Faculty & Contact - Bishop's University

Below is a list of faculty that are active in the department, and available to students with course specific questions. If you need administrative support, we encourage you to refer your questions to one of the following;

The Chair of the department (see below) can address detailed program questions, including program requirements, planning and selection, research opportunities, graduate studies, and more.
The Academic Advisor, if available, can offer support including course registration and course load, important dates, academic policies and more.
The Academic Deans serve as the academic and administrative anchors to the professors within their Faculties or Schools as well as the students.

Faculty of the Arts Administration Department:

Contact Information is found in the BU Directory

Dr. Jean Manore

Full Professor – Program Chairperson

Dr. Jean Manore, a professor in the Department of History and Global Studies, teaches a variety of courses related to Canadian and Global history, First Nations/settler relations and Public History and Heritage. She enjoys exploring ideas of heritage and how they compare with History and she enjoys creating courses along thematic lines, like the History of Night and the History of Animals.

Before becoming fully employed in academia, Dr. Manore was a partner in a Research Consulting firm, completing many historical research projects for a variety of clients, most notably, the federal and Ontario governments.

Esther Charron

Full Professor

Professor Esther Charron lives and works in symbiosis with her passion for the arts. She takes great pleasure in collaborating with people and taking up new challenges in varied settings.

Curious, dynamic and versatile, she contributed to the development of numerous artistic companies for many years: she helped them with their strategic planning; she assisted them with communication and marketing needs; she gave guidance during international collaborations, etc. She also took on production management, many research and studies for Québec and Canadian institutions, and organized, moderated and gave conferences as well as training sessions all over the world.

Esther Charron co-founded Pôles magnétiques, art et culture, in 2006. From 2002 to 2005, she was the Executive Director for the internationally renowned chamber ensemble Les Violons du Roy. Before that, she worked as an international affairs counselor at the Quebec Ministry of International Relations for many years. As such, she was part of the founding team of the event Quebec-New York 2001. She won praise and awards for her achievements as Cultural Attaché at the Québec Government House in New York between 1993 and 1999.

2013 marked her return on stage as a performer and musical director in NORGE, a co-production by Théâtre Le Trident and Théâtre Humain.

She holds a Bachelor’s degree in Music (piano) from Laval University and a Master’s in Performing Arts Administration from New York University. Esther is now a full-time faculty in Arts Administration at Bishop’s University.

Faculty from Other Academic Departments

Dr. James Benson

Full Professor – Department of Fine Arts

Dr. Benson is Full Professor in the Fine Arts Department, where he teaches primarily sculpture and drawing. He earned a BFA in Art Education (1975), a Diploma in Art Education (1979), and an MFA (1979) in sculpture from Concordia University. He came to teach at Bishop’s in 1979. After a period of teaching he returned to Concordia and earned a PhD in Art Education (1999). His interests are in both creative work in studio and scholarly activity in art education. Dr. Benson exhibits his work in galleries locally, nationally, and internationally.

Dr. Mathieu Désy

Assistant Professor (Double Bass, Theory, Recording Technology), Director of Jazz/Pop/Rock Ensembles

Dr. Désy earned his B.Mus. and M.Mus. degrees from the Conservatoire de Montréal and holds the distinction as “Canada’s First Doctor of Classical Double Bass Performance” from the Université de Montréal. He is equally versatile on the electric bass, and is capable of moving seamlessly between the genres of classical, jazz and popular music. His is a prolific composer and arranger in virtually all domains of music.

Numerous grants and awards have facilitated Dr. Désy’s keen interest in scholarship which now includes the publication of his book entitled Glow in the Dark: Incandescent Songs for Polyphonic Bass in addition to past conference presentations at the International Society of Bassists in the United States.

As a collaborative artist, Dr. Désy has been involved in over 50 distributed albums covering all genres of music and he has toured with many of Quebec’s elite singer-songwriters and performers. He can also be credited with several stage, television and radio productions. As the co-owner of Studio Makina in Montreal and as a “Producer of the Year” award nominee for his work on Martin Lizotte’s award-winning album Ubiquité, Dr. Désy brings to Bishop’s a wealth of knowledge and experience in the areas of sound technology and production. He has produced several albums and film scores to critical acclaim.

Dr. Désy’s impressive breadth of teaching experience includes past positions at UQÀM, the Conservatoire de Montréal, the Cégep de Saint-Laurent and Sherbrooke, École Mitchell-Montcalm as well as a recent artist-in-residence position at the Banff Centre.

Dr. Mathieu Désy performing

For more information, we invite you to visit his website

Mark Gandey

Lecturer – (Williams School of Business Department Chairperson)

Mark Gandey (B.U. finance, 1989) worked as an accountant for 17 years (Gillette, Air Montreal and Stikeman Elliott) while first earning a C.M.A (Concordia), a M.B.A. (U.Q.O.) followed by a graduate diploma in Instructional Technology (Concordia) prior to lecturing at the Williams School of Business in Managerial Accounting.

Dr. Rebecca Harries

Full Professor – Department of Drama

Full Professor, PhD, current Chair of the Drama Department and Chair from 2009-2013, she is currently a member of the Canadian Association for Theatre Research and a negotiator and grievance officer for the Union, she has been committed to integrating the study and practice of performance with real-world challenges.

Steven Woodward

Full Professor – Department of English

Dr. Steven Woodward is a full professor in the English Department. He has wide-ranging interests in the areas of film and media studies. He grew up in England, fully expecting to become a secret agent as an adult, but the closest he’s come to that is publishing an article on villains in the James Bond movies. After studying at Queen’s University, Ryerson University, and the University of Toronto, he taught at Nipissing University, the University of Toronto, and Clemson University (South Carolina).