Volume 7(1)  

                                          NURSING:                                                                      A DISCIPLINE FOR SOCIAL CHANGE

Witness readers, editors, reviewers, supporters and contributors form a collective of critical nurses in Canada and beyond who strive to ameliorate inequities in the health and quality of life of all. By virtue of nursing’s privileged societal position, we witness a wide array of inequities that require us to take action. Our tag line represents the ethos of the journal: “See^* it .... Speak it .... Write it .... Change it ....”

Periodically we issue an OPEN Call for Papers that reflects the ethos and intent of the journal - For 2023 we open with an Open Call we are naming " Nursing as a Discipline for Social Change."

Submission examples may include but are not limited to:

• Nursing and Social Justice
• Nursing AS Social Justice
• Nurse Activism- examples, barriers, facilitators
• Whistle Blowing in Nursing and health care
• Rebel Nurses then and now
• Critical Research Methodologies
• Examples of/Calls for Resistance in Nursing
  • Anti-Oppression Nursing Efforts: Past or Present
• Policy Advocacy by Nursing
• Disruptive Innovations in Nursing Research, Practice or Education
• Critical Pedagogy/Education for Social Change
• Intersectional Analyses of Health or Quality of Life
• Critical Analyses of Power in the context of Health, Quality of Life, or Nursing
• Health (In)Equity
• Social Justice Nursing
• Decolonizing Nursing
• Linguistic Hegemony and Resistance
• Critical Community Health Nursing
• Critical Disability lenses and practices in nursing
• other? - Feel free to contact the editor in advance of the deadline to discuss a potential piece, and include a proposed abstract - we'd love to hear your ideas!

Submissions are to be nurse-authored or if submitted by a team, the lead/first author must be a nurse. Submission formats may include arts-based knowledge translation, practice-based research-based, or review manuscripts.  First-person narrative is welcomed and encouraged. For author guidelines, please see www.yorku.ca/witness. For any questions including to discuss a proposed submission, don’t hesitate to contact us at witness@yorku.ca. 

 Deadline for Submission through our online portal: January 6th , 2025

Note: Prospective authors must register with the journal in order to submit their work. Please be sure to submit, upload and populate all required elements at the time of submission. 

          

                                                 

 

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Call for Papers

                                                                 2024 Vol 6 (2)

                                                             Children are people too!                                                   

         Re-imagining Children’s Nursing through a social studies of childhood lens

 

Guest Editor 

Franco A. Carnevale, RN, PhD (Psych), PhD (Phil) has been a Children’s Nurse for over 45 years. He’s the co-founder and principal investigator of VOICE: The Childhood Ethics Project, an interdisciplinary collaborative committed to advancing knowledge and action relating to childhood ethics. 

Intended Focus of this Special Issue 

The Canadian Journal of Critical Nursing Discourse is pleased to announce a special issue with a particular focus on Children's Nursing and the need to push back on dehumanizing hegemonic discourses and practices. This call for papers is intended to foster scholarship that explores and interrogates age-based developmental orientations that characterize young people as immature or incapable – as human becomings rather than full human beings – building on growing discourses within interdisciplinary studies of childhood (i.e., Childhood Studies). The Childhood Studies literature has advanced understandings of young people as active moral agents with aspirations, concerns, and capacities to participate meaningfully in discussions and decisions regarding research, policymaking and practices that affect them and others that they care about. Yet, very little of these advances have been integrated within the health professions literature in general or within nursing in particular. We are striving to promote scholarship that pushes back on pathology-based discourses in pediatric nursing, calling for childhood-based discourses in Children’s Nursing centered on the experiences and voices of young people as active agents.  

 

Potential topics (suggestions, but not limited to) 

1. Re-examining conceptions of best interests and protection within Children’s Nursing 
2. Critical analyses of nursing practices that impede or bolster young people’s agential expression and meaningful participation in discussions and decisions that interest them 
3. Understanding childhood as an intersectional dimension: Examining the health and health care-related experiences of racialized young people (e.g., Indigenous children and youth) 
4. Innovations in the participation of young people in the development of research, policies and practices 
5. Rethinking pedagogical approaches in Children’s Nursing in entry-to-practice preparation and continuing education 
6. Issues of consent in children’s health care
7. Countering developmentalism in Children’s Nursing approaches
8. Application of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child in Children’s Nursing Principles and Practices
9. From Pediatric Nursing to Children’s Nursing – implications, perturbations, considerations
10. Critical Analyses of Ethics as related to Children and Children’s Nursing
11. Other ideas? Connect with us to talk about it!

 

Manuscripts from nurse activists, students, clinicians, educators, researchers, administrators, policy makers/critics and nursing organizations are welcome, including contributions form young people. We especially welcome Indigenous perspectives, the experiences of nurses from many different racial and ethnic backgrounds, and contributions that reflect a critical analysis. Our guest editor will provide an editorial focusing throughout the development of this special issue. 

 

Guidelines for Authors: 

Submissions are to be nurse-authored or if submitted by a team, the lead author must be a nurse. Manuscripts should have a clear relevance to nursing. Additionally, Witness requires adherence to our authorship criteria, found at

https://witness.journals.yorku.ca/index.php/default/AuthReq Prospective authors must also familiarize themselves with the author guidelines set out in the journal found here:  https://witness.journals.yorku.ca/index.php/default/about/submissions . Undergraduate student submissions are welcomed, and such submissions are to be supported/mentored by a nursing faculty member, and this must be indicated in the cover letter. 

