Johannes R. Chan
@johannes-r-chan.bsky.social
STS PhD student @ YorkU • Environmental history of long 19C Ontario watermills, British colonialism & the metabolism of empire
if anyone ever asks you where you are really from, maybe tell them your ancestors way back were single-celled organisms that lived in a hydrothermal vent, but you're not exactly sure which one or where exactly it was located
December 12, 2025 at 1:27 AM
if anyone ever asks you where you are really from, maybe tell them your ancestors way back were single-celled organisms that lived in a hydrothermal vent, but you're not exactly sure which one or where exactly it was located
I recently encountered was Kelsey Leonard's chapter "Wunnáumwash: Wampum Justice" in Deyohahá:ge: wlupress.wlu.ca/Books/D/Deyohaha-ge3
abt how wampum beads are made from hard shell clams from the Atlantic coast. How much these organisms and their metabolisms have made the world we currently inhabit
abt how wampum beads are made from hard shell clams from the Atlantic coast. How much these organisms and their metabolisms have made the world we currently inhabit
Deyohahá:ge:
Wilfrid Laurier University Press - Transforming Ideas
wlupress.wlu.ca
December 5, 2025 at 5:14 PM
I recently encountered was Kelsey Leonard's chapter "Wunnáumwash: Wampum Justice" in Deyohahá:ge: wlupress.wlu.ca/Books/D/Deyohaha-ge3
abt how wampum beads are made from hard shell clams from the Atlantic coast. How much these organisms and their metabolisms have made the world we currently inhabit
abt how wampum beads are made from hard shell clams from the Atlantic coast. How much these organisms and their metabolisms have made the world we currently inhabit
Archaeometabolomics, the study of metabolites (small molecules produced by metabolisms) to make historical claims about the past, so well exemplifies Landecker's emphasis on metabolism's shift from industrial to informational over a decade and a half ago & more recently w ‘the biology of history’.
December 5, 2025 at 4:59 PM
Archaeometabolomics, the study of metabolites (small molecules produced by metabolisms) to make historical claims about the past, so well exemplifies Landecker's emphasis on metabolism's shift from industrial to informational over a decade and a half ago & more recently w ‘the biology of history’.
I splurged on this 8 immortals dancong oolong from the classic Nanyang teashop Pek Sin Choon about a year and a half ago when visiting family in Singapore. Nearing the end of the bag, but enjoying a cup today, and it is divine. One of my favourite teas: peksinchoon.com/product/eigh...
Eight Immortal Fragrance Dancong 八仙香单枞 – Pek Sin Choon Pte Ltd – 白新春茶庄
peksinchoon.com
November 13, 2025 at 8:32 PM
I splurged on this 8 immortals dancong oolong from the classic Nanyang teashop Pek Sin Choon about a year and a half ago when visiting family in Singapore. Nearing the end of the bag, but enjoying a cup today, and it is divine. One of my favourite teas: peksinchoon.com/product/eigh...
idea to rebrand the entire TTC system as a giant immersive Kafka-themed escape room
November 6, 2025 at 4:33 PM
idea to rebrand the entire TTC system as a giant immersive Kafka-themed escape room
If you have some extra funds to spare please consider supporting some really great folks in Cuba with relief and recovery efforts. Cuba’s especially struggling now because the US blockade makes it so hard to get relief supplies in. scmcanada.org/donate/
November 5, 2025 at 1:28 AM
If you have some extra funds to spare please consider supporting some really great folks in Cuba with relief and recovery efforts. Cuba’s especially struggling now because the US blockade makes it so hard to get relief supplies in. scmcanada.org/donate/
I encountered the oft-repeated thing today in a piece by Kate Marvel about how the same water we drink also quenched the thirst of dinosaurs and nourished the earliest forms of life. It got me thinking about the conservation of mass and energy, concepts central to metabolism, which also imply how...
October 27, 2025 at 7:28 PM
I encountered the oft-repeated thing today in a piece by Kate Marvel about how the same water we drink also quenched the thirst of dinosaurs and nourished the earliest forms of life. It got me thinking about the conservation of mass and energy, concepts central to metabolism, which also imply how...
Reposted by Johannes R. Chan
The Alchemy Lecture 2025
Sound—at the Interregnum
Glen Coulthard
Canisia Lubrin
Madeleine Thien
Immanuel Wilkins
Date: October 30, 2025
Time: 5 - 8 p.m. (Reception: 5 - 6 p.m.)
Venue: Tribute Communities Recital Hall, CIBC Lobby (Location) YorkU
Event type: Hybrid – in person and online
Sound—at the Interregnum
Glen Coulthard
Canisia Lubrin
Madeleine Thien
Immanuel Wilkins
Date: October 30, 2025
Time: 5 - 8 p.m. (Reception: 5 - 6 p.m.)
Venue: Tribute Communities Recital Hall, CIBC Lobby (Location) YorkU
Event type: Hybrid – in person and online
September 14, 2025 at 8:25 AM
The Alchemy Lecture 2025
Sound—at the Interregnum
Glen Coulthard
Canisia Lubrin
Madeleine Thien
Immanuel Wilkins
Date: October 30, 2025
Time: 5 - 8 p.m. (Reception: 5 - 6 p.m.)
