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Concordia University

Sébastien Caquard, PhD

Professor, Geography, Planning and Environment
Lead Co-Director, Centre for Oral History and Digital Storytelling

Biography    Research activities    Teaching activities    Selected publications (last 6 years)    Participation activities   

Sébastien Caquard, PhD
Background artwork by Karen Elaine Spencer

Sébastien Caquard is a full professor in the department of Geography, Planning and Environment at Concordia University (Montréal) and the lead co-director of the Centre for Oral History and Digital Storytelling. His research lies at the intersection between mapping, technologies and the humanities. In his current work, he seeks to explore how maps can help to better understand the complex relationships that exist between places and narratives. This research involves the mapping of a range of narratives such as feature films, life stories from refugees and from Indigenous people. As the director of the Geomedia lab, he has led the development of Atlascine, an online mapping application designed to map stories, and he is involved in a variety of innovative projects that require alternative ways of thinking cartographically. He is also a founding member of the MappingBack collective and the former chair of the Commission on “Art and Cartography” of the International Cartographic Association (ICA). As the graduate program director of the Master of Environmental Assessment he is deeply concerned by environmental issues and has been actively involved in implementing a flying less policy in the department of Geography, Planning and Environment.

Research activities

Recently Funded Projects

  1. Enhancing Atlascine Mapping Platform, CANARIE Research Software Program (applicant) (2018-20 & 2020-23)
  2. MappingBack / Counter-Mapping Resource Conflicts on Indigenous Territories, SSHRC (Connection) CICADA (co-applicant) (2017-20)
  3. “Des récits à la carte: méthodologies, technologies et approches sensibles pour cartographier des récits de vie de réfugiés rwandais”, SSHRC (Savoir) (Principal investigator) (2016-21)
  4. “Living Archives of Rwandan Exiles and Survivors in Canada”, SSHRC (Partnership) (PI:Steven High, Concordia University) (Co-applicant) (2016-20)
  5. "Residential Schools Land Memory Mapping Project" funded by SSHRC (Co-Applicant) (PI: D.R.F. Taylor, Carleton University) (2015-20)

Teaching activities

Current Graduate Students

  • Baumann Y. Montréal, villa abordable ? Évolution des marchés immobiliers et pressions résidentielles (co-supervision with Violaine Jolivet, Université de Montréal) (Funded by SSHRC) (PhD started in 2020)
  • Olmedo E., Post-Doctoral Fellow (Funded by SSHRC Banting program) (started in 2019)
  • Denieul L., What can mapping do for Indigenous land defenders in their political campaigns for land repatriation? (Funded by FRQSC) (PhD started in 2019)
  • Shahamati S., Mapping the Intangible City (PhD started in 2018)
  • Alavez J., If I die far from you: Deep mapping postmortem mobilities of exile in Quebec (Funded by FRQSC) (PhD started in 2016)
For more details about the students and their projects, check the web site of the Geomedia Lab

Courses taught

GEOG 466 - Geomedia and the Geoweb
HENV 615 / 805 - Research Proposal Seminar
ENVS 664 - Field course in EA
ENVS 653 - GIS for Environmental Impact Assessment
ENVS 601 - Environmental Impact Assessment
GEOG 363 / URBS 335 - Geographic Information Systems

Selected publications (last 6 years)

Software

  1. ATLASCINE: unique online cartographic application (open source) dedicated to reveal and study the geographies of stories. Used to produce different online atlases including The Atlas of Rwandan Life Stories.

Special Issues

  1. Griffin A. and Caquard S. (Guest eds.) (2018) Maps and Emotions, Cartographic Perspectives 91
  2. Caquard S. and Joliveau T. (Guest eds.) (2016/2017) La mise en carte des récits : outils, pratiques et réflexions, M@ppemonde, 118 & 121