Firm Submission Deadline: June 30^th, 2024 

                                                                                                                                                                                            Note: All required materials and online entries must be submitted through the journal’s online portal at www.yorku.ca/witness, following the journal and the Council on Publication Ethics’ guidelines including those associated with authorship, conflict of interest etc. Please ensure author teams review our webpage. Lastly, prospective authors must register with the journal in order to submit their work. 

For any questions regarding the journal or this call for papers including a desire to discuss a proposed submission not included in the introductory list of possible topics and foci, please don’t hesitate to contact the editor, Dr. Cheryl van Daalen-Smith at witness@yorku.ca 

Selected References 

Carnevale, F.A. (2022). The VOICE Children's Nursing Framework: Drawing on childhood studies to advance nursing practice with young people. Nursing Inquiry, 29, e12495.   

Esser, F., Baader, M. S., Betz, T., & Hungerland, B. (Eds.). (2016). Reconceptualising agency and childhood: New perspectives in childhood studies. Routledge. 

 

Randall, D. (2016). Pragmatic children's nursing: A theory for children and their childhoods. Routledge. 

        

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                            OPEN Call for Papers

                                         Volume 6(1)  

             CRITICAL NURSING FOR HEALTH EQUITY

Witness readers, editors, reviewers, supporters and contributors form a collective of critical nurses in Canada and beyond who strive to ameliorate inequities in the health and quality of life of all. By virtue of nursing’s privileged societal position, we witness a wide array of inequities that require us to take action. Our tag line represents the ethos of the journal: “See^* it .... Speak it .... Write it .... Change it ....”

While we LOVE special issues, every so often we issue an OPEN Call for Papers that reflects the ethos and intent of the journal - For 2024 we open with our periodic Open Call named: " Critical Nursing for Health Equity."

Submission examples may include but are not limited to:

• Nurse Activism- examples, barriers, facilitators
• Whistle Blowing in Nursing and health care
• Rebel Nurses then and now
• Critical Research Methodologies
• Examples of/Calls for Resistance in Nursing
  • Anti-Oppression Nursing Efforts: Past or Present
• Policy Advocacy by Nursing
• Disruptive Innovations in Nursing Research, Practice or Education
• Critical Pedagogy/Education for Social Change
• Intersectional Analyses of Health or Quality of Life
• Critical Analyses of Power in the context of Health, Quality of Life, or Nursing
• Health (In)Equity
• Social Justice Nursing
• Decolonizing Nursing
• Linguistic Hegemony and Resistance
• Critical Community Health Nursing
• Critical Disability lenses and practices in nursing
• other? - Feel free to contact the editor in advance of the deadline to discuss a potential piece, and include a proposed abstract

Submissions are to be nurse-authored or if submitted by a team, the lead/first author must be a nurse. Submission formats may include arts-based knowledge translation, practice-based research-based, or review manuscripts.  First-person narrative is welcomed and encouraged. Note: While we offer much support and patience as a critical journal, given our very limited infrastructure, students or first-time authors are strongly encouraged to partner with an experienced author for guidance and support. For author guidelines, please see www.yorku.ca/witness. For any questions including to discuss a proposed submission, don’t hesitate to contact us at witness@yorku.ca. 

 Deadline for Submission through our online portal: January 7th, 2024

Note: Prospective authors must register with the journal in order to submit their work. Please be sure to submit, upload and populate all required elements at the time of submission. 

________________________________________________

                             2023. Volume 5(2)  

 

                       Why are we Leaving?                                                                The Crisis and Crumbling of Nursing Workforces

                                                                                                          

The Canadian Journal of Critical Nursing Discourse is pleased to announce a special issue on exploring the crisis in the nursing workforce, asking the rhetorical question, “Why are we leaving?” Intended to foster scholarship that explores and interrogates the crisis within the nursing workforce, and the myriad reasons behind it, this special issue builds from the growing discourse about the crisis in the nursing workforce in Canada and internationally.

Guest Editors

Michael Villeneuve, MSc RN FAAN FRCN FFNMRCSI

After 44 years in health care, Michael recently retired from his role as the chief executive officer of the Canadian Nurses Association and leads his own policy consultancy, Michael Villeneuve Associates.

Linda Silas, BScN RN

A lifelong activist committed to social justice and advancing nursing and universal health care, Linda is the president of Canada’s largest nursing organization, the Canadian Federation of Nurses Unions, a role she has held since 2003.

Intended Focus of this Special Issue

In 2020, the Canadian Federation of Nurses Unions surveyed 7,153 nursing professionals, discovering a higher than typical plan of respondents to leave their position. The Registered Nurses Association of Ontario’s 2021 Work and Wellbeing Survey heard from over 2,000 nurses, discovering that close to 1 in 20 reported that they were going to leave the profession after the COVID-19 pandemic. At the start of 2022, a panel of nursing leaders collaborated to consider Canada’s post-pandemic nursing workforce, with the recognition that while nurses have assisted in aiding Canadians during this time, it came at a cost, especially due to care management approaches steeped in corporate mindsets that undervalue nursing’s contributions. Observations also highlighted how nurses have been poorly treated and neglected, contributing to the crisis, and crumbling of our nursing workforce. A call to stop viewing and treating nurses as commodities is not new, but it underscores this important policy brief.  Each contributor was asked to provide an opening reflection, with many observations informing this call for papers. Take for instance Dr. Kathleen MacMillan, who said: “The pre-existing stressors on nurses and other health care professionals were made worse by the pandemic because the system failed to listen… and apply the evidence available to create more humane and satisfying work environments.”

