Listening to the Here and Now: Spontaneous Prayer in an Era of Polycrisis

In a time shaped by rising nationalism and ecological crisis, how might the act of listening help us trace the embodied realities of these conditions? How can sound help us attune to one another, and open up possibilities for communal life?

Through performance, installation, and text-based visual and sound works, local artist and scholar Sasha J. Langford explores how sound moves through the world and affects the bodies within it. Inspired by Yiddishist musician and scholar Gabriel Levine’s idea of the “radical vernacular”—a way of engaging with tradition that is both rooted and experimental—she draws from older Jewish prayer practices like Yiddish tkhines and contemplative hisbodedus to connect past and present.

In this talk, Sasha will reflect on a recent work, or eternity (2026), which brings elements of spontaneous prayer into a post-secular, digitally mediated context. Through this piece, she considers how practices from her Ashkenazi ancestors might carry forward, helping shape new ways of listening and creating moments of shared connection among audiences.

Wednesday, June 17, 2026

5:30pm PT / 8:30pm ET on Zoom

Registration is required (by donation, no minimum)

“Listening to the Here and Now” is the closing event in the Peretz Centre's new Doikayt Speaker Series (2026): four public, online talks with local scholars and organizers to help us think about what it means to be here, right now -- and how we can be part of the work to sustain and initiate change for the sake of a better, more beautiful world for all.

Like our Zhargon program, the Doikayt Speaker Series extends classroom learning for students enrolled in Doikayt: Histories of Jews Going West and opens discussion with the broader community. Located on the unceded territories of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), and səlilwətaɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) peoples, the Peretz Centre's Doikayt program invites a lovingly critical engagement with Jewish histories of migration and settlement, and the role that Jews have played in colonial projects of nation-building.

We acknowledge the support of the Canadian Race Relations Foundation with funding provided by the Government of Canada.

About Our Speaker

Sasha J. Langford is an interdisciplinary artist who works at the intersection of sound, writing, performance, and social practice. Her collaborations with choreographers and media artists, as well as her solo live performance practice have been presented both locally and internationally.

Sasha is Faculty at Columbia College, where she teaches media and cultural studies on occupied xʷməθkʷəy̓əm, Sḵwx̱wú7mesh, and səl̓ílwətaʔɬ territories known as Vancouver, BC. She is a SSHRC Doctoral Fellow in the School for Contemporary Arts at Simon Fraser University. Her writing has most recently appeared in the collections Home is Whether the Heart Strives (Norient, 2025) and Lacan and the Environment (Palgrave Macmillan, 2021).

Event image: or eternity installation (2026), photo by Rachel Topham.