Category: Raise The Bar

The Friends of the University of Alberta present Raise The Bar
with Janet Sperling

Spring gardens and Zombie insects

As we venture into our dormant gardens, clearing away wet leaves and broken branches, we should be on the lookout for lady bugs, those fearsome foes of aphids, and lacewings, ferocious predators of the same sap sucking hemipterans. A lucky few will stumble on zombie insects. A naïve gardener may see innocent parasitized aphids and gasp when a parasitic wasp emerges. Gardening will never be the same when you learn to recognize signs of our heroic plant defenders – also known as Biological Control agents – defenders that predate human agriculture. We will learn why lazy gardeners who leave the leaf litter may be helping to defend our treasured tomatoes.

Tue, Apr 28, 2026

5:15 PM Doors Open
6:00 PM Speaker + Q&A
8:00 PM Event Ends

Ticket includes 1 drink (beer, wine, non-alcoholic)

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Janet Sperling, PhD is an alumna of the University of Alberta where she first graduated with a B.Sc. Ag in Horticulture, followed by an MSc in Entomology and more recently a PhD in Systematics and Evolution. She is currently president of the Canadian Lyme Disease Foundation where she advocates for better diagnosis and treatment of this increasingly important tick-borne disease.

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Raise The Bar is a program designed by The Friends of the University of Alberta to provide engaging learning opportunities delivered by U of A researchers in a casual setting – like a bar. We’re raising the bar on the way people consume content!

The Friends of the University of Alberta present Raise The Bar
with Katrina Ingram

AI, ethics and deep fakes – are we doomed?

The year is 2026. Generative AI, trained on humanity’s collective outputs, threatens to upend our sense of reality while displacing workers and leading the world towards destruction. Or maybe, artificial intelligence will usher in a utopic future, providing longevity and economic prosperity for all. Doom and hype are not necessarily polar opposites in the AI story. Instead, they work together to keep us invested in AI, both literally and figuratively. Join adjunct faculty member and technology ethicist, Katrina Ingram, for a critical, socio-technical take on the past, present and future of the enigma known as ‘AI’.

Blue Chair
9624 – 76 Avenue NW

Tue, Feb 3, 2026

5:00 PM Doors Open
6:00 PM Speaker + Q&A

Ticket includes 1 drink (beer, house wine, non-alcoholic)

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Katrina Ingram is the Founder and CEO of Ethically Aligned AI, a company focused on helping organizations to drive better outcomes in the design, development and deployment of AI systems. A seasoned executive, Katrina has over two decades of experience running both not for profit and corporate organizations in the technology and media sectors as well as experience in the public sector. She was named to the 100 Brilliant Women in AI Ethics list. Katrina holds an undergrad in business administration from Simon Fraser University, a master of arts in communications and technology from the University of Alberta and is an IAPP certified information privacy professional (CIPP/C). She is an adjunct faculty member with the University of Alberta’s Media and Technology Studies department.

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Raise The Bar is a program designed by The Friends of the University of Alberta to provide engaging learning opportunities delivered by U of A researchers in a casual setting – like a bar. We’re raising the bar on the way people consume content!

The Friends of the University of Alberta present Raise The Bar
with Dr. PB Berge

Video Games. No Longer Child’s Play!

Video gaming is the BIGGEST entertainment business on earth. Worth more than twice the global film and music industries combined! Yet many people think video games are “child’s play”.

They’re not. They are classrooms, laboratories, and spaces of social protest and you should know more about them. On Oct. 28th, join us when video game expert, Professor PB Berge dismantles misconceptions about games today and reveals how players are using video games to challenge technology, identity, and power itself.

Blue Chair
9624 – 76 Avenue NW

Tue, Oct 28, 2025

5:00 PM Doors Open
6:00 PM Speaker + Q&A

Ticket includes 1 drink (beer, house wine, non-alcoholic)
Drinks Menu at The Blue Chair Cafe

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Dr. Persephone Blue (“PB”) Berge is an award-winning media scholar, game designer, and self-described ludoarsonist. 🔥 She is an Assistant Professor of Experimental Game Design and is cross-appointed in the Media & Technology Studies Program and the Department of Women’s and Gender Studies. They are also the director of the Discord Academic Research Community and a co-founder of Tabletop Research in Practice. Their research concerns the so-called “unplayable,” trans game design, feminist platform studies, and toxic technocultures. Their work can be found in New Media & Society, Game Studies, Feminist Media Studies, The Journal of Cinema and Media Studies and more. Website: https://psberge.com

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Raise The Bar is a program designed by The Friends of the University of Alberta to provide engaging learning opportunities delivered by U of A researchers in a causal setting – like a bar. We’re raising the bar on the way people consume content!

The Friends of the University of Alberta present Raise The Bar
with Dr. Cressida Heyes

Sleep is the New Sex?

Sleep is always in the news, often under the headline that we are experiencing a “sleep crisis.” What is this crisis, and where did it come from? Why are we so anxious about sleep? In this short talk I’ll offer some answers to these questions drawn from my research in cultural politics. Come along and learn a little bit about the history of sleep, the preoccupation with giving advice to new mothers, the “sleep gaps” in gender and race, or why powerful men like to pretend they never sleep.

Blue Chair
9624 – 76 Avenue NW

Tue, Jun 10, 2025

5:00 PM Doors Open
6:00 PM Speaker + Q&A

Ticket includes 1 drink (beer, house wine, non-alcoholic)
Drinks Menu at The Blue Chair Cafe

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Cressida Heyes is the author of three monographs, most recently Anaesthetics of Existence: Essays on Experience at the Edge (Duke University Press, 2020), winner of the 2021 David Easton Award from the American Political Science Association, and finalist for the North American Social for Social Philosophy Book Award. The book argues that “experience” is a thoroughly political category, a social and historical product not authored by any individual. At the same time, “the personal is political,” and one’s own lived experience is an important epistemic resource. Anaesthetics of Existence reconciles these two positions, drawing on examples of things that happen to us but are nonetheless excluded from experience. If for Foucault an “aesthetics of existence” was a project of making one’s life a work of art, Heyes’ “anaesthetics of existence” describes antiprojects that are tacitly excluded from life—but should be brought back in. Drawing on critical phenomenology, genealogy, and feminist theory, Heyes shows how and why experience has edges, and analyzes phenomena that press against those edges. Essays on sexual violence against unconscious victims, the temporality of drug use, and childbirth as a limit-experience build a politics of experience while showcasing Heyes’ philosophical method.

Dr. Heyes is currently working on a SSHRC-funded project called “Sleep is the New Sex,” which extends and moves beyond the work in Anaesthetics, to examine how representations of sleep are implicated with cultural anxieties and political struggles around gender, sexuality, work, leisure, and rest.

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Raise The Bar is a program designed by The Friends of the University of Alberta to provide engaging learning opportunities delivered by U of A researchers in a causal setting – like a bar. We’re raising the bar on the way people consume content!