Meet our Team
DH@UofT Transition Team (2025– )
Building on CDHI’s successes, the DH@UofT Transition Team is working with UTSC’s OVPRI, the library’s Digital Scholarship Unit, and outgoing director Prof. Elspeth Brown to shape the next phase of digital humanities at U of T. The team is also sunsetting legacy projects while maintaining continuity for select initiatives over the coming year.
Kenzie Burchell
Faculty Lead
Read Bio
Kenzie is a media sociologist and journalism studies scholar. He holds a MSc from London School of Economics and a PhD from Goldsmiths, University of London, where he also served as a lecturer and visiting tutor. Prior to joining University of Toronto, Professor Burchell was the Research Associate of European Media Studies at the University of Manchester.
Outside of academia, Kenzie has held roles with the BBC World Service, the BBC Russian Service, the Cabinet Office of the UK Government, and international press freedom organization Reporters Sans Frontières as their representative in Moscow. As a photographer, Kenzie’s work has been exhibited internationally at the Dublin Science Gallery, the Russian Polytechnic Museum, London Fashion Week and the 54th Venice Biennale as well as other venues in the UK, Italy, and Japan.
Ling Ding
Research & Project Manager
Read Bio
Ling is a PhD student and SSHRC Doctoral Fellow at the Institute for the History and Philosophy of Science and Technology (IHPST), where she studies the history and philosophy of information and communication technologies. She holds two master’s degrees—one in design from OCAD University and another from the Faculty of Information at the University of Toronto.
With over a decade of professional experience in the information and communication sector, Ling approaches historical inquiry through a unique lens—examining the rise of technological power in modern China. Her current research investigates the relationship between state policy and the emergence of Chinese digital conglomerates from 1991 to 2015, a transformative period in which the Chinese government evolved from a principal actor to a platform builder, facilitator, and strategic driver of innovation.
Alisha Stranges
Digital Research Creation Specialist
Read Bio
Alisha is a public humanities scholar and multi-modal artist whose work bridges oral history, performance, and digital research creation.
Currently, she is Research Associate in the Department of Historical Studies at the University of Toronto Mississauga where she serves as Research Manager and Project Oral Historian for the LGBTQ Oral History Digital Collaboratory and as Digital Research Creation Specialist for DH@UofT (formerly CDHI).
She holds an M.A. in Women & Gender Studies from the University of Toronto, with a collaborative specialization in Sexual Diversity Studies. Before entering academia, she earned a Diploma in Theatre Performance from Humber College and spent a decade devising original plays within Toronto’s queer, independent theatre community.
Maira E. Álvarez
Postdoctoral Fellow
Read Bio
Maira’s interdisciplinary work bridges Border Studies, Women’s Studies, Latinx and Latin American Studies, public humanities, heritage language, and Digital Humanities. Her current research examines the militarization of the U.S.-Mexico border[lands] through the lens of literary production by fronteriza authors, as well as multilingual archival materials.
Maira earned her Ph.D. in U.S. Latino Studies from the University of Houston in 2019, along with a certification in Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies. She held the title of Early Career Provost Postdoctoral Fellow (2022-24) in Borderlands History at the University of Texas at Austin and American Council of Learned Societies Emerging Voices Fellow (2021-22) at Arizona State University. Maira is a co-founder of Borderlands Archives Cartography and a team member of United Fronteras and Torn Apart / Separados.
CDHI Core Leadership Team (2021–2025)
Under the leadership of Faculty Director Elspeth Brown and Managing Director Danielle Taschereau Mamers, the Critical Digital Humanities Initiative (CDHI) fostered programming, mentorship, community-building, and advocacy for critical approaches to digital scholarship at the University of Toronto.
Elspeth H. Brown
Faculty Director
Read Bio
Elspeth is Professor of History at the University of Toronto, where she teaches queer and trans history; the history of US capitalism; oral history; and the history and theory of photography. Her digital humanities research has focused on queer and trans archives and oral history. She received her PhD from Yale University in 2000 and is the author of (most recently) WORK! A Queer History of Modeling (Duke University Press, 2019) and co-editor of Feeling Photography (2014, Duke University Press with Thy Phu).
She is the principal investigator for the LGBTQ Oral History Digital Collaboratory, a public and digital humanities research initiative. The Collaboratory preserves gay, queer, and trans life stories, using new methodologies in digital history, collaborative research, and archival practice.
You can learn more about her work at elspethbrown.org and sometimes find her on X (@ElspethHBrown) and Instagram (@elspeth.brown).
Danielle Taschereau Mamers
Managing Director
Read Bio
Danielle received her PhD in Media Studies from the University of Western Ontario in 2017. She has previously held postdoctoral fellowships at McMaster University (ECS), the University of Pennsylvania (WHC), and the University of Toronto (JHI).
Danielle’s research identifies critical and creative strategies for destabilizing authority structures reproduced by documents, images, and their archives. Her first book, Settler Colonial Ways of Seeing (Fordham UP, 2024), investigates Indigenous artists’ engagements with settler documentation of Indian status in Canada. Alongside her work with CDHI, Danielle facilitates strategic planning, partnership ideation, and team building sessions. As a visual thinker with a career in words, she sneaks in images and illustrations wherever she can.
You can learn more about her work at dtmwrites.com and on LinkedIn.