Thomas Vennes Early on the morning of the 4th of May 1916, a military column in French West Africa set out to quell a rebellion. Their mission was one small part of World War I in Africa, about which little is said in Canada. This post helps illuminate the under-appreciated global and colonial ramifications of the First World War. The… Read more »
In January, the Graphic History Collective (GHC) launched Remember | Resist | Redraw: A Radical History Poster Project to intervene in the Canada 150 conversation. Earlier this week we released Poster #08 by Jesse Thistle and Jerry Thistle. The poster beautifully illustrates the terror of the Battle of Batoche from the perspective of their Métis Kokum, Marianne Morrissette, née Ledoux…. Read more »
By Thomas Peace Pour assurer notre existence, il faut nous cramponner à la terre, et léguer à nos enfants la langue de nos ancetres et la propriété du sol [1] These words captivated my attention a few months ago as I walked across Parc Montmorency, the site of the old parliament buildings in Quebec City. They are found on the footing… Read more »
by Christo Aivalis Justin Trudeau—since his October 2015 electoral victory that catapulted him to the office of Prime Minister, and his Liberal Party to a majority government—has not lost much of his sheen with the Canadian public. He still embodies for many youthfulness, respectable progressivism, and what the modern Canadian state and civil society should resemble. Additionally, Trudeau on the… Read more »
https://activehistory.ca/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/Alicia-Yamin.mp3Podcast: Play in new window | DownloadBy Sean Graham “Before I had my two children, I had a miscarriage.” This is how Alicia Yamin starts her new book Power, Suffering, and the Struggle for Dignity: Human Rights Frameworks for Health and Why They Matter. By introducing the book in such a personal manner, Yamin, the Policy Director of the Francois-Xavier… Read more »
We are crossposting this essay as part of our partnership with the new early Canadian history blog Borealia. By Elizabeth Mancke & Scott See In the months since the 19 October election, Canadians – from Justin Trudeau to church groups preparing for Syrian refugees – are reasserting one of the most recognizable tropes about Canada, that the country is an international… Read more »
By Billy-Ray Belcourt It’s tough: knowing that you might not get the world you want and the world that wants you back, that your bones might never stop feeling achy and fragile from the wear and tear of mere existence, from the hard labour of getting through the day. Ours are bodies that have been depleted by time, that have been… Read more »
By Lianne Charlie In 1973 when Chief Elijah Smith and a delegation of representatives from Yukon First Nations travelled from Whitehorse, Yukon, to Ottawa to present Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau with Together Today for our Children Tomorrow (TTFCT), they had my generation (and the many to follow) in mind: “This is a settlement for tomorrow, not for today…This settlement is… Read more »
By Norma Dunning In Canada there is an educational crisis. Within Nunavut the attrition rates of Inuk high school students is 51%.[i] The Inuit population is just under 60,000, making this a national disaster. Out of the three recognized Aboriginal groups Inuit remain at the lowest end of academic success. Within this country, in 2011, there were a total of… Read more »
By Claire Thomson On a warm September day, I looked down into a coulee from where my horse and I stood on a breezy prairie hill. Eight heifers crashed through the coulee, making a trail through the brush one after another. This was a tricky pasture to navigate since the hills are steep and rocky and also dense, filled with… Read more »
