Fellowship recipient to investigate environmental and civic behaviour of Canadian mining companies in foreign lands.
Photojournalist Roger LeMoyne is the recipient of the 2013 Michener-Deacon Fellowship for Investigative Journalism. The Fellowship was presented during the annual Michener Award ceremony held at Rideau Hall in Ottawa on June 18, 2013.
He will use his fellowship to investigate in words and photos the environmental and civic behaviour of Canadian mining companies in foreign countries.
It is a timely topic, given the Canadian government’s recently announced initiative to assist mining in developing countries through the CIDA-funded Canadian International Institute for Extractive Industries and Development, housed at UBC in partnership with Simon Fraser University.
In his acceptance speech, Mr. LeMoyne said that "In the last decade, we have seen more and more reports of Canadian mining companies being involved in a wide range of conflicts with communities in developing countries.....more than any other country in the world." (The full text of his remarks)
Since the early 1990’s, Mr. LeMoyne has spent most of his time documenting the human condition, conflict, human rights issues and international aid in the Middle East, Africa and Eastern Europe. His work has appeared in a variety of publications including Paris Match, Time, Maclean’s, The Globe and Mail and Canadian Art. His first book “Details Obscurs” - a look at the effects of contemporary conflict on civilians - was published in 2005. His photo documentaries have earned him many national and international awards – his most recent – a grant from the Quebec Arts Council to photograph gold-mining in the Amazon.
Roger LeMoyne studied film and Music at Concordia University in Montreal, toured Canada with a band and worked in film and music before turning to photography. He lives in Montreal with his wife, a physician, and their two young children.
(The Investigative Journalism fellowship is supported by the BMO Financial Group. It allows a journalist to devote up to four months for a reporting project. Applicants are required to undertake a project that aspires to the criteria of the annual Michener Award for journalism with its emphasis on making an impact for the public good.)
Rideau Hall - June 18, 2013
Judges for the 2013 Michener-Deacon Fellowship:
Lindsay Crysler (chair), former managing editor of The Gazette, Montreal, former director, journalism department, Concordia University, Montreal; Clinton Archibald, associate professor, professor of public ethics, St. Paul University, Ottawa; Michael Goldbloom, Principal and Vice-Chancellor of Bishops University, Sherbrooke, Quebec, and former publisher of The Gazette and the Toronto Star; Lynne Van Luven, associate professor of journalism and creative non-fiction, University of Victoria; Erin Steuter, chair of the sociology department, Mount Allison University, Sackville, NB.
The fellowship of the Michener Awards Foundation, introduced in 1987, is known today as the Michener-Deacon Fellowship (named after the late Roland Michener and the late Paul Deacon, a senior media executive and Michener Awards Foundation president). The fellowship is to encourage excellence in investigative print and broadcast journalism that serves the public interest through values that benefit the community. Mature journalists are invited to submit written outlines for studies over four months that will strengthen their competence.