
Ms. Corinna Moebius
Doctoral Candidate/Graduate Teaching Assistant
Florida International University
A cultural anthropologist, (Little Havana) tour guide and (Cuba) tour director, I am currently completing my doctorate in anthropology at Florida International University (FIU). My dissertation focuses on the intersections between local and transnational racial politics in Little Havana's heritage district. My research interests include race, public memory and public space; performances of memory; critical heritage/landscape theory; Cuban and African diasporas; commemorations. I have lived in Little Havana for a decade.
In addition to my Graduate Teaching Assistantship at FIU, I have served as a Teaching Fellow and advisor at Florida Atlantic University in Boca Raton, for a graduate-level urban planning course entirely focused on Little Havana. In 2015, I also co-authored "A History of Little Havana." This summer I am also a mentor for a Cuban tour operator through StartUp Cuba, and in 2014 I was a Latino Museum Studies Fellow with the Smithsonian Latino Center.
Previously, I was the director of Imagine Miami, a civic engagement initiative for South Florida, through the nonprofit Catalyst Miami. In Washington, DC I ran my own consulting business, focused on public participation and engagement in urban and transportation planning projects. I launched my consulting business in Los Angeles, California after leaving the Internet industry as a specialist in online content and usability (mid-1990s). I earned my M.A. in Speech Communication at California State University, Northridge and a self-designed degree in Communications and Anthropology at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst.
On a personal note ... I have been studying Afro-Cuban sacred/folkloric dance for nearly two decades, and I love to dance rumba when I have the opportunity. My weaknesses include a good cigar every now and then. And I love used bookstores.
In addition to my Graduate Teaching Assistantship at FIU, I have served as a Teaching Fellow and advisor at Florida Atlantic University in Boca Raton, for a graduate-level urban planning course entirely focused on Little Havana. In 2015, I also co-authored "A History of Little Havana." This summer I am also a mentor for a Cuban tour operator through StartUp Cuba, and in 2014 I was a Latino Museum Studies Fellow with the Smithsonian Latino Center.
Previously, I was the director of Imagine Miami, a civic engagement initiative for South Florida, through the nonprofit Catalyst Miami. In Washington, DC I ran my own consulting business, focused on public participation and engagement in urban and transportation planning projects. I launched my consulting business in Los Angeles, California after leaving the Internet industry as a specialist in online content and usability (mid-1990s). I earned my M.A. in Speech Communication at California State University, Northridge and a self-designed degree in Communications and Anthropology at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst.
On a personal note ... I have been studying Afro-Cuban sacred/folkloric dance for nearly two decades, and I love to dance rumba when I have the opportunity. My weaknesses include a good cigar every now and then. And I love used bookstores.
Sessions in which Ms. Corinna Moebius attends
12:30
12:30
- Welcome Coffee UQAM, pavillon J.-A. De Sève (DS) - DS Ground Floor Hall
- 12:30 - 17:30 | 5 hours
- Pause
- Registration UQAM, pavillon J.-A. De Sève (DS) - DS Main hall
- 12:30 - 17:30 | 5 hours
13:00
13:00
- Pre-Conference Tour: Old Montreal (2 groups) UQAM, pavillon J.-A. De Sève (DS) - DS Registration table (meeting point)
- 13:00 - 15:00 | 2 hours
- Find out more about all the eras that shaped Montréal with this interesting walking tour, from the foundation of Fort Ville-Marie in 1642 to today’...
- Tour
- Pre-Conference Tour: Mile End, the Crossroads of Three Cultures UQAM, pavillon J.-A. De Sève (DS) - DS Registration table (meeting point)
- 13:00 - 15:30 | 2 hours 30 minutes
- The west of Mile End is the fruit of the unlikely encounter between a French-Canadian artisans’ village, a new suburb at the turn of the 20th centu...
- Tour
17:00
17:00
- Opening Ceremony and Cocktail
- Signup required Concordia, Grey Nuns Motherhouse (GN) - Former Chapel
- 17:00 - 19:30 | 2 hours 30 minutes
- Welcome addresses and cocktail, followed by the Concordia Signature Event "The Garden of the Grey Nuns". As the opening ceremony and cocktail...
