UFV set Kristine Lawson on path from shy theatre kid to anthropology PhD

For Kristine Lawson, living life to the fullest has always involved a bit of fear, a bit of risk, and a bit of imposter syndrome.

Overcoming those barriers has led her to the thrills of playing a lead role on stage, rolling down rapids thousands of times on more than 50 rivers as a rafting guide, and choosing to forge a unique path with her anthropology doctorate rather than pursue a conventional academic career.

“Choosing to sit in discomfort and go for it anyway has taken me to many places,” she says.

Kristine’s experiences as a University of the Fraser Valley student were life-changing for her in two ways.

Her passion for theatre, sparked during high school, thrived during her two years in the UFV Theatre program, from which she earned a diploma in 2005.

“I was the shyest young person,” she recalls. “Theatre changed my life! It taught me how to not be afraid of the world, and to engage with other people. I have many fond memories of my time in theatre courses, working backstage, and getting to know the other students and the faculty and staff who guided me, including Bruce Kirkley, Ian Fenwick, Astrid Beugeling, Heather Robertson, and Christopher Wright.”

After several behind-the-scenes roles where she learned the nuts and bolts of production, and acting roles in UFV Director’s Festival plays, she took on the lead role on the main stage in The Secret Garden in spring of 2005.

Kristine travelled throughout Australia for more than a year after graduation, and came back with an accent so thick that her agent told her she was not castable until she shook it. She took that as a sign to ditch her professional acting aspirations and she spent the next few years pursuing her other passion as a river rafting guide.

“I loved the water and being immersed in nature and meeting people from around the world in a wilderness setting,” she recalls. “When people would ask me what I wanted to do when I ‘grew up’ I’d say I want to get paid to hang out and talk to people and hear their stories.”

More than 20 years later, she’s doing just that on a more formal level as a project director and senior researcher with Narratives Inc., a Winnipeg-based environmental planning firm that prioritizes community-led, relational approaches to technical work in planning, assessments, research, design, and capacity building.

Along the way, she got intrigued by cultural anthropology through a World Religions course taught by the late David Wyatt. A friend told her that anthropology sounded like a perfect match for her curious personality, and she returned to UFV twice over five years to take more courses.  An instructor told her that if she really wanted to pursue anthropology as an academic discipline, she should read widely in the field, discover scholars that really resonated with her, and go study with them.

She took that advice and went to California with the hopes of learning from renowned anthropologist Dr. Laura Nader at the University of California Berkeley, where she completed her Bachelor of Arts in anthropology.

She was interested in the concept of “coercive harmony” developed by Nader — how a system in which there is individual freedom but only to a certain point, where people can be ostracized if they push the boundaries, can be used as a tool of social control.

“As a lifelong oddball, I was fascinated by this,” she recalls.

After her BA, she decided to pursue an MA and PhD at University of California Santa Cruz, although along the way she decided that she didn’t want to be a professor.

“Traditional academia was not for me in the long term, so I had to ask myself why I was intent on finishing my PhD. I decided that I wanted to use my doctorate as a community asset to be of service in delivering projects that realized already-existing community visions, to put my knowledge to use. I wanted to bring my heart-centred principles to professional practice in a heart-centred way.”

She returned to Vancouver at the tail end of her doctoral research and studied the Tsleil-Waututh-led actions in Vancouver against the Trans Mountain pipeline.

“I spent a lot of time listening to Elders and Knowledge Carriers and being open to their expertise. The teachers I sat with had spiritual connections to the land that they shared with me and that I was asked to carry,”

Kristine notes. “Sharing the teachings of the plants with me were political expressions and radical acts of care for the earth. They invited me to consider how we could apply those plant teachings to ourselves, individually, collectively, physically, and spiritually. These teachings changed my life.”

She also learned about patience and the importance of deep listening while working with Indigenous Elders as part of her research.

“I’d try to ask questions about political issues, and they would talk about the earth. This was their way of talking about politics,” she says. “The lessons I learned were not linear. In conversation with my teachers — those who sat in the watch tower and were willing to share their knowledge with me — the conversation might meander for years before I got the answer to my question. It is always a learning journey.”

Her doctoral research reinforced her determination to work with clients whose values she shared.

This led to her current role at Narratives Inc., where her projects have included working with Anishinabe of Waushushk Onigum survivors of the former St. Mary’s (Kenora) Indian Residential School in Ontario. The survivor-led work included biweekly gatherings to sit with and listen to the survivors, collecting records and recording hundreds of hours of testimony, coordinating land searches, and developing years of reports and presentations to help compile the Kaatagoging book project, a set of four books by residential school survivors.

“Often the voices that matter the most get pushed to the side, so we work with clients to understand and amplify their vitally important stories that they need to tell to help plan for the next generations,” Kristine says. “We support the communities we work for to share their stories and their healing visions for the future in the ways that are most impactful for them.”

After working in Manitoba for a few years, Kristine’s heart called her home to the West Coast. Now based in Vancouver, she is tasked with exploring new partnerships for Narratives Inc. while continuing to work with existing client partners. Not bad for a first-generation university student who started out with stage fright, learned to conquer her fears, and learned from many mentors along the way.