Alexa Lepera, MA
Assistant Curator, Domestic Environments and Social Diversity
Biography
Alexa Lepera (she/her) joined Ingenium in 2022 as a practicum student conducting research about Ingenium’s collection through the lens of Black and African Canadian history. She is now the assistant curator working in the areas of domestic environments and social diversity.
She is passionate about broadening understandings of the history of science and technology in Canada. Her current work focuses on equitable approaches to community involvement in the domestic technology collection.
Her previous research centred on representations of Black Canadian histories in museums and heritage institutions, colonial archives of slavery, and community-based research. Alexa has an MA in public history from Carleton University, an MA in gender, feminist, and women’s studies from York University, a BAH in gender studies from Queen’s University, and a BA in Political Studies from Queen’s University.
She is currently the facilitator of Ingenium’s Black and African Canadian technological innovations fellowship.
Areas of expertise
- Domestic technology and domestic spaces
- Black and African Canadian history
- Community histories
- Critical museology & anti-oppressive practices
From the Channel
The face of the rails: Black porters in Canada
An examination of Black porters, who were integral to the day-to-day operations of Canadian railways from the late 19th to mid-20th century.
‘It is all up to you:’ The West Indian domestic scheme in Canada (1955-1967)
An overview of the West Indian Domestic Scheme, which brought more than 3,000 Caribbean women, mostly from Jamaica, Barbados, Grenada, Guyana, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, St. Lucia, and Trinidad and Tobago, to perform domestic labour in Canada.