Tag: The Concordian

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Arts

Capturing the raw beauty in everyday people and places

Figure 3: Hassan II Mosque across the water from Paloma Beach in Mohammedia, Morocco.

New to Concordia’s photography program, artist ASVJAD is inspired by a recent trip to Morocco

Working mainly off of his Instagram account, ASVJAD strives to capture raw beauty in everything and everyone around him. Born in the Bay Area of California and, as he put it, “molded” in Montreal, the Concordia artist discovered his passion while conducting freelance shoots of his classmates and capturing candids for the Fine Arts Core Education High School yearbook in 2013.

ASVJAD explained that he started out using a small second-hand digital camera. The more he photographed, the better he got, learning more about his own style along the way. The artist said he aspires to produce works as eye-catching and provocative as Terry Richardson’s and as timeless as Robert Mapplethorpe’s. These inspirations can be seen in his portraits, which have an incredible dramatic edge, both in black and white and in colour.

ASVJAD photographed by his mother in Morocco.

ASVJAD is also inspired by old black-and-white foreign films and the work of Sally Mann (particularly Candy Cigarette circa 1989). He prefers to use subtle props to pack a punch, a choice that is influenced by Ren Hang’s modern and eclectic photographs.

As a freelance artist, he enjoys collaborating with other freelancers because it enables him to work without the creative restraints that may come with working for an agency.

In his work, ASVJAD focuses on empowerment, sexuality and the body. He said he looks for a unique, structural appearance, a fresh face and a distinct energy. When organising a photoshoot,  ASVJAD will often take the time to get to know his models and go over styling (clothing, hair and makeup) options long before the day of the shoot.

Utilizing his background as a fashion stylist, ASVJAD will even help former clients shop for upcoming events. “I always had a love for fashion—I think it comes from my mother. From a very young age, she and my aunt would make their own clothes,” he explained.

ASVJAD often asks his subjects to think back to a time when they were sad or angry, as he likes to play with emotions in his work, specifically surrounding the past. This creative process allows the artist to enhance aspects of his clients’ personality, mood and overall aesthetic.

During a recent trip to Morocco, the artist spent much of his time photographing everyday Moroccan lifestyle.

Paco photographed by ASVJAD for a new series on the LGBTQ+ community in Morocco.

His goal was to capture members of the LGBTQ+ community, an extremely oppressed group in Morocco because of the country’s strict laws against same-sex relationships. Since he was dealing with such taboo subject matter, he said reaching members of the community proved to be rather difficult.

This series of photographs remains incomplete, due to the fact that only two individuals were willing to have their pictures taken. ASVJAD was able to get in touch with Paco (the model in figure. 2) only after contacting him through social media. ASVJAD said he is planning on adding to the series throughout the upcoming year. “Every single person has something to offer, no matter their skin colour, race or sexual orientation,” the artist added.

One of his photographs (figure. 3) was taken on 35mm film. It outlines the Hassan II Mosque across the water from Paloma Beach in Mohammedia, Morocco. Having visited his home country a mere three times, ASVJAD grew up seeing the pristine landmarks, tourist attractions and stunning Moroccan imagery only through photographs. In order to record a raw, Moroccan reality, he attempted to understand the country with the same energy and attention that he gives to his models, the artist explained. ASVJAD photographed the flea markets and the outskirts of Casablanca, as seen in one image (figure. 4), which shows a man praying in the streets.

The artist said he has “always appreciated the fact that photography can freeze a moment in time that can never be completely recreated.” ASVJAD shows his love for spontaneous moments and quick glimpses into the psyche when it comes to retouching his work. He only ever makes changes to the colouring, sharpness of his photographs and editing their overall appearance when the subject requests it.

ASVJAD is now enrolled in Concordia’s undergraduate photography program. He said he is looking forward to exploring technical lighting, working in studio spaces, developing film in darkrooms and being surrounded by creative people of all disciplines. The artist said he hopes his work will grow and evolve from the constructive criticism of his peers in a new, structured environment.