The editorial board of Witness, Canada’s critical nursing discourse journal, wants to provide yet another venue where nurses will be listened to. Why are we leaving? How can critical social science lenses and analyses further illuminate what is behind the crumble, the crisis, and the exodus of nurses?

Potential topics (suggestions, but not limited to)

• Witnessing senicide in Canada’s long term care homes during COVID-19
• Moral distress
• Power and privilege
• Voice
• What’s behind the fear?
• Critical perspectives on nurses’ mental health and vicarious trauma
• Increased privatization
• Inequities in access to health care
• Nurse union activisms
• The responses of professional nursing associations
• Trends in the nursing workforce in Canada
• Appling an EDI lens to nurse burnout
• What might the decolonization of corporate health care models change?
• ? others

 

Manuscripts from nurse activists, students, clinicians, educators, researchers, administrators, policy makers/critics and nursing organizations are welcome. We especially welcome Indigenous perspectives, the experiences of nurses from many different racial and ethnic backgrounds, and contributions that reflect a critical analysis. Our guest editors will provide an editorial focusing, in part, on the steady decimation of Canada’s nursing workforce since the 1990s.

Guidelines for Authors:

Submissions are to be nurse-authored or if submitted by a team, the lead author must be a nurse. Manuscripts should have a clear relevance to nursing. Additionally, Witness requires adherence to our authorship criteria, found at https://witness.journals.yorku.ca/index.php/default/AuthReq Prospective authors must also familiarize themselves with the author guidelines set out in the journal found here:  https://witness.journals.yorku.ca/index.php/default/about/submissions . Undergraduate student submissions are welcomed, and such submissions are to be supported/mentored by a nursing faculty member, and this must be indicated in the cover letter.

Firm Submission Deadline: June 30^th, 2023

                                                                                                                                                                  

Note: All required materials and online entries must be submitted through the journal’s online portal at www.yorku.ca/witness, following the journal and the Council on Publication Ethics’ guidelines including those associated with authorship, conflict of interest etc. Please ensure author teams review our webpage. Lastly, prospective authors must register with the journal in order to submit their work.

For any questions regarding the journal or this call for papers including a desire to discuss a proposed submission not included in the introductory list of possible topics and foci, please don’t hesitate to contact the editor, Dr. Cheryl van Daalen-Smith at witness@yorku.ca

References

             Canadian Federation of Nurses Unions. (2020). Outlook on nursing: A snapshot from Canadian nurses on work environments pre-COVID-19. [online]: Available from nursesunions.ca/research/outlook-on-nursing/

             Tomblin-Murphy, G., Sampalli, T., Bourque Bearskin, L., Cashen, L., Cummings G., Elliott Rose, A. Etowa, J., Grinspun, D., Jones, E.,   Lavoie-Tremblay, M., MacMillan, K., MacQuarrie, C., Martin-Misener, R., Oulton, J., Ricciardelli, R.,  Silas, L,  Thorne, S.  & Villeneuve. M. (2022).  Investing in Canada’s nursing workforce post-pandemic: A call to action. FACETS. 7(): 1051 -1120. https://doi.org/10.1139/facets-2022-0002

             Registered Nurses’ Association of Ontario. 2021d, March. Work and Wellbeing survey results. [online]: Available from rnao.ca/sites/rnao-ca/files/Nurses_Wellbeing_Survey_Results_-_March_31.pdf

       

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                           OPEN Call for Papers

                                         Volume 5(1)  

             CRITICAL NURSING FOR HEALTH EQUITY

Witness readers, editors, reviewers, supporters and contributors form a collective of critical nurses in Canada and beyond who strive to ameliorate inequities in the health and quality of life of all. By virtue of nursing’s privileged societal position, we witness a wide array of inequities that require us to take action. Our tag line represents the ethos of the journal: “See^* it .... Speak it .... Write it .... Change it ....”

Periodically we issue an OPEN Call for Papers that reflects the ethos and intent of the journal - For 2023 we open with an Open Call we are naming " Critical Nursing for Health Equity."

Submission examples may include but are not limited to:

• Nurse Activism- examples, barriers, facilitators
• Whistle Blowing in Nursing and health care
• Rebel Nurses then and now
• Critical Research Methodologies
• Examples of/Calls for Resistance in Nursing
  • Anti-Oppression Nursing Efforts: Past or Present
• Policy Advocacy by Nursing
• Disruptive Innovations in Nursing Research, Practice or Education
• Critical Pedagogy/Education for Social Change
• Intersectional Analyses of Health or Quality of Life
• Critical Analyses of Power in the context of Health, Quality of Life, or Nursing
• Health (In)Equity
• Social Justice Nursing
• Decolonizing Nursing
• Linguistic Hegemony and Resistance
• Critical Community Health Nursing
• Critical Disability lenses and practices in nursing
• other? - Feel free to contact the editor in advance of the deadline to discuss a potential piece, and include a proposed abstract

Submissions are to be nurse-authored or if submitted by a team, the lead/first author must be a nurse. Submission formats may include arts-based knowledge translation, practice-based research-based, or review manuscripts.  First-person narrative is welcomed and encouraged. For author guidelines, please see www.yorku.ca/witness. For any questions including to discuss a proposed submission, don’t hesitate to contact us at witness@yorku.ca. 

