Lecture | Inspiring Creative Dialogue: Arts & Health Research Symposium
Professor Emeritus Arthur W. Frank, University of Calgary, on why illness needs expressive arts, researchers, and how health research needs to change.
An Illness of One’s Own: Memoir as Art Form and Research Topic
Emily Carr University Lecture Theatre
Granville Island - 1399 Johnston Street, South Building 301
Keynote Address: Arthur W. Frank, Professor Emeritus, University of Calgary
In 1989 I began writing a memoir describing three years of critical illness. What began as a work of self-expression later turned into a form of research, as I studied others’ recollections of illness. Drawing examples from almost three decades, this lecture discusses why illness needs expressive arts, why expressions of illness need researchers, and how health research needs to change in order to recognize the full range of what symbolic recollections of illness express.
Arthur Frank is the author of several books, beginning with his illness memoir At the Will of the Body (1991; Mariner Books edition, 2002). The Wounded Storyteller (University of Chicago, 2nd edition 2013) is one of the most widely cited works on illness experience. Letting Stories Breathe (Chicago, 2010) asks how stories affect our lives and what the particular capacities of stories are. The book developed through a decade of teaching workshops on narrative analysis on five continents. Frank has lectured internationally and been a visiting professor at universities including University of Toronto, Sydney University, and Keio University in Tokyo. He is professor emeritus at the University of Calgary and currently professor at VID Specialized University in Norway. His academic honors include election to the Royal Society of Canada and the RSC’s medal for bioethics (2008).
SCHEDULE
This symposium will bring together interdisciplinary researchers and artists to discuss mutual interests and cross-pollination between the arts and health research. The event is intended for those who are currently working at the intersection between the arts and health and will include a variety of formats and opportunities for exchange.
Friday, April 1: Emily Carr University, South Building 301
Registration NOT required
- 3:30pm Artists Panel: Otto Kamensek, Landon Mackenzie, Carol-Ann Courneya
- 5:00-6:00pm Reception & Exhibition of Artworks
- 6:00 Keynote: Arthur K. Frank, An Illness of One’s Own: Memoir as Art Form and Research Topic
Saturday, April 2: UBC, School Population and Public Health
Eventbrite Registration required (see below)
- 9:30-11:30am—Co-creation Session: Hélène Day Fraser
- 11:30-1:00pm—Panel: Ethical and Methodological Aspects of Arts-Based Health Research, Gloria Purveen, Heather Walmsley, Susan Cox & Carl Leggo, George Belliveau
- 2:00-3:30pm—Panel: Using the Arts for Social Change, Alison Phinney & Elizabeth Kelson, Glen Lowry & Grant Charles, Carl Leggo
All events are free to attend. Space is limited for the Saturday events. If you are interested in attending the Saturday events, please register via eventbrite.
Co-sponsored and organized by the Maurice W. Young Centre for Applied Ethics, UBC & Emily Carr University of Art + Design