Tag Archives: Canadian studies

Bringing Black studies to Canadian universities is still an uphill battle

Afua Cooper Since my time as a graduate student to my present appointment as professor at Dalhousie University, I have been involved with championing and developing Black studies in universities and beyond. Previously, within Canadian universities, not many scholars who work in creating knowledge about Black people called it Black studies. For many, “Black studies” was something that happened in… Read more »

Is The Big Shift History?

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By Colin Coates Recently, in teaching my first-year Canadian Studies course, I have used Bricker and Ibbitson’s The Big Shift as one of the required readings. It is an accessible account of current Canadian politics, and it has the advantage of having a strong (or at least a strongly argued) thesis. Few readers can finish the book without knowing precisely… Read more »

ActiveHistory.ca repost – Who Killed Canadian Studies?

ActiveHistory.ca is on a three-week hiatus, but we’ll be back with new content in mid-August. During the hiatus, we’re featuring some of our most popular and favourite posts from the past year.  We will also be highlighting some of the special series and papers we’ve run this year. Thanks as always to our writers and readers. The following post was… Read more »

“If Stephen Harper doesn’t support Canadian Studies, why should we?”

By Colin Coates “If Stephen Harper doesn’t support Canadian Studies, why should we?” So said the vice-provost of Duke University to Jane Moss, the director of the university’s Center for Canadian Studies, as he recommended “re-purposing” the endowment that had funded the Centre. This long-lasting centre closed as of 2014, turned into a “Council for North American Studies.” The place… Read more »

Who Killed Canadian Studies?

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By Colin Coates The world of Canadian Studies, which according to the International Council for Canadian Studies includes some 7,000 scholars in 70 countries, is facing difficult times. Strangely enough, one of its chief opponents seems to be our own government. Since the 1970s successive Liberal and Progressive Conservative federal governments, along with various provincial governments, have supported the principle… Read more »

Turmoil and Meddling at the Foundation for Canadian Studies in the UK

Since the new year began, just six-and-a-half weeks ago, considerable changes have been made to the direction of the Foundation for Canadian Studies in the UK. Earlier in the month, the High Commission, which collaborates with this UK charity, added four new members to the board, signalling that problems were afoot. Last week, another four members of the board resigned… Read more »

Active History in an Age of Austerity

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Budget cuts at the municipal, provincial, and federal levels of government across the country have targeted cultural and heritage institutions, threatening the integrity of the capacity of Canada to maintain an adequate understanding of its collective past. Just as Margaret Atwood helped mobilize opposition to proposed cuts to Toronto libraries, the challenge for active historians who oppose such measures is to make their opposition public.