 Deadline for Submission through our online portal: January 3rd, 2023

Note: Prospective authors must register with the journal in order to submit their work. Please be sure to submit, upload and populate all required elements at the time of submission. 

          

                     

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Call for Papers Vol 4(2)

Critical Community Health Nursing:

Honoring the Legacy of Canada's Benita Cohen

Witness readers, editors, reviewers, supporters and contributors form a collective of critical nurses in Canada and beyond who strive to ameliorate inequities in the health and quality of life of all. One key sub speciality that pays particular attention to health inequities is Canada’s Community Health Nurses (CHNs).
In this special issue, we pay tribute to Dr. Benita Cohen’s legacy of inspiring a critical lens in the theory and practice of population health/community health nursing in Canada. Her work called for a critical lens to the approach of CHNs and to the intended outcomes of our practices. She promoted advocacy as critical in redressing health inequities; she advocated for population health as a necessary framework in public health; she explored PHN perspectives regarding our role in addressing child and family poverty; she promoted participatory action research methods in public health nursing; she tirelessly promoted the role of the PHN in health equity including co-authoring a conceptual framework so that organizations might have the capacity to enable PHNs to take up issues of health inequity; strengthening capacity of health professional education programs to promote social justice and health equity; and so much more.

Please see her full publication record here.

Authors are invited to explore her many contributions and consider infusing some of her arguments into their manuscripts. Submission examples may include but are not limited to:

• Critical Community Health Nursing: examples, barriers, facilitators
• Public health nursing and social justice
• Advocacy
• CHNs and health equity
• CHNs and participatory action research
• CHNS and the Social Determinants of Health
• Examples of/Calls for Resistance in Community Health Nursing
• Anti-Oppression Nursing Efforts: Past or Present
• Policy Advocacy
• Promoting social justice and health equity through CHN education
• Disruptive Innovations in Community Health Nursing Research, Practice or Education
• Partnering with Communities for Health Equity
• Examples of Community-Based advocacy and practice
• Examples of Community Development efforts
• The link between standards of practice and health equity commitments
• other? - Feel free to contact the editor to discuss a potential piece, and include a proposed abstract

Submissions are to be nurse-authored or if submitted by a team, the lead author must be a nurse. Submission formats may include arts-based knowledge translation, practice-based research-based, or review manuscripts.

First-person narrative is welcomed and encouraged. For author guidelines, please see www.yorku.ca/witness. For any questions or to discuss a proposed submission, don’t hesitate to connect at witness@yorku.ca.

Deadline for Submission through our online portal: July 1st, 2022 Note: Prospective authors must register with the journal in order to submit their work. NB: Authors are required  to submit all required information at the time of submission including bios, contact info, ORCID, ethics statements etc.

 

 

 

Call for Papers Volume 4(1) - 

             See* it, Speak it, Write it, Change it.

Witness readers, editors, reviewers, supporters and contributors form a collective of critical nurses in Canada and beyond who strive to ameliorate inequities in the health and quality of life of all. By virtue of nursing’s privileged societal position, we witness a wide array of inequities that require us to take action. Our tag line represents the ethos of the journal: “See^* it .... Speak it .... Write it .... Change it ....”

We are pleased, then,  to draw on our tag line as our inspiration for an open Call for Papers that reflects the ethos and intent of the journal.

Submission examples may include but are not limited to:

• Nurse Activism- examples, barriers, facilitators
• Whistle Blowing in Nursing and health care
• Rebel Nurses then and now
• Critical Research Methodologies
• Examples of/Calls for Resistance in Nursing
  • Anti-Oppression Nursing Efforts: Past or Present
• Policy Advocacy by Nursing
• Disruptive Innovations in Nursing Research, Practice or Education
• Critical Pedagogy/Education for Social Change
• Intersectional Analyses of Health or Quality of Life
• Critical Analyses of Power in the context of Health, Quality of Life, or Nursing
• Health (In)Equity
• Social Justice Nursing
• Decolonizing Nursing
• Linguistic Hegemony and Resistance
• Critical Community Health Nursing
• Critical Disability lenses and practices in nursing
• other? - Feel free to contact the editor to discuss a potential piece, and include a proposed abstract

Submissions are to be nurse-authored or if submitted by a team, the lead author must be a nurse. Submission formats may include arts-based knowledge translation, practice-based research-based, or review manuscripts.  First-person narrative is welcomed and encouraged. For author guidelines, please see www.yorku.ca/witness. For any questions including to discuss a proposed submission, don’t hesitate to contact us at witness@yorku.ca. 

 Deadline for Submission through our online portal: January 3rd, 2022

Note: Prospective authors must register with the journal in order to submit their work. Please be sure to submit, upload and populate all required elements at the time of submission. 

 

^{* Rather than imply an ableist bias, “See it…” is intended to incorporate the multiple ways nurses experience/witness injustices.}

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                           Nursing (on) a Sick Planet:

      Critical Consciousness and Action in a

                    Time of Planetary Decline

 

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                          DISRUPTING NURSING:

   Towards Anti-Racist and Decolonial Practice.