Papers in Refereed Journals

  1. Olmedo É, and Caquard S (2022) Mapping the Skin and the Guts of Stories: A Dialog Between Geolocated and Dislocated Cartographies, Cartographica 57:2, pp. 127-146, https://doi.org/10.3138/cart-2021-0006
  2. Shahamati S., Denieul L., Baumann Y., Shaw E, and Caquard S (2022) uMap: A Free Open-Source Alaternative to Google My Maps, Cartographic Perspectives 99, https://doi.org/10.14714/CP99.1729
  3. Caquard S., Shaw E., and Alavez J (2021) How Distant is Close Enough? Assessing the Geographic Distortions of a Distant Hearing Methodology for Mapping Life Stories, GeoHumanities, https://doi.org/10.1080/2373566X.2021.1965898
  4. Alavez J., Rachédi L. and Caquard S. (2021) (Deep) Mapping Post Mortem Geographies in the Context of Migration, From the European South Journal 8: 29-46, ISSN 2531-4130
  5. McGurk T. and Caquard S. (2020) To what extent online mapping can be decolonial? A journey throughout Indigenous cartography in Canada, The Canadian Geographer: 1-16, https://doi.org/10.1111/cag.12602
  6. Caquard S. and Griffin A. (2019) Mapping Emotional Cartography, Cartographic Perspectives 91: 4-16 (available here or on demand)
  7. Joliveau T., Noucher M., Couderchet L. and Caquard S. (2018) Enseigner le géoweb à distance par la pratique et la critique, Ingénierie des Systèmes d'Information 5/2017: 11-33.
  8. Caquard S. and Dimitrovas S. (2017) StoryMaps & Co. The state of the art of online narrative cartography, M@ppemonde 121, 1-31 (Available here or on demand)
  9. Caquard S. and Joliveau T. (2016) Penser et activer les relations entre cartes et récits, M@ppemonde 118, 1-7 (Available here or on demand)
  10. Caquard S. (2015) Cartography III: A post-representational perspective on cognitive cartography, Progress in Human Geography 39(2) 225-235 (doi: 10.1177/0309132514527039) (Available here or on demand)
  11. Marcotte D., Hung D.K., Caquard S. (2015) Mapping cumulative impacts on Hong Kong's pink dolphin population, Ocean & Coastal Management 109 (2015) 51-63 (doi:10.1016/j.ocecoaman.2015.02.002) (Available Here or on demand)

Book chapters & other papers

  1. Caquard S. (2020) Ces liens que tissent les cartes textiles / Textile maps' ties that bind, in K. Vaughan, You Are Here * Vous êtes ici, Montreal: Centre des arts visuels et Galerie McClure, 15-18
  2. Caquard S. (2020) Atlases Online, In A. Kobayashi (Ed.) International Encyclopedia of Human Geography, 2nd edition, Elsevier, 235-241 https://dx.doi.org/10.1016/B978-0-08-102295-5.10599-2
  3. Caquard S., Shaw E., Alavez J., and Dimitrovas S. (2019) Mapping Memories of Exiles: Combining Conventional and Alternative Cartographic Approaches, in S. de Nardi, H. orange, E. Koskinen-Koivisto, D. Drozdzewski & S. High (eds.), Memoryscape Handbook, Routledge, 52-66
  4. Yang M and Caquard S. (2019) Mapping The Shawshank Redemption: Film Tourism, Geography and Social Media, in A. Escher, C. Lukinbeal and S. Zimmermann (eds), Media's Mapping Impulse, Verlag, 281-300
  5. Valcourt T. and Caquard S. (2019). From Earthrise to Google Earth: The Vanishing of the Vanishing Point, in N. Duxbury, W. F. Garrett-Petts and A. Longley (eds.) Artistic Approaches to Cultural Mapping: Activating Imaginaries and Means of Knowing, Routledge, 278-295.
  6. Caquard S., Lucchesi A., Studnicki-Gizbert D., Temper L. and McGurk T. (2019) Using maps as a weapon to resist extractive industries on Indigenous territories, The Conversation, April 22, 2019 (https://theconversation.com/using-maps-as-a-weapon-to-resist-extractive-industries-on-indigenous-territories-111472)
  7. Ribeiro D. M. and Caquard S. (2018). Cartography and Art. The Geographic Information Science & Technology Body of Knowledge, J.P. Wilson (ed.) DOI: 10.22224/gistbok/2018.1.4
    http://gistbok.ucgis.org/bok-topics/cartography-and-art
  8. Caquard S. (2015). "Cinematic Cartography", in Mark Monmonier (ed.) Cartography in the Twentieth Century, Volume Six of The History of Cartography, The University of Chicago Press, 226-227.
  9. Caquard S. (2015). "Cartography & Narrative", in Mark Monmonier (ed.) Cartography in the Twentieth Century, Volume Six of The History of Cartography, The University of Chicago Press, 986-991.

