Teaching Dossier

Teaching and learning are relational. My pedagogical practice weaves authenticity, transparency, humility, curiosity, care, humour, courage, and accountability to build good relations between students, materials and learning objectives. I work to spark curiosity as the energy that propels knowledge making, research, critical analysis and creative provocations for students. I have a particular interest in methods, especially interdisciplinary and holistic approaches that invite deep engagement, lived experience, radical approaches, experimentation and risk taking, and authenticity.

I interweave technology and and interdisciplinary storytelling in my teaching practice as it spans undergraduate, graduate, corporate and civic facilitation, community arts programming, and public engagement.

I use various learning management systems, from Quercus and Brightspace to Articulate 360, alongside videoconferencing and collaboration tools to facilitate hybrid and remote learning.

I use autoethnographic storytelling, pop culture, archival material, guest lectures, and a wide range of aesthetic and digital objects including film, music, social media, podcasts, and visual art in my teaching practice.

I am knowledgeable in both successive approximation models (SAM) and ADDIE models for instructional design and curriculum development.

As a post-doctoral fellow at the Office of Public Engagement, Memorial University, I am also an expert in public engagement and community strategies, particularly engaging diverse stakeholders across sectors in place specific and culturally specific contexts. I have a keen interest in trauma informed approaches for engagement models that deal with difficult subject matter, marginalized communities, conflict or war, or historic or intergenerational violence.

June Larkin Teaching Assistant Award, University of Toronto (2023)

Dean's Award for Teaching Excellence, Memorial University of Newfoundland and Labrador (2023)

In her nomination letter for the Dean’s Award for Teaching Excellence, Dr. Sonja Boon wrote: “Kate Lahey is an exceptional pedagogue and colleague. A passionate teacher, she approaches the classroom with both rigour and care, fostering what one student terms a “viscerally collaborative” space that is attentive to all voices. Her students note that she is a “phenomenal instructor – kind, engaging, insightful and compassionate” with an “outstanding ability to create safe and inclusive space.” As a former graduate student concludes, “Having Kate Lahey as my Feminism and Social Change instructor was an experience that changed my life for the better.” Dr. Carol Lynne D’Arcangelis has observed that Dr. Lahey is a “gifted pedagogue” who “has had – and continues to have – a significant impact on student learning.” 

As a consultant, I have taught a wide range of clients and collaborators in sectors including telecommunications, SaaS, healthcare, government agencies, and non-profit organizations. I have developed and taught a broad spectrum of curriculum as a consultant, including experimental thought for strategic design, public engagement strategies for sustainable futures, radical approaches to corporate governance, DEI training, and trauma informed approaches.

In the academy, I have taught a wide variety of undergraduate and graduate courses in the Humanities. I have taught at the University of Toronto and Memorial University of Newfoundland and Labrador. The following is a selection of undergraduate and graduate courses that I have taught.

• GNDR6403: Feminism and Social Change, Memorial University of NewfoundlandGNDR1005: Critical Reading and Writing: Identities and Difference, Memorial University of Newfoundland

• SOCI2100: Social Inequality, Memorial University of Newfoundland

• WGS370: Utopian Visions, Activist Realities, University of Toronto

• WGS397: The Politics of Girlhood, University of Toronto

• GNDR3008: Feminist Practices and Global Change, Memorial University of Newfoundland

• GNDR1000: Introduction to Gender Studies, Memorial University of Newfoundland

• GNDR3003: Women’s Life Stories, Memorial University of Newfoundland

• GNDR2006: Gender and Sexualities, Memorial University of Newfoundland

• WGS374: Gender and Sexualities, University of Toronto

• GNDR3005: Feminist Texts, Theories and Histories, Memorial University of Newfoundland

• WGS369: Studies in Postcolonialism, University of Toronto

• WGS271: Pop Culture, University of Toronto

At speaking events from academic conferences to art festivals and keynote events, I teach about interdisciplinary topics including intergenerational trauma, aesthetics, psychoanalysis, accessibility and technology, pedagogy, public engagement, community collaboration, war and international conflict, and transitional justice mechanisms.

• “Act Based Learning and Community Practice Roundtable." Pedagogies of Hope Workshop. McMaster University. Hamilton, ON. May 11-12, 2023.

• “Blush: The Anatomy of Shame and Intergenerational Trauma.” History Speaks: Silenced Narratives and Social Change. Dalhousie Graduate History Society. March 25, 2023.

• “How we look after: Precarious futures and feminist pedagogies for collective becoming.” Teaching and Learning Conference. Memorial University of Newfoundland and Labrador. May 4-5, 2022.

• “Island Songs: Making Music in the Middle of Somewhere.” International Small Islands Studies Association Conference. Invited guest with Ivan Emke, Catherine MacLellan, and Owe Ronstrom. June 14-18, 2021. 

• “Held Hands: Intergenerational Memory, Queer Performance, and Trigger Mitts.” Annual conference of the Folklore Studies Association of Canada. Memorial University of Newfoundland. June 2-7, 2021.

• “Making Secrets: Intergenerational Trauma, Shame and Material Culture in Outport Newfoundland.” Annual conference of the Folklore Studies Association of Canada. Memorial University of Newfoundland. St. John’s, NL. May 31-June 2, 2019.

• “The Impossibility of a Future in the Absence of a Past: Drifting in the In-Between.” PhiloSophia: Society for Continental Feminisms annual conference. Co-presented with Dr. Sonja Boon. Memorial University of Newfoundland. St. John’s, NL. May 9-11, 2019. 

• “In-Between-ness: Intimacy, Encounters and Affect.” Women and Gender Studies et Recherches Féministes annual conference. University of Calgary. Calgary, Alberta. 2016.

• “Trauma, Affect and Haunting: Negotiating Ordinary Life After Catastrophe." PTSD conference. Memorial University of Newfoundland. St. John’s, Newfoundland and Labrador. 2016.

• “Seen/Unseen: Archival Absence, Photography and Trauma in Newfoundland.” Presented by the Department of Gender Studies. Memorial University of Newfoundland. February 27, 2024.

• “Scattered Monuments: A Conversation Between Simon(e) Van Saarloos and                            Emily Critch About Commemoration, Monuments, Settler Colonialism and More”. Moderated by Kate Lahey

  Presented by St. Michael’s Print Shop, St. John’s, Newfoundland. October 7, 2022.

• “Building Community in the Classroom During the Pandemic: Do Your Students Feel Connected?” Learning Technology Coach Podcast. Memorial University of Newfoundland. St. John’s, Newfoundland. 2022. 

• “i remember the sound of your voice: Tracing Intergenerational Memory Through Sound.” Presented by Lawnya Vawnya. St. John’s, Newfoundland. December 5, 2021. 

• “Intergenerational Trauma and Material Culture in Outport Newfoundland.” Presented by the Department of Women and Gender Studies. Memorial University of Newfoundland. St. John’s, Newfoundland. March 27, 2020.

• “Intergenerational Knowledge and Decolonial Aesthetics.” Artist talk presented at Eastern Edge Gallery. St. John’s, Newfoundland. January 31, 2020.

• Keynote Lecture. Atlantic Provinces Art Gallery Association annual meeting. Nova Scotia College of Art and Design. June 14, 2018.

• “Gender Conflict: Approaches to Wartime Sexual Violence.” War Crimes Research Group. King’s College London. London, England. January 28, 2016.