                           Call for Papers Vol 3(1) 

                                                                             

 

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                                                                               Call for Papers

                                                                                  2020 Vol 2(2)

                                                                  Power, Discourse and Resistance:

                                            Critical Perspectives on Mental Health and Mental Health Nursing

The Canadian Journal of Critical Nursing Discourse is pleased to announce a special issue exploring the myriad ways that current discourses in mental health care and mental health nursing can produce or reinforce precarious mental health and emotional distress or that create damaging identities for those who experience psychological difficulties thereby leading to stigmatization, marginalization and exclusion. It also seeks to make visible those discourses and practices that challenge these harmful processes and promote a more just and inclusionary world.

Guest Editors: 

Dave Holmes, PhD, RN, FAAN, Professor, School of Nursing, University of Ottawa

Amélie Perron, PhD, RN, Associate Professor, School of Nursing, University of Ottawa

 

 Intended Focus of this Special Issue

This Special Issue aims to foster and bring together critical perspectives on matters that directly or indirectly relate to contemporary notions of mental health and mental illness, and the way these notions suffuse everyday life. It seeks to promote scholarship that brings forth the complex intersections of sex, gender, race, class, age and ability and their effects on persons’ capacity to conform to various expectations. Such expectations may include for example the need for self-management, self-work and individual transformation; entrepreneurship; or ensuring one’s (socioeconomic) relevance in contemporary societies through proper patterns of performance, choice, consumption and competition. Such expectations are neither neutral nor inconsequential. For many individuals, groups and communities, they predetermine discourses of normality, acceptance and inclusion on the one hand, and of abnormality, rejection and exclusion on the other. They also fix corresponding identities in ways that both open up and close off opportunities for representation, recognition, justice and equity.

Making sense of the above is key to understanding two distinct but interrelated phenomena: the growing pathologization of human thoughts, emotions and behaviours, and the parallel downplaying of systems of discrimination and oppression that undermine human agency, personhood and connectedness, leaving only individual explanations of mental distress centered around ‘deficits’. The language of mental health and illness suffuses everyday life in such a way that every emotion brought on by the struggles or pleasures of life can become a symptom to be clinically managed and treated. In short, every individual can be subject to an expert evaluation of whether their thinking and functioning falls within social expectations and norms. Such thinking can be difficult to identify and problematize. It determines the way we perceive ourselves, our capacities and decisions, how we resolve problems, and how we categorize our responses to everyday occurrences. It also changes the way we perceive others around us, in particular those who think and act outside the realm of ‘normal’. Yet ‘normal’ is a moving target, spurred by multiple forces ranging from free-market policies and pressures to human rights discourses. Defining ‘normal’ is therefore a powerful act—but so is challenging the social, economic, scientific and legal foundations of such definitions.

There is a need to question those discourses, practices, institutions and laws that shape the realities of persons who experience emotional difficulties and/or who are constructed as mentally ill. We believe there is also a need to challenge and rethink the way certain agents, such as nurses, are called upon to intervene on those individuals deemed to pose a problem because of their mental state. Nurses practice at the intersection of individual and collective experience, state objectives, clinical guidelines and scientific evidence. They play a key role in the way current configurations of care and support can perpetuate or disrupt patterns of suffering, exclusion and violence. In other words, they are unequivocally bound to people’s experiences of mental health and illness. Nursing scholarship in this area is thus critical in order to shape a healthcare agenda that is respectful of people’s agency and personhood. We therefore hope this Special Issue can contribute meaningfully to the discussion, toward the full realization of social justice, equity and human dignity in mental health work.

Suggested Topics

For this Special Issue, manuscripts on the following themes are of particular interest:

• Critical examinations of current constructions of mental health and emotional wellbeing;
• Discursive shifts in the identification and management of persons experiencing emotional difficulties;
• Critical analyses expanding markets for ‘psy’ work (e.g. children, students; trans persons);
• Neuro-speak in health policy, research and education discourses;
• (Im)possibilities of care: Blurring of care and coercion in the management of emotional difficulties;
• Promises and pitfalls of techno-medicine in mental health work;
• Role of the media and social media in the psychiatrization of society;
• Ontologies and epistemologies of the psychiatrized body/mind;
• Spaces and places of inclusion and exclusion of persons experiencing emotional difficulties;
• Identity and subjectivity construction in mental health;
• The politics of legitimacy in the development of evidence informing mental health work;
• Examples and meanings of allyship in mad advocacy;
• Counter discourses and resistant practices in mental health nursing;
• Counter-hegemonic curriculum in undergraduate nursing;
• Radical approaches in mental health research.

Note: Undergraduate Student or New Graduate Nurse submissions are welcomed, and such submissions are to be supported/mentored by a nursing faculty member, and this must be indicated in the cover letter. Graduate student submissions will be vetted through the typical processes.

Guidelines for Authors:

Submissions are to be nurse-authored or if submitted by a team, the lead author must be a nurse. Manuscripts should have a clear relevance to nursing.

Prospective authors must also familiarize themselves with the author guidelines set out in the journal found here:  https://witness.journals.yorku.ca/index.php/default/about/submissions

Firm Deadline: July 1^st, 2020 

 

Note:

Priority will be given to prospective authors who have not published with Witness in the past. All required materials must be submitted through the journal’s online portal at www.yorku.ca/witness, following the journal’s and the council on publication ethics’ guidelines including those associated with authorship, conflict of interest etc. Please ensure author teams review our webpage. Lastly, prospective authors must register with the journal in order to submit their work.

