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March 13, 2025
Critical Conversations on Water and Justice: Indigenous Water, Indigenous Science
Join Just Waters, the Centre for Human Rights Research, and The Last Drop at WAG-Qaumajuq for a panel on Indigenous Water, Indigenous Science with Dr. Myrle Ballard (University of Calgary), Dr. Az Klymiuk (University of Manitoba) and Dr. Miguel Uyaguari-Diaz (University of Manitoba). The panelists will speak to the relationality of their work, the challenges and possibilities, and what keeps them going.
This panel is the first installment in the CHRR’s annual Critical Conversations series. This year, the series of three public events is held in partnership with WAG-Qaumajuq and will focus on water and justice. Just Waters: Thinking with Hydro-Social Relations for a More Just and Sustainable World, the Centre for Human Rights Research, and the University of Manitoba’s United Nations Academic Impact Hub for Sustainable Development Goal 6 Last Drop speaker series, are collaborating to host these events. Funding is provided by the University of Manitoba’s IGNITE program, with in-kind contributions from WAG-Qaumajuq.
6:00 pm Doors open + food
6:30 pm Panel discussion
FREE
No registration required
If you have accessibility requirements, including translation, please email sarah.deckert@umanitoba.ca at least one week before the event.
About the Speakers
Dr. Myrle Ballard is a Canada Research Chair in Weaving Indigenous Science and Sustainability Science and Associate Professor in the Dept. of Earth, Energy, and Environment at the University of Calgary. She stood-up the new Indigenous Science Division at Environment and Climate Change Canada. Anishinaabe from Lake St. Martin First Nation, Dr. Ballard’s research explores Three-eyed seeing and how her fluency in Anishinaabe mowin can transform approaches to water resource management using Anishinaabe mowin baseline indicators. Dr. Ballard also serves on a number of committees and working groups, with a recent appointment as Chair, World Water Quality Alliance. She was also appointed as a Scoping expert for the second IPBES global assessment of biodiversity and ecosystem services; and Expert for the IPBES task force on Indigenous and local knowledge. Her other research interests include but are not limited to, climate change, and sustainability of flooding/displacement.
Dr. Az Klymiuk, an assistant professor and Indigenous Scholar in Science at the University of Manitoba, is an autistic, two-spirit, first-generation Cree Métis and Slavic citizen of the Métis Nation of Alberta. Klymiuk grew up in subsistence-dominated lifeways in Treaty 8 Territory in northern Alberta, near the confluence of the Peace and Notikewin rivers. They remain deeply connected to this land, and Indigenous ways of relating to other-than-human kin. At the University of Manitoba, Klymiuk conducts research into plant mycobiomes, and is currently investigating how plant-fungal partnerships can be utilized to support Indigenous-led initiatives for manômin (wild rice) conservation, restoration, and food sovereignty. Their work is supported by NSERC-CRSNG, SSHRC-CRSH’s New Frontiers in Research Foundation, and the University of Manitoba’s Collaborative Research and Fieldwork Support programs.
Ayush is a professor in the Department of Microbiology and Associate Dean-Strategic Initiatives in the Faculty of Science at the University of Manitoba. A Fellow of the Royal Society of Biology, he was President of the Canadian Society of Microbiologists (2021–22). His research focuses on multidrug resistance in Gram-negative bacteria, including antibiotic resistance mechanisms, environmental factors, and genetic tools. His group also studies water quality in First Nation communities in Manitoba.
Assistant Professor/Indigenous Scholar at the University of Manitoba since July 2019. I hail from Naranjal, a small town in the countryside of Ecuador. I did my undergraduate in Ecuador in Marine Biology. I migrated to the USA in 2005 to pursue graduate studies in Aquatic Ecotoxicology and Molecular Microbial Ecology. I was a postdoctoral fellow and Senior Research Associate for ~8 years at the University of British Columbia and British Columbia Centre for Disease Control. My current research focuses on anthropogenic activities and their impact on water quality and aquatic ecosystems. I use culture independent approaches such as function and sequenced based metagenomics, quantitative PCR, bioinformatics and statistical tools to study diversity, abundance and dynamics/interactions of microbiomes particularly the resistome.