Photos by ASVJAD

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Music

Sheer Mag live at La Sala Rossa

Last Friday, the Philly band delivered a refined performance that felt inherently punk.

Shuffling casually on stage and picking up his guitar with no acknowledgement or nod to the audience, Kyle Seely launched Sheer Mag’s Montreal performance with a series of crunchy guitar chords that would have fit snugly on any AC/DC album.

The band’s performance at La Sala Rossa on Sept. 1, in support of its new record, Need To Feel Your Love, was brimming with colossal riffs and bruising political flare.

The audience’s anticipation was apparent. Before the show, there was little to no room in front of the stage, and the banter was kept to a minimum. This set the tone for the rest of the night.

Ignoring any sort of mindless pretense, pauses between songs were reserved strictly for the audience’s passionate cheers. Drummer Allen Chapman played in front of a banner that displayed Sheer Mag’s endearingly dated logo. That was about the extent of the show’s production value—no flashy flourishes, no glitzy showmanship, just uncompromising rock-and-roll swagger.

Throughout the performance, Sheer Mag aimed to cram its ambitious sounds into a short, yet unyielding 45 minutes, combining all the attitude with riffs ripped straight from Thin Lizzy’s songbook. It was a perplexing mix to witness, sure, but this is revivalism we’re dealing with. And yet, it’s revivalism edged with a brawny and confident type of artistry that feels both honest and bold.

Sheer Mag’s crux, despite all their vintage 70s adornments, is keeping its sights fixed firmly on the future. While “Button Up” pushes at breakneck speeds with a blast of fiery Southern rock and harmony-laden melodies at the forefront, it remains an anthemic protest song about refuting societal oppression. “I know they don’t like the way that I talk / Don’t like the way that I walk,” sings vocalist Tina Halladay. The lyrics act as a comment on the backseat role women have historically played in rock music, especially in the 70s. Sheer Mag’s army was the denim-clad misfits assembled at the front of the stage, grooving uniformly throughout the night.

The show wasn’t all politics, however. “Nobody’s Baby” counteracted the band’s raw, firebrand politics with glam-sensible power-balladry. “Meet Me In The Street” was a call to arms, with Halladay’s prickly vocals consistently roaring through like sandpaper. All the while, her lyrics emphasized the importance of compassion and empathy in a bleak, unforgiving world.

Typically, you wouldn’t think to mesh 70s proto-metal aesthetics with a biting political agenda—but that’s what makes Sheer Mag such an exciting project. The band inverts rock and roll expectations by churning out muscled guitar music that resonates with elements from then and now.

With a swarm of primal energy leading its performance, Sheer Mag’s sound is more closely associated with a classic rock radio station than a DIY punk outfit. Still, they cast off any and all expectations, pairing lo-fi textures with studio-polished 70s rock. This band has rooted itself in the very fabric of rock and roll and revamped it to a vehicle of escapism for misunderstood rockers.

 

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Music Quickspins

Action Bronson – Blue Chips 7000

Action Bronson – Blue Chips 7000 (Atlantic Records, 2017)

After a two-year hiatus, Action Bronson has returned to conclude his Blue Chips trilogy, one of the most beloved mixtape series in recent memory. Unfortunately, Blue Chips 7000 fails to live up to previous installments. Bronson’s eccentric, one-of-a-kind personality is simultaneously his biggest strength and his biggest weakness, as his rapping has become formulaic and sometimes repetitive. The album’s biggest strength, though, is its phenomenal production, which carries Bronson’s weaker performances but highlights him at his best. The latter is apparent on tracks like “9-24-7000,”  “Let It Rain” and “My Right Lung.” The biggest standout, “La Luna,” includes his best rapping on the project, which is placed over a gorgeous, Alchemist-produced instrumental. Though the album is slightly underwhelming and lacks any significant growth in Bronson, it does contain some of his best songs, funniest lines and gorgeous instrumentals.