For any questions regarding the journal or this call for papers including a desire to discuss a proposed submission, please don’t hesitate to contact the editor, Dr. Cheryl van Daalen-Smith at witness@yorku.ca

 

 

 

 

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Call for Papers  2020 Vol 2 (1) 

                                                                Special 2020 Guest Edited Issue:

                                          Nīpawīstimatowin -“bearing witness for one another”

The Canadian Journal of Critical Nursing Discourse is pleased to announce a special issue grounded in Canadian Indigenous discourse and worldviews, focusing on nursing’s role in truth and reconciliation, Indigenous health and well-being and the necessity to decolonize nursing in Canada. We warmly welcome three guest co-editors along with elder advisors.

Guest Editors: Dr. Lisa Bourque Bearskin, RN, PhD (Beaver Lake Cree Nation), Dr. Andrea Kennedy, RN, PhD (Settler & Métis ancestry), and Cheyenne Joseph, RN, MPH (Mi'kmaq Nation)

Elder Advisors:

Madeleine Kétéskwēw Dion Stout, RN, MA, Hon. Doctorate (Kehewin First Nation & Tsawwassen First Nation) and Evelyn Voyageur, RN, PhD, Hon. Doctorate (Musgamagw Dzawada’enuxw) .

Please download and share the call for papers by clicking here

 BACKGROUND

Over 370 million Indigenous peoples worldwide remain the most marginalized group enduring significant health inequities that require culturally sovereign actions (WHO, 2019). Health inequities of Indigenous peoples are rooted in colonization and racism. Racism, including racial discrimination and systemic and structural racism are known to negatively impact Indigenous peoples’ health (Allen & Smylie, 2015). The National Inquiry on Murdered and Missing Indigenous Women and Girls (2019) accurately identified how genocide has been ongoing for generations. Indigenous families and communities are burdened with carrying and healing from these atrocities and historical trauma. “Genocide by a Million Paper Cuts” (Thorne, 2019) speaks to the importance of truth telling, bearing witness as nursing’s moral and political obligation and essential to advancing social justice nursing. Indigenous peoples are facing confusion amidst ongoing colonization, while looking for insights about the state of their relatively poor health and wellbeing. This is a call for nurses to acknowledge their own position, privilege, and power that intersects with relational practice with Indigenous Peoples, starting with each nurse to critically examine their own practice, and develop insight and actionable strategies to address pervasive ‘othering’ while advancing cultural safety.

Nursing has not done the critical work needed within our discipline to respectfully advance Indigenous Knowledges and Wellness. We are concerned that widespread incentivizing of Indigenization may lead to mining and undermining Indigenous ways of being, knowing and doing. Colonialism will be perpetuated unless we engage in a self-implicated critique (Andreotti, Stein, Ahenakew & Hunt, 2015) for meaningful decolonization in nursing, health education and healthcare. Nursing needs to move past a soft-reform space of mere inclusion and activate positive change that authentically upholds reciprocity with Indigenous communities as central knowledge holders.

Intended Focus of this Special Issue

Intensive efforts to increase the number of Indigenous nurses and contributions from specific Indigenous knowledge systems will contribute to the enhancement of the health of Indigenous communities. Correspondingly, Witness: The Canadian Journal of Critical Nursing Discourse invites contributions to its first special issue to further develop and augment Indigenous health and critically question knowledge development in nursing.

The theme of this special issue was chosen by our esteemed Cree Nursing scholar Dr. Madeleine Dion Stout, who teaches us about the importance Nīpawīstimatowin - “bearing witness for one another”. Nīpawīstimatowin is a Cree word that finds expression in the solemnity of an occasion where stories, experiences, data, information, and wisdom are seen, spoken, scripted, and oriented towards improving Indigenous peoples’ health and well-being. While the relationships between Indigenous peoples and nurses often appear immutable and static, in reality, they are subject to a process of more or less constant recognition and a reflection of changing, evolving, and challenging circumstances and contexts. Currently, interest in Indigenous peoples’ conditions, realities, and aspirations is relatively high, along with making central a space for Indigenous peoples to voice their experiences. Furthermore, Dion Stout invites Miyopayowin -“good turns from changing fortunes” - as the aspirational ethos of reconciliation where change lies in transitioning from a conflict-ridden place to one of peace, connectedness and healing. From this ontological perspective, we hold the premise that ‘nursing is in trouble’ is real and is not only being expressed by nurses across the country but also many Indigenous peoples who receive care.

From this position, the call for Canadian nurses and nursing schools to ameliorate the social, health, and healthcare inequities of Indigenous peoples is not necessarily new. What is novel, however, is the sense of urgency this approach is engendering, due to mounting concerns about health disparities, complaints of racism, and calls for recognizing breaches in human rights for Indigenous peoples. The seemingly incompatibility between nurses’ personal experience and how nurses deliver healthcare services needs to be resolved. Nīpawīstimatowin -“bearing witness for one another ” as expressed above will provide the needed tools for decolonization and the political leveraging for truth to give meaning to strategies for change in the expression of what we see, say, write, and do. 

This special issue therefore seeks submissions grounded in Canadian Indigenous discourse and worldviews. Further and more specifically, the journal seeks contributions that critically examine the past, current, and future states of Indigenous peoples in Canada, from a nursing perspective that is consistent with the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. Submissions may also focus on decolonizing nursing care, nursing policy, nursing education and/or nursing research.

