For our seventh episode of #BookCast, we discuss “The Book of Two Ways” by Jodi Picoult—a story that explores whether we make our choices—or our choices make us. Our story begins with a plane-crash, where our main character, Dawn Edelstein is faced with the choice to return home to her life as a death-doula, or continue on to Egypt to complete her doctoral studies researching the coffin-texts and “Book of Two Ways”, a map of routes souls can take to the afterlife.

Join Riya Sidhu, Garth Casbourn, Scott Walters, resident Egyptologist: Maris Schneider, and Meghan Voll as we dive into the book’s main themes and quirks, such as it’s non-linear writing style, the duality of life and death, the nature of choices, and selfless versus selfish action. This podcast edit features a reveal of the next title in our ongoing series.

Aired February 6th, 2025 at 11 AM on Radio Western, 94.9 FM in London, Ontario.

Recorded on January 28, 2025

Produced by Scott Walters

Theme song provided by https://freebeats.io/ Produced by White Hot

Recorded on January 28, 2025

Produced by Jessica Eblie, Scott Walters, Maria Khan

Theme song provided by https://freebeats.io/ Produced by White Hot

Hosts Mark Ambrogio and Maris Schneider are joined by Sananda Sahoo, a Postdoctoral Associate at the Faculty of Information and Media Studies. In Sananda's PhD dissertation, her research extrapolated how mainstream English-language Indian newspapers represent Muslims in the context of cow violence. She discusses the tension between the Muslims and other communities, mainly Hindus from colonial India and contemporary settings. Now, in Sananda’s post-doctoral research, she is looking into the government's usage of AI and facial recognition technology in the public sector in India and how it impacts human behaviour and surveillance. She also shares her academic joinery and her work at a newspaper and radio station. Content disclaimer: This episode touches upon religious lynching and violence against Muslims in India.

Recorded on January 21, 2025

Produced by Maria Khan

Theme song provided by https://freebeats.io/ Produced by White Hot

This week, hosts Mark Ambrogio and Liam Clifford are joined by Jessica Eblie, a student in the professional master's program in Media, Journalism, and Communications. Jessica shares her fascinating journey from a music background to journalism and communications, discussing how her experience as a musician brings valuable skills and perspectives to her work as a journalist.

Recorded on January 14, 2025.

Produced by Bruno Mesquita.

Theme song provided by https://freebeats.io/ (Produced by White Hot).

This week, hosts Mark Ambrogio and Scott Walters are joined by Aloa Alota, a PhD Candidate in Western's Faculty of Information and Media Studies. His research focuses on political journalism in Nigeria following the June 12 Crisis, the annulment of a presidential election that plunged the country into a political turmoil. Listen to learn about the guerilla journalism that ensued while Nigeria worked its way back to Democracy.

Recorded on January 7, 2025.

Produced by Scott Walters.

Edited by Anthony Cruz.

Theme song provided by https://freebeats.io/ (Produced by White Hot).

This week, we engage in the second episode of our collaboration with Inspiring Minds, a campus-wide partnership between Western Research, the School of Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies, the Writing Support Centre, Western Libraries, Student Experience and Western’s 11 faculties. Inspiring Minds seeks to broaden awareness and impact of graduate student research while enhancing transferrable skills.

Hosts Mark Ambrogio and Ryan Baxter converse with Joeana Cambranis, who is pursuing her PhD in Biomedical Engineering. Joeana's research focuses on developing augmented and virtual reality tools to help surgeons practice and improve procedures related to the treatment of liver cancer. She also shares her thoughts on life as an international graduate student from Yucatán, Mexico, what Western means to her, and discusses her next steps.

Want to know more about Joeana's work? Take a look at her page on the Inspiring Minds website.

Recorded on December 10, 2024

Airing at 11am on December 17, 2024 on Western Radio, 94.9 FM

Produced by Scott Walters

Theme song provided by https://freebeats.io/ (Produced by White Hot).

Hosts Mark Ambrogio and Liam Clifford are re-joined by William Laur, PhD Candidate in the Biology Department. His research focuses on exploring representations of and attitudes towards snakes in online media, through an ethnozoological approach. He was previously in the GradCast studio over the summer (Episode 470). This time around, William completed his written scoping review and qualitative analysis of the snake and bear-specific scientific literature. William chats about human perspectives and attitudes towards snakes and bears, the theological perspectives, how snakes are charismatic and the importance of snake conservation.

Recorded on December 3, 2024

Produced by Maria Khan

Theme song provided by https://freebeats.io/ Produced by White Hot

In our sixth installment of our #BookCast mini-series, we discuss Fifth Business, by Robertson Davies. The novel builds upon childhood events and grows into a personal epic spanning decades of national and world history, centered through the perspective of an older academic looking back over his life. The story begins, and the main characters all originate from, Deptford, a fictional town based on the real community of Thamesville, Ontario. Join us as your hosts Garth Casbourne, Meghan Voll, Mark Ambrogio, and Scott Walters dive into some of the book's main themes, including spirituality, ageing & changing perspectives, and socioeconomics.

The podcast edit features an extended discussion by Mark on the concept of unreliable narrators, and Meghan reveals the next title in our ongoing series.

Aired December 5th at 11 AM on Radio Western, 94.9 FM in London, Ontario.

Recorded on November 27, 2024

Produced by Scott Walters

Theme song provided by https://freebeats.io/ Produced by White Hot