Celebrating Black History Month with Ruby Smith Diaz

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Thursday, February 12th, 2026
7:00 PM to 9:00 PM

Ruby Smith Díaz is an Afro Latina multidisciplinary artist, educator, and award-winning body-positive personal trainer. Her experiences growing up in a migrant, poor, single-parent family in amiskwaciy (Edmonton, AB) have inspired her to dedicate her life's work to exploring and addressing issues of equity and social justice. She is the author of Searching for Serafim, which was selected as a Finalist for the 2025 Governor General's Literary Award for Non-Fiction, and also CBC Book's Best Books of 2025. Ruby currently resides on the unceded territories of the Stz'uminus peoples (Ladysmith, BC)

Ruby will be sharing her research process that she undertook writing her debut book, and the role that Speculative Archiving, Magical Realism, Poetry, and her own experiences growing up on Treaty 6 Territory played in her writing. This event is sponsored by Vancouver Island University, Nanaimo Archives and the Nanaimo Historical Society.