By Jay Young A common cliché of our time is to observe that the internet has made us more connected than ever. Although historians might question the accuracy of this statement, the web, social media, and smart phone apps have allowed new opportunities for engagement with historical artifacts, stories, and landmarks. One only has to look at Canada’s largest city. … Read more »
By Krista McCracken I have a love for most things history related and I thoroughly enjoy all kinds of comics. So when these two interests collide I take note. There are a number of great contemporary history themed comics such as Machiavelli and Hark! A Vagrant (check out Ian Mosby’s great post about this webcomic). The idea of using comics… Read more »
By Kaitlin Wainwright At December’s public consultations on the new Museum of Canadian History, Sean Kheraj, an assistant professor of history at York University, made a comment that stuck with me: by commemorating moments in history we actually learn as much about our present as our past. In trying to see the past through a contemporary lens, we blur history… Read more »
By Paul W. Bennett A Review of Arming and Disarming: A History of Gun Control in Canada R. Blake Brown The Osgoode Society/ University of Toronto Press Hard Cover, 349 pages, $70.00 Guns in and around children in schools are frightening. That is why gun culture and firearms control totally dominated the news media in the wake of the horrific… Read more »
By Mark Sholdice My research examines the role played by small groups of people working towards common ends. In other words, I am fascinated by elites. Having spent almost ten years of my life in several universities, I am also intrigued by the role of elites in academia. In early December I came across a study which reported that a… Read more »
By Christine McLaughlin The Hudak Conservatives have unveiled plans to bring so-called “Right to Work” legislation to Ontario. Following in the footsteps of American Republicans, Ontario’s Conservatives are seeking to unravel an agreement that has maintained relative labour peace in the province for over half a century. This has been painted as a ‘progressive’ measure that will ‘modernize’ what have… Read more »
By Christopher Moore This post was originally published on Christopher Moore’s History News Late in 2011, before Attawapiskat and Idle No More were as newsy as they are now, CBC Radio’s Ideas presented my radio documentary “George MacMartin’s Big Canoe Trip,” an exploration of how the James Bay Treaty was made in 1905. The radio-doc draws on the diary of… Read more »
By Dan Oliana Over the last couple of years, I began to take notice of the churches in my home town of Sault Ste. Marie and admired their architectural design and details. My interest spread and I started looking for other churches and as is human nature, compared them, noticing the marked differences in their range of decorative detail and… Read more »
By Andrew Watson and Thomas Peace After reading comment after uninformed comment, both online and in the media, ActiveHistory.ca decided to compile a short list of books written by historians that address the issues being discussed by the Idle No More movement. Click on a link below to read a brief summary of the book. Peggy Blair, Lament for a… Read more »
By Merle Massie Water wells up and flows across the landscape of my memory as a cataclysmic force, ebbing and flowing through my earliest life story. Those encounters shift the flotsam of my perceptions as an environmental historian, shaping the way I think about water. And, these stories require sharing, as they differ radically from that of colleagues raised in… Read more »