Trial TracK: “La Luna”

6.5/10

Categories
Music

Taylor Swift’s ever-increasing ego

Graphics by Alexa Hawksworth

A slightly exaggerated and political take on her new song

Our favourite multimillionaire Taylor Swift has released her latest Kanye West diss track, “Look What You Made Me Do.” Swift has been more-or-less dormant since the release of her 2014 album, 1989. It seems in that time Swift has been unable to “shake it off,” and has somehow become even more vindictive.

Her peers and superiors are creating intelligent, unique-sounding and politically-motivated music that has had a decisive impact on popular culture, such as Harry Style’s “Sign of the Times” and Kendrick Lamar’s album, DAMN . Meanwhile, Swift decided to release a self-absorbed song about her “tortured” past.

The track has a minimalist, electronic-pop sound, similar to songs on her last album. The song’s primary focus is its vocals and downright terrible lyrics. Diss tracks have always had a place in pop music—Justin Timberlake’s 2002 diss track about Britney Spears, “Cry Me a River,” being a notable example.

However, Swift just doesn’t have the bite to pull it off. With lyrics like: “The role you made me play / Of the fool, no, I don’t like you,” Swift hits as hard as a 15-year-old on LiveJournal whining about high school. At the same time, she delivers the lines thinking they are badass and well-crafted disses, but in reality, the lyrics are as vicious as the average Tumblr post. The music video is much worse.

In the video, Swift is standing atop a pile of more than a dozen Taylor Swifts from different eras of her career who are fighting to get to the top, dramatically casting her arms to the side as they fall into the void. When I first watched it, I paused and took a short walk.

Last year, Beyoncé released her seminal album, Lemonade—an album that was a socially-aware commentary on blackness and femininity. In contrast, after seeing that scene in Swift’s video, I questioned the artistic value of any and all music. Swift has always had a tone-deaf approach to her music and public persona, lacking any sign of self-awareness or tact—this new Taylor has multiplied that approach tenfold.

Her silence during the 2016 United States presidential election was deafening. She has a massive platform, millions of fans and has cultivated a feminist public persona, yet refrained from standing up for what she believed in during such a divisive time—actions that directly affect her fans who are people of colour, women and part of the LGBTQ community. As the recent Video Music Awards showed, many of her peers are actively engaged in politics, even though their music may not be particularly political. Swift has refrained from the slightest mention of politics, maybe out of fear of causing controversy. I don’t know.

But what I do know is music is released into a world dominated by politics, and people’s public perceptions are not separate from that. Swift has released a song in a post-President Trump world – of course people are going to react politically. Over the summer, Nazis openly marched in Charlottesville, Va., trans service people have been denied the right to serve in the U.S. military, and Trump pardoned a racist sheriff convicted of violating civil rights laws. While all of that is happening, Swift decides to release another grueling, self-indulgent track.

With all the political events that have transpired over the summer, I can’t help but criticize the song’s irrelevancy. I can’t consider the song some kind of escapist anthem either, because the beat isn’t fun and the lyrics lack depth. This track dwells on the drama Swift hasn’t let go of, while the rest of the world has moved on. It’s absolutely fine if you enjoy the song, it reflects nothing about you, but the song certainly reflects Taylor Swift’s lack of self-awareness.

Graphics by Alexa Hawksworth

Categories
Music

Fresh faces and a new beginning

Michał Langiewicz and Allison O’Reilley are seen making a few tweaks to the station’s main soundboard. Photo by Kirubel Mahari

CJLO’s recent facelift will provide quality campus radio for everyone

“Campus Radio is for Lovers” are the words sprawled across the white T-shirt hung in the hallway by CJLO 1690 AM’s offices at the Loyola campus. The bubbly red font is reminiscent of the 70s—an era of extravagance, groove and one in which radio reigned supreme. In our internet age, where everything is digitized and readily accessible at the tips of our fingers, radio seems to be a bygone medium. Its failure to adapt to the needs of the current-day consumer has rendered it futile and irrelevant. College radio, however, proves to be the sole exception, acting as the last vestige of an archaic platform.

