IMP Labs
The Interactive Media and Performance (IMP) Labs are directed by Dr. Charity Marsh, Canada Research Chair in Interactive Media and Performance in the Faculty of Fine Arts at the University of Regina in Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada.
The labs are a primary site for interdisciplinary research and collaborative projects across the University of Regina and among wider communities of interest, particularly in Western and Northern Canada. The labs house the following:
- A multi-media DJ interactive studio and performance/workshop space
- An Ethnomusicology Fieldwork Lab
- A Beat-making-Electronic Music Studio
- Archival materials
- Research offices for post-doctoral fellows and graduate students
The labs are the focal point for the ongoing projects of the CRC. Another component of the CRC research programme is in the areas of new media, Social Network Sites (SNS) such as Facebook and MySpace, video games, and on-line interactive communities, including fan sites.
Dr. Charity Marsh
Dr. Charity Marsh holds the Canada Research Chair in Interactive Media and Performance in the Faculty of Fine Arts at the University of Regina. Dr. Marsh earned a Bachelor of Music in Musicology, Theory, and Performance as well as a Bachelor of Arts with a concentration in Women's Studies and a minor in German from the University of Ottawa. From York University she earned her MA in Women Studies problematizing the dynamic and contested relationship between nature and technology in the Icelandic artist, Björk's 1997 album Homogenic. In April 2005 Dr. Marsh defended her thesis entitled, "Raving Cyborgs, Queering Practices, and Discourses of Freedom: The Search for Meaning in Toronto's Rave Culture", completing her Ph.D. requirements for the doctoral programme in Popular Music Studies and Ethnomusicology at York University.
Dr. Marsh's current research focuses on interactive media and performance and how cultures and practices associated with this broad category contribute to dialogues concerning regionalism, cultural identity, and community specifically within western and northern Canada, and more generally on a global scale. In 2007 Dr. Marsh was awarded a Canadian Foundation for Innovation Grant and a Saskatchewan Fund for Innovation and Science grant to develop the Interactive Media and Performance Labs as a way to support her ongoing research. With the development of her new Interactive Media and Performance Labs (IMP) at the University of Regina, the emphasis of her research and arts practices include the following areas:
- Canadian (Indigenous) Hip Hop Cultures
- DJ Cultures including EDM, Club-Culture, Rave Culture, Techno, Psy-Trance, on-line, community, and pirate radio
- Isolation, Identity, and Space: Production and Performance of Popular Music in Western and Northern Canada.
In her artistic practices, Dr. Marsh incorporates interdisciplinary approaches and multiple medias, including turntablism, video, radio broadcasting, text, and soundscape composition.
Publications:
Marsh, Charity. “In the Middle of Nowhere: Little Miss Higgins Sings the Blues in Nokomis, Saskatchewan,” in Mind the Gap: Saskatchewan’s Cultural Spaces. Eds. R Rogers and C. Ramsay, Regina: University of Regina Press, 2014, pp. 413–441.
Marsh, Charity. “Hip Hop as Methodology: Ways of Knowing,” in Canadian Journal of Communication. Vol. 37, 2012, pp. 193–203.
Marsh, Charity. “Bits and Pieces of Truth: Storytelling, Identity, and Hip Hop in Saskatchewan,” in Aboriginal Music in Contemporary Canada: Echoes and Exchanges. Eds. A. Hoefnagels and B. Diamond. Montreal/ Kingston: McGill/ Queen’s University Press, 2012, pp. 346–371.
Marsh, Charity. “Keepin’ it Real?: Masculinity, Race, and Media Representations of (Gangsta’ Rap in) Regina,” in Making it Like a Man: Masculinities in Canadian Arts and Culture. Ed. C. Ramsay. Wilfred Laurier Press. Spring 2011, 149-170.
Marsh, Charity. “What it feels like for a girl: Metaphor, Transgression, and the Triumph of Madonna’s Imaginary Cyborgs,” Reprint in Canadian Perspectives in Sexuality Studies. Ed. D. Naugler. Oxford University Press, 2012, pp. 340–348.
