Rebecca Friend, a recent graduate of Carleton University’s Curatorial Studies Graduate Diploma and Public History’s MA, has had her research highlighted in a recent article written by Taia Goguen-Garner and featured in TheGraduate@Carleton newsletter.
Friend’s research studied how children and childhood have been represented in Canadian commemorations like monuments and memorials. Along with this research, Friend also designed a participatory project with a group of children at an elementary school in Montreal where they were asked to design their own monuments to Canadian childhood.
She credits her work in co-curating an exhibition with fellow Curatorial Studies students Morsels of Memory: A Taste of Ottawa’s Food History as inspiration.
Friend says, “I knew from this experience that working on exhibitions and in the field of public history more broadly was a path that interested me,” shared Friend. “However, I found that children and youth were largely excluded from these projects, both as a target audience and as co-producers on the projects. My interests therefore turned to seeing how I could meaningfully include children and youth in my public history practice and engage their input on topics that pertain to their daily lives.”
Here we see Rebecca at the opening of Morsels of Memory exhibition March 2019. Congratulations on your recent graduation! You can read the full article here Incorporating Youth Perspectives in Monuments.