Subhead:The historic Casavant pipe organ stands in the centre of the University of Alberta’s historic Convocation Hall, where an ‘inclusive’ campaign designed to ‘modernize’ the room would see it removed from the premises.#
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They say it’s about modernization. They say it’s about inclusion. But when institutions start tearing out history in the name of progress, people have every right to ask what is really being modernized — and who is being included.
At the University of Alberta, that argument now means removing the memorial pipe organ from Convocation Hall.
Convocation Hall is not just another room on campus. It is one of the university’s most historic ceremonial spaces — a grand early 20th-century hall where generations of students have crossed the stage, families have celebrated milestones, musicians have performed, and the life of the institution has been marked in public.
It’s where honourary degrees are awarded. It’s where formal ceremonies take place. It’s where memory and milestone meet architecture.
The approach to the hall is lined with the names of University of Alberta students and staff who lost their lives in the First World War, giving the space a solemn memorial dimension that goes far beyond bricks and mortar.
At the centre of that setting stands the Casavant pipe organ.