Nestled at the far end of the CC building’s fourth floor, reaching the station requires you to awkwardly trudge through the Guadagni Lounge. Upon entering the station, however, its charm immediately takes over. The sound of music buzzing from speakers greets you as you pass by the in-house studio space and DJ room.

A community-driven operation, CJLO 1690 AM is run by a devoted team of DJs and volunteers. “We are not for profit,” said Allison O’Reilly, the station’s program director, whose CV includes commercial radio gigs in Nova Scotia. “Everything we do is in service of the students and of the local music scene. We try to stay progressive, we try to avoid commercialisation, we try to appeal to underground music. So everything I value.”

O’Reilly, alongside station manager Michał Langiewicz, and director of promotions, sponsorship and funding Josh Spencer, make up the “big three.” They are a tireless trio with invaluable experience in the industry, which makes them a tremendous asset to the station. They are also fresh faces to the station, having all joined the team within the past year, after the exodus of a large portion of the longtime staff. “It was like a domino effect,” Langiewicz said. “A lot of people were graduating, a lot of people had been there for a while and felt like it was time to move on.”

The change, although major, is generally seen as positive. This coming school year marks the newly-assembled staff’s first year together and seems to be the dawning of a new era for the station. Though the new staff greatly commend their predecessors’ work at the station, they made it clear they plan on revamping CJLO as much as possible. “I think it’s a new opportunity for us to expand into different directions,” said Langiewicz, who first broke into the city’s music scene through BAD LUNCH, a DIY concert venue he ran out of his Pointe-St-Charles home. “It’s kind of continuing a legacy, but taking it in a new direction.”

The changes made to the station deal, in part, with modernizing its programming by introducing more progressive shows into its already packed rotation. “We have LGBTQ programming, we have programming which deals with social and racial issues, and that’s something I feel the station didn’t have as much of in the past,” Langiewicz said. “We’re definitely looking to go in a direction that’s covering more ground and representing as many different people as possible.”

Allison O’Reilly’s enthusiasm about CJLO’s future is infectious.

The most noticeable update is the new staff’s dedication to increasing community involvement. This new direction is obvious in the station’s upcoming promotional events. Hiring Josh Spencer, the founder of the local music event planning company Kick Drum, as director of promotions, has certainly helped. “He’s very attuned to what’s happening in the local music scene, so since he came in all of a sudden, Montreal bands came in,” O’Reilly said. Despite his recent arrival, Spencer’s  promotions expertise has proven momentous, as his summer backyard sessions have been greeted with great applause from spectators and artists alike.

The station’s biggest event, its annual FUNDrive, takes place from Sept. 22 to 30 on both campuses. The event will be a grand debut of sorts for the new trio. Showcasing their experience, as well as the station’s new direction, the eight-day event is going to be jam-packed with 10 events ranging from a heavy metal showcase to a soccer tournament. The proceeds will go to the station, allowing its staff to make improvements and continue pursuing their vision.

With regard to the importance of campus radio, O’Reilly said, “while it may not seem relevant [within the scope of modern media], what we can do to support those who wouldn’t otherwise have a platform in mainstream media, I believe, is very important and still relevant.”

Photos by Kirubel Mahari

Categories
Music

Mile Ex End Musique merges artistry and urbanity

Over Labour Day weekend, eager music lovers congregated beneath Van Horne overpass for a fun and unique festival experience

Were it not for the large, yellow “Mile Ex End Musique” sign propped up against one of the concrete supports of the Van Horne overpass, festival-goers might have mistaken the set-up for an elaborate back-to-school barbeque. Past the entranceway was a long line of picnic tables, with people of all ages resting in their seats, eating an assortment of festival foods and tranquilly putting back booze.

