The 2024 DOCTalks Festival & Symposium will be a hybrid event (in-person & Zoom) taking place in Fredericton, New Brunswick at the University of New Brunswick and St. Thomas University from Tuesday June 18th to Thursday June 20th.

Free admission for all event activities. Registration for the 2024 DOCTalks Festival & Symposium will be through Eventbrite.

If seeking accommodations, please visit Fredericton Tourism: 

DOCTalks is pleased to present two evening documentary film screenings & talks with a call to action, four presentations that delve into storytelling from a community engagement and social impact perspective, and two discussions about funding and disseminating knowledge-based documentary media.

Note: All times are in Atlantic Standard Time (AST).

Gary Weekes: DOCTalks President & Host

Ntoliwis Nil Wolastoq is a powerful documentary (44 minutes) that seeks to preserve and celebrate Wolastoqui culture and identity, including a call to officially change the name to the Wolastoq (Saint John) River, as outlined by Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada in 2015. For over 400 years, settler maps of what is now called New Brunswick have called the Wolastoq the St. John River. But the Wolastoq is the ancestral home, the life source and the namesake of the Wolastoqey – the people of the beautiful, bountiful river – since time immemorial. As we follow a young Wolastoqew man, Riley Gaffney, striving to reclaim a culture eroded by colonialism, we see its parallels with the Wolastoq Nation’s fight to have maps and governments accept the true name of the Wolastoq river. 

After the screening there will be a discussion about the film and its social impact.

Anthony Truong Swan is the Impact Director of Story Money Impact. He works with social justice and environmental documentaries to develop partnerships across all sectors of civil society, helping to put relevant issues-based films on the front lines of creating social impact. He has created strategies for over 25 documentary films through Story Money Impact’s programs, and helped create or run 15 campaigns.   

Join the live conversation on Zoom.

This is an opportunity to learn more about the Social Sciences & Humanities Research Council and mobilizing knowledge using knowledge-based documentary media. Discussions will centre around the Connection program and potential collaborations with partners, such as a joint initiative to support documentary films for social impact purposes.

Éric Bastien is the Director of the Research Partnerships Portfolio at the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council since 2018 and has been working for SSHRC for 25 years. Éric’s main responsibilities have been the development and management of funding opportunities and joint initiatives that support partnerships between Canadian postsecondary institutions and organizations of our society, in Canada and abroad, such as all level of governments, not-for-profit organizations, foundations, and the private sector.

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The film documents the 1987 Luke Elwood case, which was a constitutional challenge on the right to education for disabled youth. Luke Elwood was an elementary student with an intellectual disability in the Halifax County Bedford District School Board. His family challenged his placement in a Special Education class rather than a placement with his grade-level peers at his neighborhood school. The Charter of Rights and Freedoms case was settled by injunction and Luke was permitted an integrated educational experience. The Luke Elwood case was one of the first Charter of Rights and Freedoms challenges of Section 15: discrimination based on mental disability and is often cited as a precursor to movements for educational equity and inclusion.

We will screen the 22 minute documentary film and be joined in a conversation with the researchers and filmmakers collaborating on this project. 

Matthew Rogers (PhD) is a New Brunswick based filmmaker and an Assistant Professor in the Faculty of Education at the University of New Brunswick. His research focuses on youth-centered participatory filmmaking, and documentary inquiry as a knowledge mobilization tool. As a filmmaker, his primary interests rest with directing documentary and cinematography. His narrative film work with Frictive Pictures has been internationally recognized with awards and nominations in cinematography, editing, writing, and direction. 

Lynn Aylward (PhD) is an activist teacher educator, curriculum designer, and researcher with expertise in intercultural teacher development, community schooling, and inclusive education. Dr. Aylward’s research projects examine equity as it intersects with culturally responsive pedagogy, indigenous education, disability studies, technologies for accessibility, place -based curriculum, rurality and gender.

Join the live conversation on Zoom.

The Digital Storytelling Project was designed to bring together older adults and students to create digital stories about an event, theme, place, or relationships that are important to the older adult – for example, meeting their spouse, receiving an award or an achievement – or something that is important to them such as family, work, or faith. The project also sought to engage older adults in learning digital skills. Digital Stories use multimedia tools to bring stories to life. Those stories can be personal reflections, an account of an event, or may address a theme or an issue that is important to the person telling the story. Digital stories are typically 5-8 minute videos that combine audio, images, and video clips to tell a story.

We will screen several Digital Storytelling videos and discuss this community engagement project and the academic ethics associated with producing knowledge-based documentary media.

Clive Baldwin (PhD) is Professor of Social Work at St Thomas University. His research interests are narrative and identity, spirituality in New Religious Movements, and the experience of living with Body Integrity Identity Disorder. He is Chair of the Research Ethics Board of St Thomas University.

Linda Caissie (PhD) is an Associate Professor and Chair in the Gerontology Department at St. Thomas University. Her research and teaching interests include narrative gerontology, cultural gerontology, aging in the media, aging and gender, and gero-ethics.

Join the live conversation on Zoom.

A DOCTalks ‘Meet & Greet’ will be held in the first floor foyer of Brian Mulroney Hall at 4:30pm with light refreshments being served.

