Speaker: Melanie J. Newton is an Associate Professor of History at the University of Toronto, where she teaches Caribbean and Atlantic World History. Her publications include The Children of Africa in the Colonies: Free People of Color in Barbados in the Age of Emancipation, Returns to a Native Land? Indigeneity and Decolonization in the Anglophone Caribbean and Counterpoints of Conquest: The Royal Proclamation of 1763, the Lesser Antilles and the Ethnocartography of Genocide.

Topic: This year’s Open Forum theme is REFUGE, Refuge refers to the layers of safety and welcome created in the past centuries on Turtle Island. Waves of both refugees and settlers have found safe haven here and created new spatial relationships with Indigenous peoples. Refuge made in love and beauty, and sometimes, taking the refuge of home from Indigenous peoples.