- Cocktail
19:30
19:30
- The Garden of the Grey Nuns / Le jardin des sœurs grises Concordia, Grey Nuns Motherhouse (GN) - GN 1210
- 19:30 - 21:00 | 1 hour 30 minutes
- Working with archival documents and the current-day morphology of the Grey Nuns' site, Dr Cynthia Hammond, Dr Shauna Janssen, in collaboration w...
- Research-Creation
8:00
8:00
- Morning Coffee UQAM, pavillon J.-A. De Sève (DS) - DS Ground Floor Hall
- 8:00 - 10:00 | 2 hours
- Pause
9:00
9:00
- Keynote : What does heritage change? Le patrimoine, ça change quoi? (Lucie K. Morisset)
- Signup required UQAM, pavillon Judith-Jasmin (J) - Salle Alfred-Laliberté
- 9:00 - 10:00 | 1 hour
- What if we changed our views on heritage? And if heritage has already changed? While, on the global scene, s...
- Keynote with simultaneous translation / Conférence avec traduction simultanée

10:30
10:30
- Break | Pause UQAM, pavillon J.-A. De Sève (DS) - DS Ground Floor Hall
- 10:30 - 11:00 | 30 minutes
- Pause
11:00
11:00
- 13.30 Cultural Policy, Heritage Logic, and Cultural Contest: Afro-Cuban Religions and Inclusionary Discrimination in Contemporary Cuba
- Participant Dr. Michelle Tisdel (National Library of Norway) |
- 11:00 - 11:30 | 30 minutes Part of: Cultural Contestation: Politics and Governance of Heritage
- While Afro-Cubans have benefitted, in general, from many social, economic and cultural policies implemented by the socialist government, their o...
- Paper
- 13.30 New Heritage Imaginaries: Reconsidering Race Slavery and its Political Legacies through Public Commemoration and Art in Charleston, SC
- Participant Stephanie E. Yuhl (College of the Holy Cross) |
- 11:00 - 11:30 | 30 minutes Part of: Current Research I
- As the site of the first shots fired in the America Civil War (with 2015 marking the 150th anniversary of the war’s end) and, more recently, the...
- Paper
- 15.50 Dancing in the Vaults: Examining Brendan Fernandes’ “Lost Bodies”
- Participant Dr. Sarah E.K. Smith (Harvard University) |
- 11:00 - 11:30 | 30 minutes Part of: The Artistry of Heritage
- Bearing in mind the legacy of artist-history interventions, this paper will address one such project to consider how heritage collections can be...
- Paper
- Cultural Contestation: Politics and Governance of Heritage UQAM, pavillon J.-A. De Sève (DS) - DS-1950
- 11:00 - 17:00 | 6 hours
- Heritage practices often lead to social exclusion. As an "Authorized Heritage Discourse" (AHD) (Smith 2006) may define what is considered to be her...
- Regular session
- The Artistry of Heritage UQAM, pavillon J.-A. De Sève (DS) - DS-M460
- 11:00 - 17:00 | 6 hours
- This session explores artist-history exchanges in the context of heritage sites, venues and spaces, and considers recent curatorial and artistic...
- Regular session
- 16.00 Mitigating Cultural Contestation: The Case of Black Pete
- Participant Dr. Pieter Wagenaar (Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam) | Participant Jeroen Rodenberg (Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam) |
- 11:00 - 11:30 | 30 minutes Part of: Cultural Contestation: Politics and Governance of Heritage
- In current cultural heritage literature there is much emphasis on the uses of heritage in the construction of group identities. The (hi)stories ...
- Paper
- 15.30 Recognition Politics and Multicultural Heritagization in Canada
- Participant Dr Susan Ashley (Northumbria University) |
- 11:00 - 11:30 | 30 minutes Part of: Cultural Contestation: Politics and Governance of Heritage
- With Co-author Caitlin Gordon-Walker Ethno-cultural groups in Canada use community centres as cultural spaces to promote a sense ...