Marsh, Charity. “Spaces of Violence and Sites of Resistance: Music, Media and Performance: An Introduction,” in MUSICultures: Journal of the Canadian Society for Traditional Music. Eds. C. Marsh and G. Smith. Vol. 38, 2011, pp. 1–6. With G. Smith.
Marsh, Charity. “Globalization, Identity, and Youth Resistance: Kenya’s Hip Hop Parliament,” in MUSICultures Journal of the Canadian Society for Traditional Music. Vol. 38, 2011, pp. 132–147. With S. Petty.
Marsh, Charity. “Don’t Call Me Eskimo: The Politics of Hip Hop Culture in Nunavut,” In MUSICultures: The Canadian Journal for Traditional Music. Fall, 2010, pp. 110–129.
Marsh, Charity. “Flux CrossFit and Hip Hop: Considering the Relationship between Arts and Athleticism,” In CrossFit Kids Journal. Issue 52. March 2010, pp. 16–19.
Marsh, Charity. “The Politics of Academic Fandom.” In Studies in Music. London: University of Western, Serge Lacasse, Ed. Fall 2010.
Marsh, Charity. “Interview with Saskatchewan Hip Hop Artist Lindsay Knight (a.k.a. Eekwol),” in Canadian Folk Music. 43.1 Spring 2009.
Marsh, Charity. “What it feels like for a girl: Metaphor, Transgression, and the Triumph of Madonna’s Imaginary Cyborgs,” in Atlantis: A Women’s Studies Journal. 34.1, 2009, pp. 111–120.
Marsh, Charity. “Last Night a DJ Saved My Life: The Flatland Scratch Seminar and Workshop Series,” In At the MacKenzie: The Magazine of the MacKenzie Art Gallery. Fall 2008. p. 15.
Marsh, Charity. “The Nature/Culture Binary Opposition Dismantled in the Music of Madonna and Björk,” Reprint in Cultural Studies: An Anthology. Ed. Michael Ryan. Oxford: Balckwell Publishing, 2008, pp. 850–866.
Marsh, Charity. “In & Out of the Classroom: Reflections on Identity, Technology, and the Radio Project,” In Intersections: Canadian Journal of Music. (26/2), 2007, pp. 81–96.
Marsh, Charity. “‘Understand Us Before You End Us’: Regulation, Governmentality, and the Confessional Practices of Raving Bodies,” In Popular Music. (Vol. 25/3), Cambridge University Press, 2006, pp. 415-430.
Marsh, Charity. “Performing Femininity as a Transgressive Act through the Dissolution of ‘Real’ and ‘Imaginary’: Björk's Performance as Selma in Lars Von Trier's Dancer in the Dark.” In Scandinavian-Canadian Studies. (Volume 14), 2002, pp.104-129.
Marsh, Charity. “The Nature/Culture Binary Opposition Dismantled in the Music of Madonna and Björk.” In Music and Technoculture, René Lysloff, ed. New England: Wesleyan Press, 2003, pp. 182–203. With Melissa West.
Marsh, Charity. “DJ Club.” Women and Music in America Since 1900: An Encyclopedia, Kristine H. Burns, Ed. Westport, Connecticut and London: Greenwood Press, 2002, pp. 158–159.
Research Objectives
- To spearhead a range of projects focused on how interactive media-based performance cultures initiate new dialogues concerning issues of identity, community, social relations, politics, anxiety, space and citizenship.
- To understand the significance of regionalism, cultural identity, access to new technologies, and a consciousness of resistance in relation to these music cultures within the context of Canada.
The labs are a primary site for interdisciplinary research and collaborative projects across the University of Regina and among wider communities of interest, particularly in Western and Northern Canada.
Canada Research Chair (CRC) Research
- Four Major Areas of Research Include
- Canadian (Indigenous) Hip Hop Culture
- DJ Cultures (EDM, Club Culture, Rave, Techno, Psy-Trance, Online and Community Radio, Hip Hop)
- Isolation, Identity and Space: The Production of Music in Western and Northern Canada
- Interactive Media and Technology (SNS, New Media, Virtual space, Online communities)