A celebration of the return of the Olympics to Canada, the Bodyworks Symposium will take place on Thursday and Friday, at York’s Keele campus (details below). Priscila Uppal, author of two novels and five poetry collections and professor of English literature at York, is the principal organizer.

Sessions at the two-day symposium include:

• Power-lifter and poet Leslie Heywood on the mind/body states that link art and sport
• Sport and social progress panel with sport activist and painter Jane Roos (Canadian Athletes Now fund), Canadian poet/novelist Michael Holmes (poems about wrestling), and sport activist Cory Freedman
• Pushing the boundaries of sport panel with Olympic diving medalist Mary Ellen Clark, University of Ottawa Professor Bradley Young and York U Professor Greg Malszecki
• World-renowned hypnotist Mike Mandel on how hypnotism can help athletes
• Olympic racewalker Ann Peel, founder of the Canadian Athletes Association and former director of Right to Play
• Panel with Olympic Gold medalist rower and photographer Kevin Light, Canadian poet/novelist George Bowering, who has written extensively about baseball, and visual artist Craig Le Blanc
• Creative writing workshops for athletes by writers Barry Callaghan and Priscila Uppal
• Sports activism and gender in sport panel, with Olympian Silvia Ruegger, who has held the Canadian women’s marathon record for 24 years, and Albion College Professor Elizabeth Ben-Ishai, a competitive runner and political theorist
• Panel on interdisciplinary representations of sport in Canadian culture
• Learning from diversity panel, with Gold Medal Paralympian Billy Bridges, University of Toronto Physical Education Dean and former Olympian Bruce Kidd, and professional Ironman Triathlete Tara Norton
• An art exhibition featuring works by athletes and/or works inspired by sport (Samuel J.Zacks Gallery, Stong College, and the Special Projects Gallery)
• Film screenings of Canadian sport documentaries with Q and A with the directors

For more information and related events, see the program at bodyworkssymposium.ca. All events are free of charge.

WHAT: Bodyworks Symposium 
WHEN: Thurs. Nov. 5 and Fri. Nov. 6, 2009 
WHERE: York University Keele Campus. Founders College (#50) on Thursday and Vanier College (#56) on Friday. See Map.

NOTE: A book launch for The Exile Book of Canadian Sports Stories, edited by Priscila Uppal, including readings by the authors and Olympic athletes, will take place at The Annex Live (Brunswick Avenue at Bloor Street), Thurs. Nov. 5 at 7 pm.

York University is the leading interdisciplinary research and teaching university in Canada. York offers a modern, academic experience at the undergraduate and graduate level in Toronto, Canada’s most international city. The third largest university in the country, York is host to a dynamic academic community of 50,000 students and 7,000 faculty and staff, as well as 200,000 alumni worldwide. York’s 10 Faculties and 28 research centres conduct ambitious, groundbreaking research that is interdisciplinary, cutting across traditional academic boundaries. This distinctive and collaborative approach is preparing students for the future and bringing fresh insights and solutions to real-world challenges. York University is an autonomous, not-for-profit corporation.

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Media contact:

Janice Walls, Media Relations, York University, 416 736 2100 x22101 / wallsj@yorku.ca