Biography

Community involvement and collective social justice efforts beyond the academy are an important part of Dr. Motapanyane’s intellectual life.

She has served on the programming committee of the North York Women's Centre (Toronto, Canada), with the Immigrant and Refugee Women's Program in Saint Louis (Missouri, USA), and has several years of experience as a mentor and counsellor to African Nova Scotian youth in Halifax and surrounding region (Canada).

Dr. Motapanyane is accredited in conflict resolution and mediation, having served as a mediator for the Calgary Provincial Courts Civil Claims Mediation Program, Alberta Justice and Solicitor General. She served as Chair of the Board of Directors for the Alberta Historical Resources Foundation (AHRF), an agency under the purview of the Ministry of Culture, Multiculturalism and Status of Women, and sat on the Advisory Board of Calgary’s Future, an organization dedicated to recruiting, supporting and electing community leaders to municipal government.

Dr. Motapanyane is currently based in Halifax, Nova Scotia, with a faculty position in the Department of Women’s Studies at Mount Saint Vincent University.

Selected Publications

• Motapanyane, M., & Shankar, I. (2022). Increasing Pathways to Leadership for Black, Indigenous, and other Racially Minoritized Women. Atlantis, 43(1), 3-18.

• Motapanyane, M. w/ McFarlane, A. (2020). Childcare as a public and common good: A Canadian perspective. In C. Zufferey & F. Buchanan (Eds.), Intersections of mothering: Feminist accounts (57-74). London: Rutledge.  

• Motapanyane, M. (Ed.). (2016).  Motherhood and lone-single parenting: A twenty-first century perspective. Bradford: Demeter Press. 

• Calixte, S. L., Johnson, J. L., & and Motapanyane, J. M. (2016). Theorizing women’s oppression and social change: Liberal, socialist, radical and postmodern feminisms. In N. Mandell & J. L. Johnson (Eds.), Feminist issues: Race, class and sexuality, 6th edition, (pp. 1-34).  Toronto: Pearson Canada Inc.

• Badruddoja, R. & Motapanyane, M. (Eds.). (2016). "New Maternalisms": Tales of Motherwork (Dislodging the Unthinkable). Bradford: Demeter Press.

• Motapanyane, M., & Dobson, K. (Fall/Winter 2015). Interrogating the language of diversity in academe: Motherhood and parenting in view. Journal of the Motherhood Initiative 6(2), 125-139.

• Motapanyane, M. (2013). Nostalgia and poetry: Reflections on research, creative expression and fieldwork across borders. Atlantis: Critical Studies in Gender, Culture, and Social Justice 36(1), 12-21.

• Motapanyane, M. (Ed.). (2012). Mothering in hip-hop culture: Representation and experience. Bradford: Demeter Press.

• Motapanyane, M. (Spring 2011). Capitalizing on multiculturalism: Reading the success of Canadian comedian Russell Peters. TOPIA: Canadian Journal of Cultural Studies 25, 97-113.

• Motapanyane, M. (2010). Insider/outsider: A feminist introspective on epistemology and transnational research. Atlantis: A Women’s Studies Journal/Revue d’etudes sur les femmes (Special Issue: Across the Generations in Women’s Studies) 34(2), 96-103.

• Motapanyane, M. (2010). Notes on agency, empowerment and feminist consciousness: A look at South Africa. Nevi Sara Kali: Roma Women’s Journal/Romane зuvleanqe зurnalo 2, 29-40.

• Motapanyane, M. (Spring 2006). The Black female body and artist in Canadian hip-hop: The question of femini(st)ne space. New Dawn: Journal of Black Canadian Studies 1(1), 28-49. 

Awards

• Queen Elizabeth II Platinum Jubilee Medal (Alberta, 2022)

• Distinguished Faculty Award 2020, Mount Royal University.

• Knowledge Mobilization Award in recognition of outstanding contributions to research and scholarship at Mount Royal University (2019). 

• Alberta Professional of the Year (2016). Obsidian Awards: Southern Alberta Jubilee Auditorium.