- Paper
- 11.40 Embodied Memoration: Unsettling Colonial Forms through Performative Acts in the Everyday
- Participant Leah Decter (Queen's University) |
- 11:00 - 11:30 | 30 minutes Part of: The Artistry of Heritage
- This paper foregrounds, as critical “artist-history exchanges,” performative interventions that act upon everyday spaces and objects with the im...
- Paper
- 14.00 Disseminating Disgust: De-colonizing Monuments through Affective Atrategies: The Case of Cecil John Rhodes in Cape Town and Oxford
- Participant Dr. Britta Timm Knudsen (Aarhus University) |
- 11:00 - 11:30 | 30 minutes Part of: Cultural Contestation: Politics and Governance of Heritage
- This paper argues that political mobilization and enthusiasm is created as a consequence of profane strategies of disgust rather than of anger a...
- Paper
12:30
12:30
- Heritage as Global Challenge UQAM, pavillon J.-A. De Sève (DS) - DS-2518
- 12:30 - 13:30 | 1 hour
- A new Centre for Critical Heritage Studies in partnership between University College London and University of Gothenburg started in April 2016 a...
- Talk
- Lunchboxes | Boîtes à lunch UQAM, pavillon J.-A. De Sève (DS) - DS Ground Floor Hall
- 12:30 - 13:30 | 1 hour
- Repas
15:00
15:00
- Break | Pause UQAM, pavillon J.-A. De Sève (DS) - DS Ground Floor Hall
- 15:00 - 15:30 | 30 minutes
- Pause
17:00
17:00
- Smoked meat in questions Bistro le Sanguinet - Bistro, étage principal et terrasse
- 17:00 - 18:00 | 1 hour
- This festive event will offer delegates a taste of one of the iconic dishes of Montreal, the smoked meat sandwich, imported by Jewish immigration f...
- Cocktail
18:30
18:30
- Keynote: Is Tangible to Intangible as Formal is to Informal ? (Michael Herzfeld)
- Signup required UQAM, pavillon Judith-Jasmin (J) - Salle Alfred-Laliberté
- 18:30 - 20:00 | 1 hour 30 minutes
- Most of what we experience as heritage emerges into conscious recognition through a complex mixture of political and ideological filters, including...
- Keynote with simultaneous translation / Conférence avec traduction simultanée

7:00
7:00
- Through the alleys of Saint-Henri - guided by Pohanna Pyne Feinberg
- Signup required UQAM, pavillon J.-A. De Sève (DS) - DS Registration table (meeting point)
- 7:00 - 9:00 | 2 hours
- Movement, stillness, and creation will be combined during this walk as participants are encouraged to attune themselves to the environment through ...
- Tour
- Registration UQAM, pavillon J.-A. De Sève (DS) - DS Main hall
- 7:00 - 13:00 | 6 hours
- Morning Coffee UQAM, pavillon J.-A. De Sève (DS) - DS Ground Floor Hall
- 7:00 - 9:00 | 2 hours
- Pause
9:00
9:00
- 10.00 The Role of World Heritage Sites in Urban Revitalization
- Participant Julia Tétényi (Erasmus University Rotterdam) |
- 9:00 - 9:30 | 30 minutes Part of: Current Research II: Engaging and Uncovering Collective Memories
- Cultural clusters seem to have a leading role in urban and cultural policy decisions. In recent years, more and more cultural clusters attract i...
- Paper
- Changing Places, Changing People? Critical Heritage(s) of Diaspora, Migration and Belonging II UQAM, pavillon J.-A. De Sève (DS) - DS-M560
- 9:00 - 12:30 | 3 hours 30 minutes
- Much is being made of the perceived breakdown of the nation-state, which was historically configured as a “container” of heritage formations, adopt...
