Education
Doctor of Philosophy, English and Comparative Literature
Goldsmiths, University of London
Dissertation: ‘Then Cover the Abyss With Trance’, on the representation of the Holocaust in novels by Imre Kertész, Georges Perec and others
Supervisor: Josh Cohen
Master of Architecture, Architectural History and Theory
McGill University, Montreal
Graduated cum laude from program headed by Alberto Pérez–Gómez
Thesis: ‘Vienna in Dreams’, a look at the faces of the fin–de–siècle metropolis through the works of Joseph Roth, Arthur Schnitzler, Robert Musil and Sigmund Freud
Supervisor: Martin Bressani
Honours Bachelor of Arts, Major in South Asian and Post-Colonial studies, Minors in History and English
University of Toronto
Graduated with distinction
Courses and Related
2016 to present
University of Waterloo, School of Architecture
Adjunct Faculty: instructed the first–year Iconography and Cultural History course, part of the school’s core curriculum in cultural history; the subject of the class is great European architectural works and thought in the Modernist Period
2011 to 2015
University of Toronto, Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape and Design
Instructor: designed and taught ‘Forgetting Architecture’, a Masters-level elective seminar on the architectural memorialisation of trauma, based on my PhD research, as part of the faculty’s offering of courses in Selected Topics in Architecture History and Theory
Instructor: designed and taught ‘Cultural History and Design’, a second-year undergraduate course on the expression of cultural phenomena in architectural conceptions and design
2013 to 2015
Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto
Henryk Ross Photographs from the Lodz Ghetto
Curatorial Consultant: advised on the exhibition of a newly acquired collection of photos of the ghetto taken during the time of its operation by Henryk Ross
2014
University of Waterloo, School of Architecture
Adjunct Faculty: teaching 3A studio term ‘The Architectural Imagination’, focusing on developing and educating design instincts; specialising in exploring the construction and possibilities of narrative as a means of understanding and expressing creative processes
2012
Toronto Metropolitan University, Department of Architectural Sciences
Instructor: designed and taught ‘The First Architects’, the first–year Ideas, Technologies and Precedents course, which is part of the school’s core curriculum; the subject of the architectural history class is design and its context from prehistory to the end of the Middle Ages
2009
Bergen Arkitekt Skole, Norway
Co–coordinator, Guest Lecturer and Critic of ‘The Impossible Necessity’: under the aegis of Sarah Wigglesworth Architects, designed and participated in the instruction of a fourth–year design and theory studio on libraries and the limits of knowledge
2004, 5
University of Waterloo, School of Architecture
Adjunct Faculty: instructed the second–year Iconography and Cultural History course, part of the school’s core curriculum in cultural history; the subject of the class was great European architectural works and thought in the Renaissance, Scientific Revolution, and Enlightenment
Selected Consultations, Guest Lectures and Publications [*peer reviewed]
2022, Montreal Holocaust Museum International Design Concept Competition
Collaborator with Schwartz Silver and Affleck de la Riva Architect’s long-listed proposal, ‘In the Birch Forest’
2019, Vine Awards, Toronto
Jury member
November 2017, Toronto Public Library
Interviewed author Alison Pick on her most recent novel, Strangers with the Same Dream
March 2017, Appel Salon
Interviewed the short story writer and film-maker Etgar Keret on his memoirs, The Seven Good Years
April 2017, Hamilton Jewish Federation
Keynote Speaker on the preservation of memory, focusing on the Venice Architectural Biennale exhibition, ‘The Evidence Room’
November 2016, On Empathy, University of Waterloo
Invited speaker on Subjectivity and History in Counter-Monuments
October 2016, International Festival of Authors
Panelist, ‘Life of an Artist’
November 2015, Holocaust Education Week, Toronto Metropolitan University
Featured speaker for the annual event’s ‘Legacy Symposium’, discussing the article ‘Not Again’ and the direction of memorial design in North America
2015-17, Facing History and Ourselves
Regular Featured Speaker addressing Secondary School teachers and students and workshopping with Primary School students on representations of trauma
October 2015, Rain, Gravity, Heat, Cold, Blok Publishing
Interview of Superkül principals Meg Graham and Andre D'Elia included in this monograph about the first ten years of the firm’s practice in Canada and abroad
January 2015, Memory Unearthed, Yale University Press
Author of ‘The Ordinary and the Extreme’, an essay exploring the representation of trauma in Henryk Ross’ photographs of the Lodz Ghetto, included in the Art Gallery of Ontario's catalogue for the exhibition
January 2015, Jackman Theatre, Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto
Featured speaker on a panel discussing the representation of trauma in the photographs of Henryk Ross
October 2014, Berfrois
Author of ‘Not Again’, a critique of Daniel Libeskind's winning proposal for the Canadian Holocaust Monument
July 2014, Journal of Modern Literature*, Indiana University Press
Author of ‘Georges Perec, Lost and Found in the Void: Memoirs of an Indirect Witness’, an article examining the identity Perec created out of a war–time childhood spent in hiding
May 2014, Los Angeles Review of Books
Author of ‘Avoided’, an exploration of the void in art, architecture and the novels of Georges Perec
March 2014, Comparative Literature and Culture*, Purdue University Press
Author of ‘Sisyphus in Fatelessness: The Allegory and Irony of Eternal Recurrence’, an article evaluating Imre Kertész’ novel as a work in conversation with essays by Nietzsche and Camus
November 2013, Holocaust Education Week, Toronto
Featured Speaker for the annual event, discussing the subject of the American narrative (the ‘Americanization’) of the Holocaust
November 2013, Le Mood, Montreal
Selected Featured Speaker for festival of Jewish thought and culture; part of a three person presentation, with David Heti and Natalie Mathieson, on the history, limits and transgressions of provocative humour
April 2013, Life? Or Theatre?, Robert Gill Theatre
Performer in Ars Mechanica’s original theatrical production on the life of German artist Charlotte Salomon
April 2013, Descant, Issue 160: The Hidden City
Author of ‘Dresden/Dresden’, an article about the city’s escape from its traumatic history
December 2012, University of Toronto, Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape and Design
Invited Guest Critic to Masters Final Reviews
November 2012, CBC
Invited Guest of the Remembrance Day program, discussing the changing shapes of monuments and memorials in Canada
October 2012, Treehouse Talks, Toronto
Lectured on the subject of Mnemotechnics (the art of memory) in classical and medieval architecture
March 2011, University of Toronto, Department of English
Lectured on George Elliott Clarke’s most recent work, I & I, for Clarke’s second–year English course on African–Canadian Literature