Venue: Tribute Communities Recital Hall, CIBC Lobby (Location) YorkU
Event type: Hybrid – in person and online
Sound—at the Interregnum
Glen Coulthard
Canisia Lubrin
Madeleine Thien
Immanuel Wilkins
Date: October 30, 2025
Time: 5 - 8 p.m. (Reception: 5 - 6 p.m.)
Venue: Tribute Communities Recital Hall, CIBC Lobby (Location) YorkU
Event type: Hybrid – in person and online
Looking forward to this. Will be speaking on the Social Movements and Decolonization Roundtable at 10:20am about organizing with the Student Christian Movement. It will be moderated by Ariel Siagan (who is doing really interesting research on Christians for National Liberation in the Philippines).
Announcing! TST Conference: Spaces of Encounter: Interdisciplinary Conversations in Theological Research - Nov 14, hosted at Knox College. FREE to attend and includes lunch; attend in-person or remotely. Limited in-person space, register by Nov 7. More info and registration: bit.ly/48WYhph #theology
October 27, 2025 at 4:05 PM
Looking forward to this. Will be speaking on the Social Movements and Decolonization Roundtable at 10:20am about organizing with the Student Christian Movement. It will be moderated by Ariel Siagan (who is doing really interesting research on Christians for National Liberation in the Philippines).
An excellent blog post on the Association of Canadian Archivists blog by Isa Carlin on Filipino activist archives in Canada. Organizing with ICHRP and other related Filipino activist groups was extremely formative for me. They are among the most organized folks I've met: archivists.ca/Blog/13488329
Association of Canadian Archivists - Rights & Records: Filipino Community Archives and Activism
ORG description
archivists.ca
September 17, 2025 at 3:56 AM
An excellent blog post on the Association of Canadian Archivists blog by Isa Carlin on Filipino activist archives in Canada. Organizing with ICHRP and other related Filipino activist groups was extremely formative for me. They are among the most organized folks I've met: archivists.ca/Blog/13488329
DuckDuckGo was mentioned in a 4S panel on practices of refusal this morning and I remember using it a lot once, but reverting back to google because I could always review my own search history to revisit lines of thoughts I was having or find things I couldn't remember the words for but knew when...
September 3, 2025 at 5:12 PM
DuckDuckGo was mentioned in a 4S panel on practices of refusal this morning and I remember using it a lot once, but reverting back to google because I could always review my own search history to revisit lines of thoughts I was having or find things I couldn't remember the words for but knew when...
There's been a lot of celebration of Oscar Peterson at 100. Almost every week I sit just steps away from where Peterson was laid to rest. I was surprised to learn recently that one of his favourite jazz pianists was Teddy Wilson. These are some mentions of Wilson in Peterson's autobiography...
August 22, 2025 at 5:13 AM
There's been a lot of celebration of Oscar Peterson at 100. Almost every week I sit just steps away from where Peterson was laid to rest. I was surprised to learn recently that one of his favourite jazz pianists was Teddy Wilson. These are some mentions of Wilson in Peterson's autobiography...
Why did nobody tell me Thomas Sankara was in a jazz band called Tout-à-Coup: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tout-%C...
Tout-à-Coup Jazz - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
August 21, 2025 at 3:32 AM
Why did nobody tell me Thomas Sankara was in a jazz band called Tout-à-Coup: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tout-%C...
pretty wild there are people out there making synthetic cells that can metabolize and reproduce: www.science.org/doi/epdf/10....
Integrated translation and metabolism in a partially self-synthesizing biochemical network
One of the hallmarks of living organisms is their capacity for self-organization and regeneration, which requires a tight integration of metabolic and genetic networks. We sought to construct a linked...
www.science.org
August 16, 2025 at 2:44 AM
pretty wild there are people out there making synthetic cells that can metabolize and reproduce: www.science.org/doi/epdf/10....
Recently quit spotify over the Helsing thing, but found out about the Naxos Music Library app that's free with a Toronto Public Library account. You can download music for offline listening. Lots of other great resources available for free via TPL: www.torontopubliclibrary.ca/books-video-...
www.torontopubliclibrary.ca
July 10, 2025 at 3:43 AM
Recently quit spotify over the Helsing thing, but found out about the Naxos Music Library app that's free with a Toronto Public Library account. You can download music for offline listening. Lots of other great resources available for free via TPL: www.torontopubliclibrary.ca/books-video-...
I attended this really great talk today online. Prof. Leddy describes the affects of the sulphuric acid plant run by Noranda Mines on Serpent River FN and Indigenous resistance against it. I was just at the Noranda Earth Science Library ytd at UofT for dissertation research wondering abt its name.
Event
Lianne Leddy "Serpent River Resurgence: Anishinaabek Activism in Cold War Canada" (June 26, tomorrow)
csn-rec.ca/news/78072-e...
Lianne Leddy "Serpent River Resurgence: Anishinaabek Activism in Cold War Canada" (June 26, tomorrow)
csn-rec.ca/news/78072-e...