 

Suggested Topics

• Cultural Humility, Cultural Safety and Cultural Security
• Jurisdictional Issues including Jordan’s Principle
• Indigenous Genomics
• Decolonizing nursing care, nursing policy, nursing education and/or nursing research in Canada
• Gendered Oppression
• Indigenous Health Rights
• Restorative Health Justice
• Indigenous Data Sovereignty
• Indigenous Wellness Practice
• Counteracting Epistemic Racism
• Indian Hospitals and Medicalization
• Historical and Intergenerational Trauma
• Social Justice for Rights Based Healthcare
• Responses to the TRC Calls to Action in Nursing
• Indigenous Perspectives: Her/His-stories and Pearls of Wisdom

Note: Student or New Graduate Nurse Voices for Positive Change are welcomed, and such submissions are best supported/mentored by a nursing faculty member.

Guidelines for Authors:

Submissions are to be nurse-authored or if submitted by a team, the lead author must be a nurse. For this special issue, we especially invite submissions from nurse authors who identify as Indigenous. For non-Indigenous lead nurse authors, meaningful authorial inclusion by at least one Indigenous contributor is requested. Prospective authors must also familiarize themselves with the author guidelines set out in the journal found here: https://witness.journals.yorku.ca/index.php/default/about/submissions

Firm Deadline: November 15^th, 2019.    All required materials must be submitted through the journal’s online portal found at www.yorku.ca/witness

Prospective authors must register with the journal in order to submit their work.

For any questions including a desire to discuss a proposed submission, please don’t hesitate to contact the journal editor Dr. Cheryl van Daalen-Smith at witness@yorku.ca being sure to cc the lead guest co-editor Dr. Lisa Bourque-Bearskin at lbourquebearskin@tru.ca

 

References

Allan, B. & Smylie, J. (2015). First Peoples, second class treatment: The role of racism in the health and well-being of Indigenous peoples in Canada. Toronto, ON: The Wellesley Institute.

Andreotti, V. D.O., Stein, S., Ahenakew, C., & Hunt, D. (2015). Mapping interpretations of decolonization in the context of higher education. Decolonization: Indigeneity, Education & Society, 4(1), 21-40.

National Inquiry Murdered and Missing Women and Girls (2019). Reclaiming Power and Place: The Final Report of the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls. Retrieved from https://www.mmiwg-ffada.ca/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Final_Report_Vol_1a-1.pdf

Thorne, S. (2019). Genocide by a million paper cuts. Nursing Inquiry DOI: 10.1111/nin.12314 Retrieved from https://onlinelibrary-wiley-com.ezproxy.tru.ca/doi/epdf/10.1111/nin.12314

United Nations (2008). United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. Retrieved from https://www.un.org/esa/socdev/unpfii/documents/DRIPS_en.pdf

World Health Organization (2019). WHO's work on indigenous peoples' health. Retrieved from https://www.who.int/gender-equity-rights/knowledge/indigenous-peoples/en/

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Call for Papers:   "Social Justice Nursing"  Vol 1(2) (2019)

 

Just over a decade ago, the WHO’s (2008) commission on the social determinants of health concluded that social injustice was killing people on a grand scale. With increasing health inequities (i.e. disparities in health and quality of life rooted in marginalization and/or social disadvantage), the role of nursing advocacy to affect social change through practice, leadership, policy and education is crucial. Indeed, the Canadian Nurses Association recently reaffirmed the centrality of social justice as a focus for nursing viewing it as “means to an end and an end in itself,” acknowledging its consistency with the values set out in our code of ethics (CNA, 2010; CNA, 2017). Critical community health nurse, Dr. Benita Cohen (2010) invites nurses in any setting to take four key advocacy steps in order to enact a social justice practice, including: equipping ourselves with the facts, challenging societal beliefs about individual responsibility for health, promoting equity considerations in health policy and program planning within our own organization, and working to bring about social change. To that end, submissions are invited reflecting Social Justice Nursing including any combination of these themes:

 

• Critical analyses of health inequities and the role of nurses/nursing;
• Strategies to challenge societal beliefs, policies or health care practices which contribute to the marginalization or victim-blaming of populations experiencing health inequities;
• Innovations in practice, policy, education or research aimed at promoting social justice and equity;
• Calls for Action or Lessons Learned from nursing-led social justice activism.

Submissions are to be nurse-authored or if submitted by a team, the lead author must be a nurse.

For author guidelines, please see https://witness.journals.yorku.ca/index.php/default/about/submissions

Firm Deadline for Submission through our online portal: August 15^th, 2019

Note: Prospective authors must register with the journal in order to submit their work.

For any questions including a proposed submission, don’t hesitate to contact the editor at witness@yorku.ca

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Canadian Nurses Association (2010). Social Justice: A Means to an End. An End in itself. 2^nd Ed. Retrieved from:  https://www.cna-aiic.ca/~/media/cna/page-content/pdf-en/social_justice_2010_e.pdf

Canadian Nurses Association (2017) Code of Ethics for Registered Nurses. Retrieved from: https://www.cna-aiic.ca/html/en/Code-of-Ethics-2017-Edition/files/assets/basic-html/page-1.html

Cohen, B. (2010). From witness to social justice advocate. The Canadian Nurse Journal, The last word. September. Retrieved from: https://www.canadian-nurse.com/articles/issues/2010/september-2010/from-witness-to-social-justice-advocate  .

