cassandra hartblay

Teaching

Upcoming Courses at the University of Toronto:

I am on leave in fall 2026. My next course offerings will be in winter 2027.

UofT students are invited to join the Centre for Global Disability Studies Core Lab meetings, currently hosted by my colleague Aparna Nair and graduate students.

Winter 2027 courses: 

Global Disability Studies. HLTC20. C-level undergraduate course at UTSC. Counts toward the Health Studies majors and the Health Humanities minor; students from humanities and social sciences majors encouraged to join the course. HLTB50 or HLTB60 prerequisite, or permission of instructor.

Advanced Topics in Health Humanities: Theatre & Health Humanities Workshop. HLTD50. Undergraduate course. HLTB50 or HLTB60 and one C-level Health Humanities course, or relevant theatre coursework, or permission of the instructor.

This workshop-style seminar course focuses on theatre as a modality for critical health humanities. We will build an understanding of theatrical process as a tool for knowledge production and community-building, by exploring how making theatre shapes possible futures, develops empathy and awareness, and shifts perspectives about current issues in health, illness, disability, and healthcare. Students will develop nuanced understanding of the consumption and production of theatre as a critical research method in health humanities. Class sessions will take a workshop format, including discussion of academic texts, reading and discussion of theatrical scripts, encounters with experts, and performance exercises. As a D-level course in Health Humanities, students will create a term project that mobilizes the skills and perspectives developed in the course in relation to a critical health humanities theme.   Note: Last year’s version of this course had a special relationship with a production of VITALS by Rosamund Small starring Janet McMordie; details of a GTA theatre project collaboration for winter 2027 TBA.

 

A person is looking at a book. The side of their face in quarter profile is illuminated in an otherwise dark room. Another person is seated nearby, facing the camera, out of focus.
Image from winter 2025 Ethnographic Theatre workshop. Photo by Pavel Prykhodko.

Graduate supervision:

Prospective graduate students are welcome to email me to discuss possible fit. I can supervise graduate students in the Department of Anthropology, and oversee Masters Research Papers papers for MA students in CEES. I am also able to join supervisory committees in these and other graduate units. I have limited capacity to take on new graduate students. The admissions process is highly competitive, especially for international students (e.g. who do not hold citizenship or permanent residency status in Canada).

I am not available to supervise new MA or MSc students for fall 2026 matriculation.

Dr. Hartblay is a white woman with short dark brown hair, smiling, sitting on a stoop, wearing a one-piece sleeveless outfit, with some tattoos on her left upper arm showing. Arlo is a black and tan golden retriever mix, who looks happy go lucky, relaxed, and excited. Dappled sunlight falls on a brick wall in the background.
Dr. Hartblay at home in Toronto with her dog, Arlo. Photo by Shannon Laliberte.

Frequently Taught Courses at the University of Toronto:

Introduction to Interdisciplinary Disability Studies. HLTB60. B-level undergraduate course at UTSC. Counts toward Health Studies majors and the Health Humanities minor; ask about credit for another major.

Global Disability Studies. HLTC20. C-level undergraduate course at UTSC. Counts toward the Health Studies majors and the Health Humanities minor; ask about credit for another major. Previously taught as a special topics course (HLTC52).

Documentary & Memoir Workshop. HLTD56. D-level undergraduate course at UTSC. Counts toward the Health Studies majors and the Health Humanities minor; ask about credit for another major. Previously taught as a special topics course (HLTD53).

Disability Anthropology. ANT 6062. Graduate Course. Department of Anthropology.  University of Toronto.

Anthropology of Sexuality and Gender. ANT6061. Graduate Course. University of Toronto.

Course Flyer for Introduction to Interdisciplinary Disability Studies

Past Teaching:

Global Disability Studies. HLTC20. University of Toronto Scarborough.  2019, 2020, 2022.

Documentary & Memoir Workshop. HLTD56. University of Toronto Scarborough. 2020, 2022.

Introduction to Disability Studies. HLTB60. University of Toronto Scarborough. 2021, 2022, 2024.

Disability Anthropology. ANT 6062. Graduate Course. Department of Anthropology.  University of Toronto. Fall 2018, 2020, 2024.

Special Topics in Health Humanities: Disability Arts & Culture. HLTD53. Undergraduate course. University of Toronto Scarborough. Fall 2020.

Anthropology of Sexuality and Gender. ANT6061. Graduate Course. University of Toronto. 2019.

Introduction to Health Humanities. HLTB50. Undergraduate Course. University of Toronto Scarborough. 2019.

Critical Human Rights and Global Postsocialism. RSEE 365 01 / ANTH460 & ANTH 549 / E&RS 531. Spring 2018. Yale University.

Course Flyer for Critical Human Rights and Global Postsocialism, Yale Unviersity Spring 2017. Small Image of a 1962Soviet Globalism poster showing people of different ethnic backgrounds hands held and raised in front of a globe, with the words Peace! Friendship! in Russian in red text. Followed by course description: his new advanced seminar considers Human Rights and Socialism as modernist, utopian visions for global justice in human society. In the late 20thcentury, socialist visions for justice in the future lost ground, as the doctrine of human rights was put forth by many as a standard bearer for checks on justice across political territories. This course traces the variety of critical approaches that scholars have taken to the problem of human rights, with a focus on ethnography and sociocultural anthropology, or how human rights actually function in daily life. Emphasizing postsocialism, this course foregrounds the so-called second world (Russia, China, and other post/socialist countries) and the global impact of socialism as a moral doctrine for justice. Students write a term paper in which they focus in on either a region or a topic (disability rights, LGBTQ rights, right to education, humanitarian medical intervention, etc). Students are encouraged to develop their own point of view about human rights as transnational humanitarian legal policy and political philosophy. Suitable for students with an interest in Postsocialism and Socialism, Sociocultural/Medical Anthropology, Human Rights and Humanitarianism, and regional interests related to Russia, Eastern and Central Europe, China, and other socialist and postsocialist regions.

Critical Human Rights and Global Postsocialism. RSEE 365 01 / ANTH460 & ANTH 549 / E&RS 531. Spring 2018. Yale University.

Gender and Sexuality in Contemporary Russia: Ethnography and Social Theory. Anthropology 325/Women’s Gender & Sexuality Studies 327/Euro&Russian Studies 532. Fall 2017. Yale University.

Queer & Crip Theory (CGS 102). Program in Critical Gender Studies. Summer Session 2017. University of California, San Diego.

Performance and Cultural Studies (COMM 111P). Department of Communication. Spring Quarter 2017. University of California, San Diego.

Ethnography in Practice (ANSC 173). Department of Anthropology. Spring Quarter 2017. University of California, San Diego.

The Problem of Voice (COMM 127). Department of Communication. Winter Quarter 2017. University of California, San Diego.

“UNITAS” – a year-long course on diversity & democracy, and ethnography as a social justice practice (ANTH 92 and ANTH 93). Department of Anthropology. Fall 2013-Spring 2014; Fall 2014-Spring 2015. University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.