Graduate Theses & Dissertations

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An Exploration of Partnership Models for Urban Conservation Land Management in Ontario
Partnerships for management of public parks have a long history, but little attention has been given to the current models of partnerships during a period of municipal austerity in Ontario. Using a qualitative assessment of transcripts from representatives of 10 municipal partner groups, this research considers what some of the current models are, the impact that they may have, and how municipalities may foster these partnership arrangements. The participating organizations demonstrated that their governance models evolved to suit their mandate, activities, and scope of interaction with their municipality. Additionally, this research corroborates past findings that efficacy of an organization is tied to their ability to partner with other agencies and act as a capacity amplifier. These results demonstrate how municipal conservation partnerships can be effectively applied to create enhanced financial outcomes and improved community engagement, while delivering community based environmental programming. Author Keywords: Conservation, Environmental Stewardship, Municipal Management, Partnership, Social Ecology, Urban Parks
Analyzing the Effectiveness of Social Movements Opposing Fossil Fuel Infrastructure
Blocking fossil fuel infrastructure projects like pipelines is increasingly being seen as a legitimate way for civil society groups to reduce global carbon emissions. This research project is an exploratory case study of the Trans Mountain pipeline in British Columbia and its opposition. My research question asks, ‘What has each tactic/strategy of opposition in the campaign to stop the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion accomplished, and how have they been effective? How can they be done more effectively?’ Through interviews and an autoethnography, my research explores the effectiveness of activists in this campaign. I analyze the results of my findings within social movement theory and other activist definitions of effectiveness from my literature review. The more significant findings from my research are that activists need to do a better job educating the public on the issue, need to direct more of their resources towards promoting a solution to the issue and make alliances with other movements and groups. This research project contributes to the literature on the effectiveness of oppositional strategies and tactics of pipeline resistance, as well as social movement theory. Author Keywords: British Columbia, pipeline, protest, strategy, tactic, Trans Mountain
Barriers and Facilitators to Indigenous Knowledge Incorporation in Policy Making
The inclusion and application of Indigenous Knowledge (IK) has become a central and often demanded element of policy making involving Indigenous peoples. However, there are very few examples that exist in the literature and elsewhere that show how IK can be effectively integrated into decisions, policies, and programs. In response to these challenges, this research explored what processes are used to incorporate IK into policy and their effectiveness through the development of a framework that sought to identify critical factors related to IK inclusion. The framework was then applied to evaluate IK incorporation opportunities in the Nunatsiavut case, focusing on the development of the Nunatsiavut Government's Environmental Protection Act. The case study analysis was used to test and provide adaptations to the initial framework. This research identifies the importance of governance structures and processes, community participation and engagement approaches, and IK research and support programming in enhancing opportunities for IK to be integrated and reflected in policy outcomes. The Nunatsiavut case largely supported, but in some cases challenged critical factors of IK incorporation identified in the framework. The findings of this study are valuable for policy and decision makers (both Indigenous and non-Indigenous) regarding approaches and programs that can assist and support IK inclusion into policy processes and decisions. Author Keywords: environmental assessment, Indigenous Knowledge, Inuit Knowledge, Nunatsiavut, policy, self-government
Community and conservation
Faced with the intersecting environmental crises of the 21st century, conservation organizations are searching for practices that produce better, more sustainable outcomes. However, they have often relied on forms of conservation which shore up rather than disrupt settler relationships to land in the form of fortress conservation and assumptions about the human-nature dualism. In this thesis, I examine a local land trust that intends to include community[-based] conservation into its conservation practices. In particular, I explore how the organization’s volunteers understand and construct the relationship between community and conservation, and the ways this might impact operations. Using a community-based research approach, interviews (n=17) were conducted. The findings indicate that the volunteers are demographically homogenous, leading to a homogenous, Western-science informed understanding of community[-based] conservation. This perspective views involvement of community as a direct trade-off with optimal ecological goals. As the volunteers wield uncommon power in organizational governance, difference in opinions toward missions or operations could lead to constraints on the organization. This study contributes to larger academic discourses on environmental volunteers, land trusts, and frames of conservation, and provides tangible recommendations to an organization attempting to include community[-based] conservation in its practices. Author Keywords: community-based conservation, environmental governance, environmental volunteers, frames of conservation, land trusts, power
Distribution of Cluster Fly Species (Pollenia, spp. Diptera