World Health Organization (2008) Closing the gap in a generation: Health equity through action on the social determinants of health. Commission on the Social Determinants of Health. Geneva, Switzerland.  Retrieved from: https://www.who.int/social_determinants/thecommission/finalreport

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Call for Papers: Inaugural Issue 1, Volume 1.

“See^*it .... Speak it .... Write it .... Change it ....”

 

In 2010, the Canadian Nurse journal featured Saskatoon health policy scholar Steven Lewis, who wrote of nursing as having many voices, (yet) so little voice, further stating: “Nursing’s combination of numbers, reputation and reach should translate into power and influence over how health care is financed, organized and delivered. Yet politically, the profession punches below its weight. The country is the worse for it.”

In response to nursing’s historical “punching below its weight,” we introduce Witness: The Canadian Journal of Critical Nursing Discourse, as an antidote.

There is a rich history of critical discourse and practice in Canada: Discourse and practice gleaned from what Canadian Nurses witness regarding health, health care and the quality of life of individuals, groups and populations. The time has come to formalize a scholarly space for critical nursing discourse that is rooted in such ideas as social justice, intersectionality, advocacy and critical social theory, to name but a few.

Witness readers, editors, and contributors form a collective of critical nurses in Canada and beyond who strive to ameliorate inequities in the health and quality of life of all. By virtue of nursing’s privileged societal position, we witness a wide array of inequities that require us to take action. Our tag line represents the ethos of the journal: “See^* it .... Speak it .... Write it .... Change it ....”

Witness is a Canadian online open access scholarly nursing journal.Together, contributors and readers form a collective of nurses whose practice, research, teaching and way of being is rooted in social justice.We embrace the open access movement and seek to further dismantle multiple systemic barriers to knowledge creation and dissemination. To that end, no payment to publish nor access the journal’s offerings will be required. The journal is rooted in critical discourse, where the term ‘critical’ refers to a capacity to inquire ‘against the grain.’ It involves a persistent sense of perturbation with the status quo. This is a disposition that involves questioning claims of truth or falsity, charging the thinker with the task of disrupting and destabilizing epistemological certainties, including one’s very own. ‘Critical’ is about recognizing dominant political, economic, and social forces–and interrogating how these influence ways of knowing, the very production of knowledge, and systemic inequities. As both a stance and an action, it is a commitment to the decolonization of knowledge by an analysis of both dominant discourses and oppressive practices. Moreover, ‘critical’ is about a necessity to surface assumptions and tensions in our own and others’ works and practices. It encompasses an unyielding commitment to interrogate the relation of power to knowledge with an understanding that individuals, groups, and systems may–intentionally or unintentionally–reproduce such relations. For Witness, it is a salient attribute that welcomes, and is strengthened by, an openness to perspectival plurality.

To that end, we seek to foster and disseminate critical nursing discourse that is underpinned by the principles of social justice and health equity which interrogate power relations and structural violence, and which aim to advance social change. Submissions may explore advocacy, power, justice, intersectionality, gender, health equity, critical social theory, pedagogies for social change and others.

As an open access, peer-reviewed journal that celebrates critical analyses, practice, policy and action, we know that there are thousands of examples where nursing has found and used its voice to affect change. To that end,our inaugural issue’s theme will reflect the journal’s tag line:“See^* it .... Speak it .... Write it .... Change it ....”Our inaugural issue offers space for a wide cross-section of submissions that critically reflect on current and historical nursing concerns and/or examples of advocacy efforts across Canada that seek to dismantle inequities, oppressive practices, and achieve social justice. In this important time of Truth and Reconcilliaction, we especially invite submissions from Indigenous nurses and/or Indigenous scholarship.

The editorial collective welcomes submissions that are language-based and/or arts-informed and wishes to support emerging critical scholarship. In so doing, we invite experienced, emerging and/or nursing student scholars to consider submitting works concerning social justice and advocacy. Together we can affect change.

Submission examples may include but are not limited to:

• Nurse Activism
• Examples of/Calls for Resistance in Nursing
  • Anti-Oppression Nursing Efforts: Past or Present
• Policy Advocacy
• Disruptive Innovations in Nursing Research, Practice or Education
• Critical Pedagogy/Education for Social Change
• Intersectional Analyses of Health or Quality of Life
• Critical Analyses of Power in the context of Health, Quality of Life, or Nursing
• Health (In)Equity
• Social Justice Nursing
• Decolonizing Nursing
• Linguistic Hegemony and Resistance
• Critical Community Health Nursing

Submissions are to be nurse-authored or if submitted by a team, the lead author must be a nurse. Submission formats may include arts-based knowledge translation, practice-based research-based, or review manuscripts.  First-person narrative is welcomed and encouraged. For author guidelines, please see www.yorku.ca/witness. For any questions including to discuss a proposed submission, don’t hesitate to contact us at witness@yorku.ca. 

Firm Deadlinefor Submission through our online portal: Feb 20^th, 2019

Note: Prospective authors must register with the journal in order to submit their work.

 To download the Call for Submissions, please click here. 

^{*Rather than imply an ableist bias, “See it…” is intended to incorporate the multiple ways nurses experience/witness injustices.}