- Regular session
10:30
10:30
- Break | Pause UQAM, pavillon J.-A. De Sève (DS) - DS Ground Floor Hall
- 10:30 - 11:00 | 30 minutes
- Pause
14:00
14:00
- Keynote: Renaming, Removal, Recontextualization of Heritage: Purging History, Claiming the Present, Imagining the Future? (What Change-Role for Heritage Professionals?) (James Count Early)
- Signup required Musée des Beaux-Ars de Montréal - Cummings Auditorium
- 14:00 - 15:30 | 1 hour 30 minutes
- "What does heritage change?" is a multifaceted question to which the answer(s) are in primary respects related to real-life negotiations among dif...
- Keynote with simultaneous translation / Conférence avec traduction simultanée

19:00
19:00
- Film Series: De engel van Doel
- Signup required Concordia, LB Building - LB 125
- 19:00 - 21:00 | 2 hours
- Directed by Tom Fassaert and presented by Marc Jacobs. ___ Doel, a Belgian village near the Dutch border, is disappearing quickly and d...
7:30
7:30
- Un chant yiddish au creux de l'oreille - Traversée
- Signup required Concordia, John Molson School of Business Building (MB) - MB 2.130
- 7:30 - 8:30 | 1 hour
- (in French and English) L’artiste et anthropologue Miléna Kartowski-Aïach no...
- Event
9:00
9:00
- 09.00 Ethnoheritage: Heritage Theory from the American Anthropological Perspective
- Participant Prof. Kathryn Lafrenz Samuels (University of Maryland, Department of Anthropology, United States) |
- 9:00 - 9:30 | 30 minutes Part of: Critical Heritage Theory: Foundational Cores and Innovative Edges
- The discipline of anthropology has been home to some of the most productive elaborations of cultural heritage research in the United States. In ...
- Paper
- 09.30 Unless They Value our Invisibles, Their Visible Will Never Be Safe: Linking Spirits, Monumental Ruins and Baobab Trees of the Swahili Coast in Tanzania
- Participant Dr. Elgidius Ichumbaki (University of Dar es Salaam, Tanzania) |
- 9:00 - 9:30 | 30 minutes Part of: Subversion and Heritage in Contemporary Africa
- Paper
- 14.00 Just Heritage? Examining the Redevelopment of Jaffa’s Port (Israel) from a Social Justice Perspective
- Participant Nufar Avni (McGill University) |
- 9:00 - 9:30 | 30 minutes Part of: Contested Pasts: Urban Heritage in Divided Cities
- “Heritage” is a term that is ambiguous in the best of circumstances. However, it becomes even more so in urban environments where conflicts of i...
- Paper
- 11.00 Moving History and History in the Making: A Contrasting Comparison on Heritage and Memory Culture in Southern Africa
- Participant Mr Matthias Schulze M.A. |
- 9:00 - 9:30 | 30 minutes Part of: Subversion and Heritage in Contemporary Africa
- “Thank God they have taken him off. It reminds me of the colonial past.” (Interview excerpt) These were the words that expressed the gr...
- Paper
- Critical Heritage Theory: Foundational Cores and Innovative Edges Concordia, John Molson School of Business Building (MB) - MB 3.435
- 9:00 - 15:00 | 6 hours
- The field of heritage has emerged as a key site of reflection. Influenced by shifts in the academy (e.g., post-colonial, post-structural and femini...
- Regular session
- Critical Creation series: The visits (of which there were none) Episode N. 2 Concordia, Engineering, Computer Science and Visual Arts Integrated Complex Building (EV) - EV Atrium
- 9:00 - 17:00 | 8 hours
- Dominique Fontaine / Livia Daza-Paris, A video and photographic installation.
- Event
- 11.30 Performing Imaginary Healings: The Post-Conflict Heritage of Ebrington Barracks in Derry-Londonderry
- Participant Dr Tom Maguire (Ulster University) |
- 9:00 - 9:30 | 30 minutes Part of: Contested Pasts: Urban Heritage in Divided Cities
- The crucible of the violent conflict in Northern Ireland in the latter part of the twentieth century is known euphemistically as “The Troubles.”...
- Paper
- 11.30 Acting on the Body: Heritage as a Governing Strategy for Disciplining the Female Body in Twentieth-Century Iceland
- Participant Ólafur Rastrick (University of Iceland) |
- 9:00 - 9:30 | 30 minutes Part of: Critical Heritage Theory: Foundational Cores and Innovative Edges
- The title of the paper refers to Tony Bennett’s article “Acting on the social” and his employment of the Foucauldian notion of governmentality e...