There was a sense of serenity that came with Labour Day weekend—with the knowledge one had an extra 24 hours to prepare for the week and, for some, the start of a new school year. Fairy lights were strung up between slabs of concrete, and as the sun dipped lower in the horizon, the entire space was painted in warm yellow hues.

The festival had three stages: Mile Ex, Mile End and Van Horne. The largest, Mile Ex, was positioned at one end of a parking lot. The other two were tucked, near seamlessly, into the urban landscape. Unlike many musical gatherings, most of the performances were staggered, meaning acts rarely had to fight to be heard. These individual run-times allowed the event’s impressive sound quality to shine through, demonstrating the unique resonance of the confined location.

The festival’s audience doesn’t seem to mind the persistent rain. Photo by Sandra Hercegova

Day one was the quieter of the two days, and there was space to recline in the grass as bands like the Foreign Diplomats took the Van Horne stage. The group had gusto worthy of a full-sized stadium, and lead singer Élie Raymond channeled old-school alternative acts like The Cure with his quaking, gothic vocals.

Busty and the Bass, similarly, radiated charisma. Wearing dress shirts and wielding their brass instruments with the nonchalant expertise of frat boys holdings beers, they wooed and impressed in equal measure.

Other Saturday acts included Cat Power and City and Colour. The former was her typical ethereal self, but failed to hold a crowd the way her fellow headliners did. City and Colour likewise maintained the pitch-perfect sound we’ve come to expect from lead vocalist Dallas Green, but their overall energy paled in comparison to that of some of the younger, more eager acts.

Despite persistent rain on day two, the festival was livelier. Standing and swaying amidst a sea of poncho-laden listeners heightened the festival’s underground, cult atmosphere. One often had to crane their neck to catch a glimpse of the band members between umbrellas.

Local trip-pop star Charlotte Cardin amazes the crowd with an energetic set consisting of original work and even a Post Malone cover. Photo by Sandra Hercegova

Flexing her chilled fingers and commenting on the cold, local trip-pop star Charlotte Cardin nevertheless dazzled the crowd with everything—from newly minted original work to a cover of Post Malone.

Of all the performers, Patrick Watson best demonstrated the festival’s aesthetic potential. Between positioning a choir atop a viaduct column and descending into the audience in an Inspector-Gadget-esque contraption to sing “Man Under the Sea,” Watson captured the raw intimacy of the space unlike any other headliner.

Though this brand of spectacle might run the risk of overpowering the event’s gritty, indie aesthetic, ultimately, Mile Ex End Musique was an event based in experimentation. One can only hope to see future acts play to this strength in the years to come.

Photos by Sandra Hercegova

Categories
Music Quickspins

Lil Uzi Vert – Luv Is Rage 2

Lil Uzi Vert – Luv Is Rage 2 (Atlantic Records, 2017)

Lil Uzi Vert’s latest album, Luv is Rage 2, sees the Philly trap rapper expand on his signature eclectic sound with some of his best songs to date, but also some of his most mundane. The album starts with the song “Two,” a boring run-of-the-mill Uzi song complete with nasally vocals and a complete lack of lyrical substance. Songs like “444+222” and “The Way Life Goes” make up for the lows on the album, but aren’t enough to take away from the fact that Uzi sounds completely uninspired. The album finishes with Uzi’s biggest hit, “XO Tour Life,” which recently won “Song of the Summer” at the MTV Video Music Awards. Uzi’s personal lyrics and flow placed over record producer TM88’s beat makes the song one of the best in his catalogue. But at song 16, “XO Tour Life” is too little too late.

