, these measures don’t address systemic root causes of violence on campus while neglecting the worries of Black, Indigenous and racialized students who have historically and presently been targeted and surveilled by the police (and the scholastic) institution.

A toxic, heterosexist and oppressive has taught individuals from marginalized communities such as women and Trans folks that walking outside at night or going to clubs is dangerous, but why is it up to them to not be sexually assaulted for simply living their lives?

Alessandra Plancarte, an exchange student in the Creative Industries program and a Wen-Do participant, expresses how unfair it is that women have to learn self-defense strategies and fear going to the bathroom because of systemic violence and harm inflicted upon them.

Interviews with women on campus unilaterally expressed concerns about safety in Kerr Hall and on campus at large.

“It feels scary,” said a New Media student Ayah Noor, “there’s always stories we hear about; it’s not like it can never happen to us. It is happening around us.”

Safety concerns prompted Wen-Do, a women’s self-defense class designed “for women by women,” to work to promote self-empowerment strategies among marginalized community members.

Leslie Allin, a Wen-Do instructor, coaches students, of all levels of knowledge and experience, to learn self-defense techniques in case of unfortunate circumstances where they must physically or verbally protect themselves.

“Nobody should be following others in washrooms. My understanding of the situation is that the young woman fought back. She confronted the attacker and was able to get away, which took a lot of courage,” said Allin.

Allin demonstrates the importance of yelling to prevent freezing.

In this class, community members are witnessing themselves stepping into power, recognizing that they deserve much more. Wen-Do is hoping to make “ a difference one student at a time,” said Allin.

Isabella Iula, a first-year journalism student and Wen-Do participant, demonstrates a Wen-Do technique. (CanCulture/Aliya Karimjee)

Iula said that she believes the Wen-Do class is a good resource, helping her “feel safer, especially as a woman in first-year.”

Consent Comes First (CCF) organizes Wen-Do workshops for TMU community members.

Tiffany Wong, a sexual violence specialist at CCF, followed the class first-hand and felt safer, confident and empowered.

“CCF creates opportunities for people affected by violence to cultivate safety, healing and leadership on their own terms,” said Wong in an email.

As liberationist spaces work towards dismantling patriarchal systems and rape culture that harm communities, Wen-Do wants to anchor folks with tools to fight against gender-based violence and abusers' entitlement to the bodies of marginalized peoples.

As danger is a constant, “having to take a self-defense class is so sad, but it is the last measure,” said Sarme Saseeharan, a graphic communications management student.

“You must be prepared to defend yourself because the school won’t help you,” said Saseeharan.

Students can enroll in the course starting Winter 2023

By: Krishika Jethani

Sonya Fatah (left) and Janeyce Guerrier (right) performing in Harmed in Hamilton, a stitched! Production on Oct. 22 at the Theatre Aquarius in Hamilton. (Aloysius Wong/stitched!)

A live journalism course is coming to Toronto Metropolitan University (TMU) in the Winter 2023 semester. The course, named Special Topics in Journalism, will be offered by the Creative School’s School of Journalism.

Live journalism, unlike traditional journalism, requires a live audience. Instead of publishing a story in a newspaper or magazine, a story is performed on stage while engaging the audience.

The course will be found as “JRN 319” for the upcoming semester. In the following year, it will have its own course code and will be known as “Journalism: Live on Stage” and will be taught by Sonya Fatah, an assistant professor at the School of Journalism.

Aru Kaul, a fourth-year journalism student who is assisting in promoting the new course, says live journalism differs from traditional news by providing audience members with an experience. “Live journalism shows them what is happening,” Kaul said.

stitched!, founded by Fatah, is a live journalism lab at TMU that encourages students to perform journalistic practices in front of a live audience.

The underlying notion is to bring news to the stage. Journalists employ oral storytelling techniques to share stories before audience members, who become news consumers.

While the course is open to all journalism students that have completed the prerequisite courses JRN272 and JRN273, students from other programs can also obtain permission from Fatah to enroll.

Through exploring an oft-underrepresented form of news and information dissemination, students will be able to practice journalism in a different and innovative way. In a journalist fellowship report on live journalism and its capacity to re-engage audiences, Jaakko Lyytinen cites theatre as “the last oasis of undivided attention.” To bring journalism to theatre means bringing the media apparatus into a “shared place and time for experiencing something corporeal with words, pictures, sound.”

Professor Fatah says this course serves as a “unique” opportunity for journalism and non-journalism students alike. Live journalism allows students to learn how to communicate issues to an audience as a way of practicing storytelling.

Although live journalism is practiced differently by individual organizations, it still follows the same reporting approach as traditional journalism, as “you still need to go out there, meet people whose stories you’re sharing and come report it and bring it back,” said Fatah.

Those enrolled in the course in the Winter 2023 semester, will have the opportunity to work with the climate disaster project based at the University of Victoria– a project led by environmental journalism professor Sean Holman.

“He runs this program that is established across 13 schools in North America and the students in those 13 schools have been collecting testimonies of climate crisis survivors… and we have access to that archive,” said Fatah.

Students will also break up into different groups and work with those who have shared these stories.

There are also more live journalism shows produced in the U.S. and Europe including Pop-Up Magazine, The Black Box, and Live Magazine in France, among others.

“The goal of some of our work is to create a space where you can have a post-show engagement to push the conversation beyond the story itself,” said Fatah. “And to consider how we as a community, as a society, really discuss this issue.”