Participants: Peter Kulchyski (Canadá), João Kulcsar (Brasil), Miriam Pederneiras (Corpo Cidadão, Brasil)

Moderator: Doris Sommer (USA)

Biographies

Peter Kulchyski received his B.A. in Political Science (Hons) from the University of Winnipeg in 1980. He received his M.A. (1981) and his Ph.D. in Political Science (1988) from York University. Dr. Kulchyski’s research focuses on Aboriginal cultural politics; political development in the NWT and Nunavut; contemporary critical theory; land claims and self-government, Aboriginal rights. Dr. Kulchyski has published extensively in the areas of First Nation and Aboriginal rights and impacts on land use rights. He is currently working on articles that cover the standards for consultation and community consent for First Nation and Aboriginal peoples. In 1994 Dr. Kulchyski edited, Unjust Relations: Aboriginal Rights in Canadian Courts. This collection of cases and accompanying commentary covers the way that Canadian courts have defined Aboriginal rights from 1888 until 1990.

João Kulcsar is currently a Professor of Photography at SENAC University, in São Paulo, Brazil. He is a doctoral candidate at PUC/SP. He was a visiting scholar at Harvard University's Graduate School of Education in 2002-03. Kulcsar has a Master's degree in arts from the University of Kent, where he studied visual literature. He has directed five films, and served as curator of numerous photography exhibitions. Since 1990 he has been working in public and state institutions, training professors to use photographs in the classroom. He has also worked on projects involving low-income children and at-risk youth (Febem), always using the concept of Visual Literature.

Miriam Pederneiras is the founder of GRUPO CORPO, where she worked as a dancer (from 1975 to 1995), as choreography assistant and as director of the CORPO ESCOLA DE DANÇA (Corpo Dance school) since 1997. She has worked in performances such as MARIAMARIA and ÚLTIMO TREM, by Oscar Araiz, music by Milton Nascimento and Fernando Brant; and in the performances PRELÚDIOS, MISSA DO ORFANATO, A CRIAÇÃO and LECUONA, by Rodrigo Pederneiras, Corpo's resident choreographer. She also coordinates the SAMBALELÊ project and is the founder and current president of the Association CORPO CIDADÃO and of Associação Querubins.

Doris Sommer: Professor of Latin American Literature at Harvard University and Director of the Cultural Agents Initiative, to promote social contributions through arts and academic reflection. Among her books are: Cultural Agency in the Americas (forthcoming); Bilingual Aesthetics: A New Sentimental Education (2004), Proceed with Caution, when engaged by minority writing in the Americas (1999), Foundational Fictions (1991).