Trial Track: “The Way Life Goes”

Score: 4/10

Categories
Music Quickspins

The War On Drugs – A Deeper Understanding

The War On Drugs – A Deeper Understanding (Atlantic Records, 2017)

Heartland rock revivalists, The War On Drugs, is back with their amazing album, A Deeper Understanding. Meticulously crafted instrumental layers give the album a dense and dreamlike vibe, complemented by Adam Granduciel’s gravelly singing. Lyrics are striking and emotionally charged, such as this line from “Pain”: “I met a man with a broken back / He had a fear in his eyes that I could understand.” With each new song, the album puts you in a constant state of awe. The album’s best tracks are “Holding On” and “You Don’t Have To Go,” because of the lush production value and vivid imagery of the lyrics. This album is perfect for walking through the city in the early morning when the weather’s slightly cold and no one is around.

Trial track: “Holding On”

Score: 9.5/10

Categories
Arts

The Celestial Tree inspires visions of collective action

Concordia alumnus, Skawennati, uses her piece, The Celestial Tree, to inspire visions of collective action. Photo by Mackenzie Lad.

Walk along the Promenade Fleuve-Montagne as Montreal’s history unfolds in Path of Resilience

Telling a story of transcendence, Path of Resilience presents three works spread out along the new Promenade Fleuve-Montagne created by Indigenous artists Maria Hupfield, Nadia Myre, and Concordia’s own BFA design graduate, Skawennati.

Commissioned by DHC/ART’s managing director and curator, Cheryl Sim, and established for Montreal’s 375th anniversary, the Promenade Fleuve-Montagne allows pedestrians to discover the city’s historical landmarks and public artworks.

Hupfield’s piece, Ka Pow !, can be found directly outside of the Square Victoria metro station, catching the attention of passersby. Inspired by comic book art, Hupfield arranged white cedar benches into action bubbles around a tree.

Maria Hupfield starts off the Path of Resilience with Ka Pow !, an interactive sculpture aiming to unite passersby and inspire dialogue. Photo by Chloё Lalonde.

A few blocks further along the promenade, Myre’s piece illuminates the trees behind the St-Patrick Basilica with a string of fairy lights. The space is inviting. Wooden chairs are grouped together to form a strong sense of community, while the heart-wrenching story of Marie-Joseph Angélique, a young black slave who was tried and convicted for arson based on a widespread rumour in the 18th century, is narrated from a sound system in the trees. The piece, titled Histoire Revenue, reminds us of Montreal’s past injustices, forcing us to be aware of all the anguish held within this land.

Skawennati’s piece is much further along the path, sitting in front of the Royal Victoria Hospital at the corner of Pine Avenue West and McTavish Street. The Celestial Tree is at the highest altitude of the Promenade Fleuve-Montagne. “I wanted to take the image of She Falls for Ages—which is the central image of Skyworld, a very important image in Iroquois cosmology and Iroquois traditional stories—and put it in the city, using materials and processes that are [as] recognisable as the city,” the artist said.

The body of the tree is a large stop sign post, and it’s branches are thick pieces of metal coated in reflective paneling.

The installation refers to the Concordia alumna’s upcoming machinima (a new media production), She Falls for Ages. As a way of opposing modern animation aesthetics, Skawennati chose to work with Second Life. Similar to Sims, the platform allows for immense creative freedom under some technical limitation. This approach is entirely specific to the artist’s body of work. When she began using the platform in 2007, Second Life, a “massively multiplayer online world” otherwise known as a virtual environment, really represented the future of modern social interaction. To be released in October 2017, She Falls for Ages will be a feminist, futuristic, utopian retelling of the First Nations’s creation story.

Today, many Indigenous stories are not known by their own people. Skawennati said she believes everyone should be familiar with them, as these stories are the foundation of the city of Montreal. The story of Skyworld, otherwise known as the First Nations’s creation story, adds a dimension to the Iroquois people and heritage that is not widely known, she explained. The Iroquois are often seen as warriors, fighters and troublemakers, and in Skawennati’s words, “knowing the creation story allows you to understand that it’s all about peace and love for creation”.  