The Fishing On-demand short doc explores the collaborative efforts between commercial fish harvesters and conservation organizations to prevent the entanglement of marine mammals in Atlantic Canada. The film showcases the challenges and successes of implementing new technologies to protect the critically endangered North Atlantic right whale population and captures the diverse perspectives of fishers, conservationists, and industry stakeholders as they work together to find solutions that support both marine conservation and the livelihoods of the fishing community. Fishing On-Demand has screened at several conferences and community stakeholder meetings.

We will screen Fishing on-demand and have a discussion about engaging communities through research and short films.

Cameron Lane is a Scottish-Canadian freelance video producer, video journalist, camera operator, drone operator, and video editor with five years of experience working in both Canada and the United Kingdom. Cameron’s documentary work has been featured on prominent platforms such as CBC The National, The Weather Network, and The Globe and Mail, and his award-winning short films have been showcased at several film festivals. The majority of Cameron’s work revolves around his passions for environmental conservation and outdoor adventure.

Join the live conversation on Zoom.

The Community Conservation Research Network is based at Saint Mary’s University in Halifax, Nova Scotia, and is a global learning hub on themes related to communities, conservation and livelihoods as part of an international initiative to study and support local communities engaging in environmental conservation that sustains local livelihoods. For many years, the CCRN has been engaged in local community-focused studies around the world. More and more, these studies involve video production, often by researchers or members of local communities who are working on activities involving environmental conservation and livelihood security. The CCRN has also developed a “Documenting With Video” guide that is used to reach more and more people, providing positive examples for communities engaged in shaping their own destinies.

We will learn more about CCRN activities and how they are using knowledge-based documentary media content for community engagement and social impact purposes.

Tony Charles (PhD) is a professor at Saint Mary’s University where he works in the Sobey School of Business and the School of the Environment. Tony’s work focuses on the governance, socio-economics and sustainability of environmental systems and natural resources. He leads the Community Conservation Research Network, a multi-year international initiative to explore how local-level conservation supports local livelihoods, and links with large-scale policy for effective environmental governance.

Don Duchene has over four decades of experience in the film and television industry and owns Nexus Media based in Nova Scotia. He spent seven years with the National Film Board of Canada and has been producing independent documentary and dramatic films for over thirty years. The focus of his recent work has been democracy and the environment including collaborating with First Nation communities and the Community Conservation Research Network.

Join the live conversation on Zoom.

Since 2013 DOCTalks has been promoting cross-sector collaborations between creators – documentary producers, academic researchers, charities, governments, foundations, and broadcasters – to create, fund and mobilize knowledge based documentary media for communitiy engagement and social impact purposes. Over the last 10 years, DOCTalks has undertaken a number of initiatives to develop a best practices & principles ecosystem, where some activities are well established and others are still works-in-progress. One of these initiiatives is the DOCTalks Presents film series being planned in collaboration with CHCO and CIMC community television stations.

Join us in a conversation about the DOCTalks Ecosystem and the DOCTalks Presents Film Series.

Lloyd Salomone is a DOCTalks Co-founder and a researcher, writer and documentary producer in New Brunswick. Since 2003, he has been actively developing, producing and distributing documentary media content for television broadcast, online streaming, interactive websites, and educational purposes. He has worked with the National Film Board of Canada, Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, Aboriginal Peoples Television Network, Bravo Channel, Bell FibeTV1; and has collaborated with community based groups to tell their stories.

Gary Weekes is the President of DOCTalks and a photographer and filmmaker based in Fredericton New Brunswick. Over the last 20 years he received photographic commissions and participated in solo and group exhibitions in England and Canada. He has been a cinematographer on several short dramas; directed, shot and edited several short documentary films; and recently received an Arts NB grant for a photographic project and Canada Council grant for a documentary film.

Join the live conversation on Zoom.

A DOCTalks ‘Meet & Greet’ will be held in the first floor foyer of Brian Mulroney Hall at 4:30pm with light refreshments being served.

Teenagers are putting an end to mental health stigma. To do it, they’re telling their own stories in the documentary film and teen-hosted podcast series Our Turn To Talk. From skyrocketing rates of anxiety and depression to the impacts of racism, social media and the pandemic, their struggles and triumphs carry a powerful message that – Storytelling Saves Lives. The feature documentary film is real, raw and life-affirming, and is a call for action at a time when it’s needed most.

Join us in a conversation about the Our Turn To Talk project and its social impact on teenagers and local communities.

Beth Murphy’s teenage daughter has struggled with anxiety and an eating disorder, inspiring her to use her storytelling skills to fight stigma and create media that can inspire more open conversations about mental health issues within families and communities. Beth is also the founder of Principle Pictures, a media and impact company dedicated to storytelling for social impact—through films, podcasts, news reports, and complementary impact campaigns. Her work premiers at top-tier film festivals globally and can be found across national and international media outlets, including PBS (FRONTLINE, POV, Independent Lens and NewsHour), The New York Times Op-Docs, TIME, History Channel, The Sundance Channel, Discovery Networks, Lifetime, ABC News, Reveal from the Center for Investigative Reporting, The Washington Post, PRI The World, NHK, Canal Vie, and many others. Her honors include: Emmy Award, World Press Photo Award, Overseas Press Club Award, Scripps Howard Award, National Headliner Award, Webby Award, RTNDA Edward R. Murrow Award, AWRT’s Gracie Allen Award, One Shared World International Outreach Award, and Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University Award.

Join the live conversation on Zoom.

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