Participation activities

Organization of workshops & Seminars

  1. Conversations around Maps & Stories, Series of 4 online public conversations with 10 invited speakers, Feb-June 2021, COHDS, Montreal (co-organized with S. Shahamati, L. Denieul, E. Olmedo, J. Alavez and E. Shaw)
  2. MappingBack: Designing Alternative Indigenous Maps, Indigenous Mapping Workshop 2018, Montreal, Aug. 20-23, 2018 (co-organized with Annita Lucchesi, Tom McGurk & Heather Elliott)
  3. MappingBack: Indigenous Cartographies of Extractive Conflicts, Concordia University, Montréal, Oct 14-16, 2017 (co-organized with Leah Temper, Daviken Studnicki-Gizbert, Tom McGurk)
  4. Maps and Emotions, Washington DC, July 1-2, 2017 (co-organized with Amy Griffin and Alex Kent)
  5. Mapping my own life story, Concordia University, May 18, 25 and June 9, 2017 (co-organized with Stefanie Dimitrovas, Emory Shaw, José Alavez as well as three artists and four storytellers)
  6. Community Mapping Summit, Concordia University, Nov. 25-27 (co-organized with Peter Keller, Steven High, Maeve Lydon, Crystal Tremblay and Susan Eden)
  7. Mapping Ephemeralities / Ephemeral cartographies, Rio de Janeiro, Aug. 21-22, 2015 (co-organizer with T. Ng-Chan, L. Vaughan, C. Perkins & J. Seemann)

Selected Talks

  1. Atlascine: voir et écouter le territoire en cartographiant des récits, Séminaire de cartographie autochtone, UQAT, Val d'Or, Québec, May 13, 2021
  2. You Are Here: Art and Place in the Anthropocene, (virtual) round table around the exhibition You Are Here * Vous êtes ici by Kathleen Vaughan, Montreal, Nov 17, 2020 (with Vaughan K, Olmedo É, Reid N, Sloan J and Denieul L.)
  3. L'atlas des récits de vie rwandais: cartographier les récits pour mieux les écouter, 4th Space, Concordia University, Dec 10, 2020 (with Olmedo E, Nyilinkwaya J-P & Ndejuru L.) (see the video)
  4. Mapping Life Stories of Rwandan Refugees in Canada: A Cartographic Reading of Exile, Seminar Series, Vassar College (NY), Nov. 13. 2019
  5. Distorting the Story of Distorting the Map? Research Seminar Morts en Contexte Migratoire (MECMI), UQAM, Montreal, May 2, 2019
  6. Atlascine 4: Methodological and Technological Aspects of Mapping Life Stories of Exile, Critical and Narrative Mapping Workshop, TRYSPACES, INRS, Montreal, March 19, 2019
  7. MappingBack: Indigenous Cartographies of Extractive Industries, Indigenous Mapping Workshop (IMW 2018), Montreal, Aug. 23, 2018 (with Lucchesi A., McGurk T., Studnicki-Gizbert D., Temper L., and Weber L.)
  8. Les récits (de vie) comme bases de données géographiques, Atelier Transversal McMo, CNRS Laboratoire Passage, Université de Bordeaux, Nov. 13, 2017
  9. Stories MaPPer: Vers une plateforme de cartographie des récits (de vie), Centre National des Arts et Métiers (CNAM), Paris, Sept. 21, 2017
  10. Mapping (Life / Moving) Stories, Workshop on Moving Stories, Luxembourg, June 17, 2017
  11. Cartographier les récits de vie : Aspects technologiques, méthodologiques et analytiques. Université de Montréal, Atelier Ethnolab,7 avril 2017

 
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