The six bright colours of the flowers depicted on The Celestial Tree match the skin tones of the citizens of Skawennati’s Skyworld. By using these colours, she said she wants to call all people, no matter their race, to seek awareness and fight for a brighter, inclusive future. Skawennati strives to inspire collective action, providing various visions of what could be, while on her own path of learning more about her Mohawk heritage.

In the most common version of their story, the people of Skyworld live quietly and happily, knowing nothing of death and inequality. Instead, their day-to-day lives revolve around the maintenance of the Celestial Tree. The tree sits inside a hole to the universe, and provides light to all the land, according to the myth.

In the original story, one of the sky women realises she is pregnant. Her husband, the guardian of the Celestial Tree, becomes so angry that he rips the tree from its roots, revealing the massive hole in the universe. Curious, Sky Woman, peers into the hole and her husband pushes her in.

In She Falls for Ages, the Celestial Tree grows weak, and the people of Skyworld know that their time is coming to an end. The Celestial Tree guardian’s wife, here named Otsitsakáion, volunteers to jump into the abyss with child and serve as the seed of the new world.

In all versions of the story, Sky Woman “falls for ages,” eventually landing on the backs of geese, who place her on the back of a turtle. At this time, the Earth was simply water, devoid of land, and Sky Woman makes it her duty to create it. With the help of small animals, she was eventually able to grow shrubbery. As time passed, Turtle Island grew from a small mound of dirt on a turtle’s back, into what we now know as North America.

On display until Nov. 30, Path of Resilience tells a story of transcendence. The installations start by gathering people of all kinds together, encouraging them to acknowledge the history of the place in which they live—a necessary process in moving towards a unified future.

Categories
Opinions

Looking back on volume 34

This past year, The Concordian saw new projects come to fruition. In the winter semester, we launched our first-ever radio show and a series of weekly spreads about part-time faculty professors at the university. We had a video team that put out content regularly—also a first. In addition, we had opportunities to interview amazing individuals, including Homa Hoodfar and Mohamed Fahmy, and attend awesome events, like South By Southwest (SXSW) and the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF). We’ve even broke a few stories before mainstream media outlets did.

Among the successes and fulfilling experiences, we’ve also learned a lot about the world of journalism and the nature of writing about and for university students. Here are some of the key things we’ve learned as a team over the course of this year:

The importance of diversity

We believe diversity is important not only within our newsroom, but within the content of our articles. We try our best to give a voice to the voiceless and cover events that will help educate students on important social and environmental issues within the university or the city. We’ve also tried to cater to people with varying political views within our opinions section—we believe healthy debate and discussion is important in order for us to sympathize and understand one another. Next year, we hope to more actively report on all faculties within Concordia, to further diversify our content.

How to embrace criticism

With publishing articles comes readers, and with readers comes criticism. Not everyone is going to like every article we put out, and that’s okay. As reporters and writers, we are constantly learning—we are bound to make mistakes, despite our best efforts to be as accurate and sensitive as possible in our reporting. While criticism can be discouraging at first, over the year, we’ve learned to acknowledge it and, in turn, refine our approach to our practice. Our readers always have the option to write a letter to the editor or, if it’s in reference to an ops piece, write a rebuttal. And for the people spewing out incoherent hate messages about articles we’ve published, we ain’t got time for you.

How to be innovative

Working at a student newspaper comes with pressures to meet deadlines and the need to think on your feet when things don’t go as planned. Nearly every week, we’ve been faced with articles falling through or interview subjects not getting back to us. As a team, we’ve aimed to support one another when something goes wrong and always look for solutions. We are proud of the creativity everyone brought to every issue. Going into volume 35, we hope our team continues to be one collaborative family.

On behalf of the team, we’ve had a blast putting an immense amount of energy and love into volume 34 of The Concordian. With the recent launch of our new website, we’ll be bringing you so much more next year. It is really only up from here.

See you around,

The Concordian team

Categories
News

March 22 live blog recap

[View the story “The Concordian at March 22” on Storify]

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