Activist's status as grad student up in the air

By chaining himself by the neck to two women on a stage at the University of Waterloo, Dan Kellar was doing more than adding journalist Christie Blatchford to the list of controversial speakers barred from Canadian university campuses.

He denounced her "unacademic" and "racist" writing in Helpless, a new book about the failure of law during native protests in Caledonia, Ont.

Kellar was also loudly announcing his own return to academia after an eventful absence, during which he allied with the radical Anti-Racist Action, built a website focused on social justice, and was arrested but not charged at Toronto's G20 protests.

He said he is "actively pursuing" a PhD in geography as an "unpaid student" exploring environmental laws with a "decolonial" and "settler" perspective, and currently "articulating my work with my writings and doing the required readings to gain a better understanding of the issues."

But he has no supervisor, is not taking classes, and has not been in contact with the department for over a year, since two professors refused to continue supervising him because of a dramatic shift in his interests.

"Up until [the bike lock protest, when he identified himself as a graduate student], no one was aware of his intention to return to active status," said Sue Horton, Associate Provost for Graduate Studies at the University of Waterloo.

"Anybody can do research," she said.

"But if you are being supervised, then you would be registered and you'd be interacting regularly with your supervisor."

Until a few days ago, Mr. Kellar's personal website said he was in the joint Waterloo-Wilfrid Laurier PhD program in geography.

Mr. Kellar's website also said he was under the "advisement" of Daniel Scott, Canada Research Chair in Global Change and Tourism at the University of Waterloo, and Kevin Hanna, associate professor of geography and en-v ironmental studies at Wilfrid Laurier University.

Those names have since been removed from his website.

Mr. Kellar said he is "in discussion with several professors who are engaged in critical research."

Prof. Scott said he refused to continue as Mr. Kellar's main supervisor over a year ago, when Mr. Kellar's interests diverged from Prof. Scott's own work on the human aspects of climate change.

"All of a sudden, he wasn't interested in working on the projects [about climate change planning] that were funded, that he originally came in to work on," said Prof. Hanna, a co-supervisor. "It doesn't happen very often."

Mr. Kellar said he and Prof. Scott "parted ways as I did not wish to work in climate change adaptation or mitigation research as I felt it was not critical of the role of transnational and neoliberal capitalism in the perpetuation of global ecological shifts."

He said he has a meeting with the dean at Waterloo on Monday, and he expects to have a "rousing debate," although he has a pessimistic view of university life in general.

"With the university turned to a degree mill through continuing neoliberalization, knowledge has become appreciated only when it can be commodified," he said.

"Most students are not there to learn, they are there so they may become acceptable to the capitalist system by receiving a piece of paper which gives them the privilege of accessing sectors that those without that paper can not."