By Alban Bargain-Villéger In the wake of the January 7-9 attacks in France, millions of tweets, millions of demonstrators, thousands of heads of state, intellectuals, and celebrities of all kinds not only condemned the murders of seventeen people (including four as a result of an anti-Semitic hostage taking linked to the other shootings), but also praised Charlie Hebdo’s courage in… Read more »
https://activehistory.ca/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/Pierre-Savard-Roundtable.mp3Podcast: Play in new window | DownloadOn Friday April 25, 2014 as part of the annual Pierre Savard Conference at the University of Ottawa, there was a roundtable discussing the future of history. Entitled ‘The Future of the Past: Transmitting History to Future Generations” the roundtable was chaired by Adria Midea and featured Jennifer Anderson (Canadian Museum of History), Stéphane… Read more »
By Aitana Guia On Mondays for the past 13 weeks, thousands of Germans have marched on Dresden declaring “Wir sind das Volk,” we are the people. Were it 1989 on the eve of the collapse of the Berlin Wall, these same protestors might have been those who delivered the message to the Communist government of the German Democratic Republic that… Read more »
https://activehistory.ca/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/Isabel-Campbell.mp3Podcast: Play in new window | DownloadBy Sean Graham On December 4, 2014, the Canadian War Museum and UBC Press book launch as part of their joint Canadian Military Series. The series features a wide range of military historians and their examinations of this country’s military history. The books launched on this night discussed consumerism on the home front during… Read more »
Or, the perils of teaching the history of disease amid global health crises Casey Hurrell This semester, I’ve had the pleasure of teaching a senior undergrad seminar, focusing on the history of disease from the time of Hippocrates to the present. Every week, in front of twenty-two energetic and curious undergrads, I wholeheartedly attempt to steer conversations away from the ongoing… Read more »
By Krista McCracken The rise and fall of midwifery as an accepted profession is directly linked to the medicalization of birth, feminism, and social conditions. The history of midwifery in Canada is similar to the rise and fall of midwifery in the United States and Europe. For years women gave birth at home surrounded by female relatives and neighbours, with… Read more »
Last month Karen Dubinsky published a post with us on Kingston’s preparations for commemorating the 200th anniversary of Sir John A. Macdonald’s birth. In that post she mentioned a symposium on “Critical Indigenous Reflections on Sir John A. Macdonald” that was held in November at Queen’s University. Much of that symposium was recorded and has now been placed on YouTube…. Read more »
By James Daschuk Ok, first things first: I do not hate John A. Macdonald. At the risk of maddening some colleagues out there, I am wary of trying to contort huge historical events and consequences into how they apply to a single individual’s psychological makeup, political vision or personal ambition. As a self-professed environmental historian, I have even joked with… Read more »
By Christa Zeller Thomas “[Confederation …] will make us historical.” John A. Macdonald “History is not the province of the ladies.” John Adams Did Canada’s Confederation women give birth to the new dominion in 1867? Sir John A. didn’t have women in mind when he made his statement (above) about entering history. He was mainly referring to himself. And yet,… Read more »
By Timothy J. Stanley Racisms are central to the creation of Canada through European dominance over the vast territories of the First Nations, Inuit and Métis people. A case in point is provided by John Alexander Macdonald and his enactment of Asian exclusion and the genocide of the people of the southern plains.[1] Macdonald not only excluded the Chinese, he… Read more »
