Stephen J. Neville is a PhD candidate in the Joint Graduate Program in Communication and Culture at York University and Toronto Metropolitan University. His research explores how the intersection of sound, media, and power shapes the conditions under which voices are made audible or silenced. Currently, he leads a project titled, “Losing your voice to AI,” funded by the Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada, which maps the emerging industry of health-related machine listening to address problems of data privacy, consent, and discrimination. Neville is also a Métis musician. A song from his recent album, OFF TRACK (2022), “Going Home”, reached #5 on the Indigenous Music Countdown, mirroring themes of cultural reconnection that animate his research into Indigenous sound archives and land-based research creation. Neville’s academic research and artistic practice have been supported by fellowships and grants from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, the Social Science Research Council in New York, Mitacs Globalink, and Canada Council for the Arts. He was also a visiting scholar at the Erasmus Research Centre for Media, Communication and Culture in Rotterdam, and a former cohort member of the Digital IDEAS Summer Institute at the University of Michigan. With Greg Elmer, he is the coauthor of The Politics of Media Scarcity (Routledge 2024) which foregrounds marginalized histories and storytelling as a challenge to dominant narratives in media studies. His work has appeared in Culture, Theory & Critique, Convergence, Surveillance & Society, Social Media & Society, and the Canadian Journal of Communication.
Student Spotlight
Rosario is a first-year PhD student in Science and Technology Studies at York University. Her research examines how digital and traditional media platforms in Latin America shape cultural narratives around fatness, health, and body norms—often reinforcing stigma through medical discourse, yet also opening up spaces for resistance and body-positive activism. Originally from Peru, Rosario holds a BA and a professional degree in Anthropology, an MA in Human Geography and completed graduate studies in Gender and Development. She brings over a decade of experience as an educator, feminist researcher, and activist. Her work sits at the intersection of digital culture, decolonial feminist theory, and social justice, with a strong commitment to collaborative, accessible knowledge production.
Joel is a second-year master’s student in Communication and Culture at York University. His current research focuses on how the process of character creation in singleplayer video games affects player engagement. In addition to all things game studies, Joel is especially interested in forming connections and sharing knowledge across disciplinary boundaries. He’s happy to talk about events, research, gaming, and most everything else! Joel is also a new grad student representative on the IRDL executive, joining Fresange Maleka.