The recent high-profile cases of two BC women who disappeared in the Lower Mainland sparked an alarming number of posts on social media regarding abduction concerns. This led to a growing number of questions from UFV students and staff about what is true, what is rumour, and how to be safe. It also dynamized the disproportionate focus of media coverage of missing person cases involving women of color.

What does the average missing person look like? Judging from national media reports, and the widespread circulation of videos and posts on social media platforms: young, white, upper-middle-class, and female. When we shift our focus from news coverage to facts, a very different picture emerges. One in which white women occupy a privileged role as violent crime victims in news media reporting.

On Monday March 29 at 12:30 pm,  UFV Campus Living and Student Life will host a panel discussion about missing women and the media. Panelists will address topics of community safety, violence against women, reporting to the police, media bias, and the unseen women of colour who go missing.

This event is for UFV staff, faculty, and students only.

Mon, March 29
12:30 to 2:30 pm

Location: Zoom: Link will be sent to people who register the morning of the event
Register: Eventbrite https://www.eventbrite.ca/e/seen-and-unseen-missing-women-and-the-media-tickets-145755571839

Sponsored by UFV Housing and Campus Living, Student Life, Indigenous Student Centre, South Asian Studies Institute and Risk and Safety.

Panelists

Linda Kay
Linda Kay has an educational background in Communications Arts/Aboriginal Business/Native Studies and Community Economic Development. Linda has retired from her position as Community Hub Program Coordinator at Seabird Island Band, where she worked with First Nations communities in the Fraser Valley assisting with transferring health services from Health Canada to the BC First Nations health services.

 

 

 

Chris Gosselin
Chris Gosselin, RCMP Cpl, First Nations liaison to the Federal Government and First Nations Consultant

 

 

 

 

Dr. Satwinder Kaur Bains
Dr. Satwinder Kaur Bains is the Director of the South Asian Studies Institute at the University of the Fraser Valley and an associate professor in Social, Cultural, and Media Studies. Dr. Bains’ critical analysis of India’s multilingual policy and planning has fueled her interest to study the impact of language, culture, and identity on South Asian Canadian migration, settlement, and integration. Her research includes and intersects cross-cultural education with a focus on anti-racist curriculum implementation; race, racism, and ethnicity; identity politics; Sikh feminist ideology; migration and the South Asian Canadian Diaspora and Punjabi-Canadian cultural historiography.

 

 

Justin Cole
Justin Cole has over 20 years’ of experience in the private security industry and as a private investigator. As security coordinator, Justin provides UFV with evidence-based solutions to security, risk and emergency management issues.

 

 

 

 

 

Stephanie Demeules
Stephanie Demeules, a dedicated student leader in UFV student housing, the co-president of the UFV Student-Athlete Council, and a member of the Cascades women’s volleyball team, believes her role as a student leader extends beyond housing and the volleyball court. She advocates that radical education and truth are the principal means for helping people to understand societal issues and to realize that despite the inequalities that exist we have agency and the power to change the narrative.