This thesis looks at the genus Pollenia: historically where they were first introduced into Canada and spatially, where they are found now. This project involved me identifying 2211 files, sorted from the 3 years of field specimens obtained in 2011, 2012, 2013. P. pediculata was the most abundant and widespread, yielding 1272 specimens out of 2211, and it was found in all provinces sampled. The previous understanding of all Pollenia specimens as being P. rudis appears to be incorrect both in terms of actual number of species – which is known – and how prevalent it is. P. rudis comprised only 20% of the entire collection. The least common was P. griseotomentosa, occurring as 45 of 2211, or 2%. I found new eight first provincial records: four species in Alberta (P. angustigena, P. labialis, P. rudis, P. vagabunda) , one species for Saskatchewan (P. pediculata), two for New Brunswick (P. griseotomentosa, P. labialis), and one for Nova Scotia (P. labialis). P. labialis was new to three provinces, the other species to one province each. Author Keywords: Calliphoridae, Canada, Cluster Fly, Distribution, Pollenia, Provincial Records
EXPLORING THE EFFECTS OF WATERPOWER OPERATIONS ON RIVERINE ECOSYSTEMS ACROSS NORTHERN ONTARIO
In this study, we attempt to enhance current knowledge of ecological responses to riverine alterations from waterpower by using a bottom-up food up approach. A series of extensive and intensive study components were performed across northern Ontario, Canada, where biological (nutrients, dissolved organic matter (DOM) and periphyton) and physical (water level and thermal regimes) ecological indicators were examined in regards to alterations from dams and waterpower facilities. Overall, we found that the water levels and thermal regimes deviated from their reference condition at sites below the dams, whereas the biological indicators were more resilient to river alterations. Our results suggest that the characteristics of the watershed were influential in controlling the variability of nutrients and DOM resources in rivers within the boreal watersheds of northern Ontario, as well as the for the downstream recovery patterns of the physical indicators. The recovery of the periphyton communities downstream of the dams were also predicted to be cumulatively related to the physical alterations, nutrient availability and the possible displacement of invertebrate communities. Therefore, our bottom-up food web approach was not effective for better understanding how ecological responses from waterpower cascade through aquatic food webs, and instead multiple indicators should be used for examining the ecological responses in these particular river systems. Author Keywords: dissolved organic matter, ecological indicators, river alteration, waterpower facilities
Factors Influencing the Prioritization of Sites for Conservation on Private Land in Southern Ontario
Conservation organizations use strategic prioritization methods to order complex environments, evaluate landscapes, and distribute efficiently resources for conservation. This study explores how strategic prioritization decisions are made, drawing on a case study of the Nature Conservancy of Canada (NCC). This thesis identifies the factors affecting prioritization and their influence on the public perception of the NCC. The case study revealed that the NCC utilizes comprehensive science-based methods when prioritizing for conservation but its methods are also influenced by the 'opportunity function' (funding, threats, public/political support). How these factors are communicated depends on the audience (e.g. NCC Conservation Blueprints stress the scientific value of the environment; the NCC uses its media sources to emphasize the human-environment connection). These differences indicate the multi-dimensional nature of planning for conservation, its links to values emerging from science, politics, and society, and the need for collaborative conservation efforts and earning and maintaining public trust. Author Keywords: biodiversity conservation priorities, collaboration, Nature Conservancy of Canada, opportunity function, private conservation organizations, science-based conservation
Investigation of Air Recirculation and Thermal Efficiency within a Climate Controlled Passage
Historically, entrances have been used for passage between two separate temperature environments, such as moving from inside to outside of a building. Energy loss through entrances is a cause for concern, as it has been known to increase energy consumption to replace the lost energy; and with the exchange of air masses and cold air entering the building, human discomfort may occur. In this research, thermal efficiency and air circulation within a Conventional Entrance (CE) and Climate Controlled Passage (CCP) are compared. A small scale model of the CE and CCP was constructed to examine forty-eight energy exchange conditions, emulating those found through an entrance between a temperature controlled lab and the model. Instruments such as a power meter, a flow explorer laser Doppler anemometer, and thermocouples were used to measure and compare the energy consumption, velocity vectors, and temperature energy within the entrance. Results indicate that the CCP did retain thermal energy compared to the CE. The CE developed sloped isotherm lines and air flow that enabled and maintained thermal exhaust. Conversely, the CCP developed horizontal isotherm lines and a two-layer density current to recirculate and retain thermal energy. The research demonstrates that it is possible to increase energy efficiency of entrances in many applications. Author Keywords: Air Recirculation, Building, Entrance, Oven, Thermal Energy Efficiency, Two-layer Density Current
Mythopoeia Sylvatica