June 26, 2025 at 10:46 PM
I attended this really great talk today online. Prof. Leddy describes the affects of the sulphuric acid plant run by Noranda Mines on Serpent River FN and Indigenous resistance against it. I was just at the Noranda Earth Science Library ytd at UofT for dissertation research wondering abt its name.
Reposted by Johannes R. Chan
Excited to be teaching this summer! The course is online, meeting Mondays and Wednesdays for 6 weeks starting July 14. It's a new course, looking at degrowth and liberation theology, the topic of the book I'm writing with @mattbernico.bsky.social.
Info and register: www.icscanada.edu/summer-courses
Info and register: www.icscanada.edu/summer-courses
May 7, 2025 at 4:46 PM
Excited to be teaching this summer! The course is online, meeting Mondays and Wednesdays for 6 weeks starting July 14. It's a new course, looking at degrowth and liberation theology, the topic of the book I'm writing with @mattbernico.bsky.social.
Info and register: www.icscanada.edu/summer-courses
Info and register: www.icscanada.edu/summer-courses
(1) last month of being stuck at my desk marking papers vs (2) the past year as a whole
May 2, 2025 at 2:52 PM
(1) last month of being stuck at my desk marking papers vs (2) the past year as a whole
I feel like whittling down writing to meet word counts is one of the most difficult and time-consuming things for me. Yet I also feel it often improves the quality of my excessively tangential style of writing, and also helps me rethink what is most essential about my argument.
April 29, 2025 at 9:51 PM
I feel like whittling down writing to meet word counts is one of the most difficult and time-consuming things for me. Yet I also feel it often improves the quality of my excessively tangential style of writing, and also helps me rethink what is most essential about my argument.
Reposted by Johannes R. Chan
It's your lucky day! We're having a Flash Sale, today and tomorrow only. Save 50% on all books (including pre-orders) and journal issues. Use coupon FLASH50.
buff.ly/hpjC4Uw
buff.ly/hpjC4Uw
March 25, 2025 at 3:15 PM
It's your lucky day! We're having a Flash Sale, today and tomorrow only. Save 50% on all books (including pre-orders) and journal issues. Use coupon FLASH50.
buff.ly/hpjC4Uw
buff.ly/hpjC4Uw
Dionne Brand said in an interview at the Toronto Library that "the Napoleonic Wars... are really colonial wars about who owns Sri Lanka, who owns Barbados, who owns Tobago, et cetera." brickmag.com/unseen-scrip...
Could anyone suggest a good anticolonial or radical history of the Napoleonic Wars?
Could anyone suggest a good anticolonial or radical history of the Napoleonic Wars?
Unseen Scripts: A Conversation with Dionne Brand | Brick
The following conversation took place at the Toronto Reference Library on September 11, 2024, to celebrate the release of Dionne Brand’s Salvage: Readings from the Wreck. David Chariandy: You describe...
brickmag.com
March 14, 2025 at 12:03 AM
Dionne Brand said in an interview at the Toronto Library that "the Napoleonic Wars... are really colonial wars about who owns Sri Lanka, who owns Barbados, who owns Tobago, et cetera." brickmag.com/unseen-scrip...
Could anyone suggest a good anticolonial or radical history of the Napoleonic Wars?
Could anyone suggest a good anticolonial or radical history of the Napoleonic Wars?
Reposted by Johannes R. Chan
Joy for days! I was so happy and honored to give a lecture and workshop research in the @tru-uoft.bsky.social. Meeting and engaging with Dr. Murphy was as joyous as it was intellectually generative. Toronto owes me not a single thing. Thank you dearly for the invitation.
March 6, 2025 at 3:40 PM
Joy for days! I was so happy and honored to give a lecture and workshop research in the @tru-uoft.bsky.social. Meeting and engaging with Dr. Murphy was as joyous as it was intellectually generative. Toronto owes me not a single thing. Thank you dearly for the invitation.
Reposted by Johannes R. Chan
I’m thrilled and honored to be in Toronto to give this lecture. I hope to see you there.
Our Technoscience Salon is back! Join us this Tuesday from 4-6PM for a lecture by Dr. Jayson Maurice Porter
(@roguechieftan.bsky.social) on arsenic, race and empire 🤓
www.eventbrite.ca/e/2025-techn...
(@roguechieftan.bsky.social) on arsenic, race and empire 🤓
www.eventbrite.ca/e/2025-techn...
2025 Technoscience Salon: Jayson Maurice Porter
Join us for a lecture by Dr. Jayson Maurice Porter on arsenic, race and empire for the 2025 Technoscience Salon: What is a Chemical?
www.eventbrite.ca
March 4, 2025 at 3:19 PM
I’m thrilled and honored to be in Toronto to give this lecture. I hope to see you there.
I also would love to read a monograph by a radical historian or STS scholar on this (if anyone knows someone who studies American military science laboratories lmk): en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_...
United States Army Research Laboratory - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
January 23, 2025 at 4:56 AM
I also would love to read a monograph by a radical historian or STS scholar on this (if anyone knows someone who studies American military science laboratories lmk): en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_...