- Paper
- 11.40 Crowds, Events and "Acts" of Citizenship: Heritage-Making at the Chattri Indian Memorial
- Participant Dr Susan Ashley (Northumbria University) |
- 9:00 - 9:30 | 30 minutes Part of: Activism, Civil Society and Heritage
- Movements such as Occupy Wall Street, embracing the immanent possibilities of the “here and now,” assert the affective presence and radical pote...
- Paper
12:30
12:30
- Small (ERA Architects Inc.)
- Signup required Concordia, John Molson School of Business Building (MB) - MB 2.445
- 12:30 - 13:30 | 1 hour
- As Canada shifts from a resource-based economy to a knowledge-based economy, small communities that were established to service the primary sect...
- Talk
13:30
13:30
- Moving Memory: Difficult Histories in Dialogue (exhibition opening) Concordia, LB Building - LB 671 CaPSL/CEREV
- 13:30 - 15:00 | 1 hour 30 minutes
- Around the globe the planning of large-scale memorial-museum projects concerned with violent histories are frequently marred by conflict, omissi...
- Research-Creation
18:00
18:00
- Film Series Celebration : Sugar Shack Event
- Signup required Concordia, LB Building - LB 123
- 18:00 - 19:00 | 1 hour
- To celebrate our film series dedicated to heritage, sponsored by the Department of American Studies at the University of Maryland and the United St...
- Cocktail
7:00
7:00
- In Griffintown/ Dans le Griff and Scandal! Vice, Crime and Morality in Montreal, 1940-1960
- Signup required Concordia, Engineering, Computer Science and Visual Arts Integrated Complex Building (EV) - EV Atrium (meeting point)
- 7:00 - 9:00 | 2 hours
- (Guided visits to Two Exhibitions, Centre d’histoire de Montréal- bilingual) – The Centre d’histoire de Montréal presents Dans le Griff
- Tour
9:00
9:00
- 11.30 The Heritage of Solidarity
- Participant Roman Sebastyanski (University of the West of Scotland) |
- 9:00 - 9:30 | 30 minutes Part of: Representing Intangible Heritage of Post-Industrial Waterfront Zones: Politics of Seeing, Ways of Noticing
- In 1996 the Gdansk Shipyard—a place associated with 150 years of shipbuilding as well as the birthplace of the Solidarity movement—went bankrupt...
- Paper
- 11.00 Choosing Histories: Agency and Motive in the Representation of Cultural Heritage
- Participant John Mullen (Edinburgh, Scotland) |
- 9:00 - 9:30 | 30 minutes Part of: Representing Intangible Heritage of Post-Industrial Waterfront Zones: Politics of Seeing, Ways of Noticing
- This paper examines various uses of representations of heritage as tools for transforming post-industrial waterfront areas of Scotland and Polan...
- Paper
- 09.30 Commemoration at the Edge: From Preservation to Activism
- Participant Anita Bakshi (Rutgers University) |
- 9:00 - 9:30 | 30 minutes Part of: Current Research IV
- With the increased focus on preserving the past has come scrutiny and criticism of commemorative practices and the “heritage crusade.” One of th...
- Paper
- Representing Intangible Heritage of Post-Industrial Waterfront Zones: Politics of Seeing, Ways of Noticing Concordia, John Molson School of Business Building (MB) - MB 5.215
- 9:00 - 15:00 | 6 hours
- While intangible cultural heritage is an important factor in maintaining cultural diversity in the face of growing globalization, there is still li...
- Regular session
11:00
11:00
- Critical Creation Series : LWÀZA (The Noise) Concordia, Engineering, Computer Science and Visual Arts Integrated Complex Building (EV) - EV Atrium
- 11:00 - 12:30 | 1 hour 30 minutes
- Nyata Nyata (Karla Etienne and Zab Mabongou) This hybrid demonstration project explores the links between heritage...
- Event