Since British colonization of North America and the beginning of Anglo-speaking Euro-Canada and the United States, myth-making or representations of the forests have witnessed degradation and loss of old-growth forest ecosystems or intact sylvan landscapes. Canadian and American versions of the story of the North American Forests shared the same trajectory: forests as ‘wasted-land’ or the sylvan wilderness (terra nullius) divided into properties and cleared to “improve” the land for settlement/agriculture, forests as storehouses for timber and imperial expansion, forest landscapes and specific forest trees as identity politics and sources of industrial and economic power. While forests are recognized according to various stakeholders’ values today, what is commonly accepted as a forest varies widely. The meaning given to “forest” determines related terms and concepts, such as “sustainable forestry” and “reforestation.” This thesis addresses the issue of social-bioecological degradation, loss, and dis(re)membering of old-growth forests and problematizes traditional Western relationships with old wildwoods shaped by notions of space, politics, and economy. In the forest topos, the core question becomes which forest(s) are being imagined, represented, and remembered? Whose environmental imagination is shaping the landscape? As a critical topographical exploration of the North American forests through six witness trees, this thesis demonstrates how the meanings imbued in trees and wild woods come to determine the fate of the forests. It reveals how colonial values and trends persist in our societies still, and calls for an ethical social-ecological reimagining of the forests through traditions of ethical storytelling and environmental witnessing. Author Keywords: critical topography, environmental generational amnesia, environmental witnessing, forests, social-ecological systems, witness trees
Nature without Balance
This thesis critically analyses the connection between ideology and nature, and in particular, aims to reflect on the dominant discourses on the topic of ecological crisis. The ecological thought framework that I adhere to rests on a combination of Frankfurt School and Žižekian theories. This combination is not without serious tensions and deviations; however, central to this project are the ways in which their respective works extensively critique ideology, and propose subversive alternatives to and new meanings of how we can conceptualize nature without domination. Dominant ideas and critiques of nature and natural history emerged during the Enlightenment era, and as Adorno argues, fell victim to a “reduction ad hominem,” or the claim that in order to free oneself, one must dominate, appropriate, and master nature. I claim that the extreme choices in environmental politics today - namely organic populism on one hand and increased technological intervention on the other - fail to account for the ways ‘nature’ is a socio-historical construct, and moreover, is situated within a false reality wherein the ‘essence of existence’ is reduced to technological mastery. What we encounter in this cautionary armoury of paradoxical approaches to nature, then, is the ideological currents of established belief systems. By exposing the illusions within the concept nature, such as the argumentative persuasion that there exists an inherent balance, the elementary cell of ideology reveals itself alongside revolutionary possibilities. Author Keywords: Crises, Critical Theory, Ideology, Nature, Slavoj Zizek, Theodor Adorno
On Forests, Witness Trees, and Bears
This dissertation is about Forests, their loss and the grieving that arises from their loss. The loss of ancient and old-growth forests by way of clearcutting and or anthropogenically driven disturbances, including climate change, presents the quandary of loss of both biological and cultural diversity. Following Umeek’s/E. Richard Atleo’s term, I suggest that “dis-ease” in the dominant relationship to forests in parts of the Western world significantly rests within inherited cultural and political pasts at play in the present, carried in much of the language and lifeways of modern Anglophone societies today. I do so by a critical topographical exploration of thematic patterns that go back to the Epic of Gilgamesh, the oldest written account of deforestation in the history of Western civilization. I offer at the center of my inquiry a collection of witness trees as North American case studies. Each tree is a witness object, a station from which I confront and explore social-ecological grief as it has accumulated over time from English colonization, with one focusing on Indigenous cultural reclamation and place-based ecological co-management. Lastly, I turn to a multispecies exploration of social-ecological grief, using bears in North America as a face for reflection and consider who and what more is lost when old forests are degraded and gone. By asking the place question—“what place is this?”—of forests, or the Forest Question, my dissertation is thus an exploration of the connection and responsibilities to other place-based human and other-than-human communities in a rapidly changing climate. Author Keywords: critical topography, environmental grief, forests, multispecies, social-ecological relations, witness trees
Robert Bringhurst and Polyphonic Poetry
Robert Bringhurst states that polyphonic art is a faithful, artistic reflection of the multiplicity of the world’s ecosystems. This ecocritical perspective recognizes that human art informs our understandings of the world, and therefore artists have a moral obligation towards that world. In Chapter One I argue that mimesis should be reclaimed as a useful literary category since all art, regardless of intentions, has an effect on both culture and the natural world. In Chapter Two I argue that by reconnecting publishing craft and philosophy, our books can serve to bring us more in tune with the structures of the natural world. I conclude in Chapter Three by asking how a counterpublic consciousness can be cultivated, and how Bringhurst’s mission of transforming culture might be fully realized. Altogether, this view of literature offers an antidote to Western culture’s destructive tendencies towards the natural world. Author Keywords: Bringhurst, ecocriticism, mimesis, poetry, polyphony, typography

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Graduate student theses produced at Trent University. You may also browse theses and dissertations by year, program, or author.

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