Tag Archives: Politics

Caucasian Complexities: White Ethnicity and the Politics of Ultimate Fighting

Travis Hay & Angie Wong On the 6th of October, the trash-talking Irish superstar and mixed martial artist Conor McGregor was handed a very one-sided loss in his fight with Khabib ‘The Eagle’ Nurmagomedov – a white Muslim man raised in the Dagestani mountains of the Caucus region. When the match was stopped in the fourth round to save McGregor… Read more »

History Slam Episode 122: The Influence of American Conservative Media

https://activehistory.ca/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/History-Slam-122-Conservative-Media.mp3Podcast: Play in new window | DownloadBy Sean Graham Accusations of media bias are a hallmark of 21st century political debate in the United States. From claims that the ‘mainstream media’ opposes the Republican Party to hyperbolic accusations of Fox serving as a form of government propaganda, there is no shortage of distrust when it comes to news outlets. It… Read more »

History Slam Episode 120: Decoding Monuments and Memorials

https://activehistory.ca/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Tonya-Davidson.mp3Podcast: Play in new window | DownloadBy Sean Graham In this episode of the History Slam, I talk with Tonya Davidson of Carleton University about the meaning of monuments. We talk about monuments from a sociological perspective, the controversies around taking monuments down, and whether we should have monuments to individual people. We also visit two monuments in downtown Ottawa… Read more »

Newfoundland’s 1948 Referendum: A People’s Victory?

Raymond B. Blake Referendums are blunt instrument to measure public sentiments. They take complex issues and reduce them to simple yes or no answers. They allow charismatic politicians to seize the public stage and rally voters for or against a particular public policy option through the greater use of fear, distorted realities, and appeals to emotion than is generally normal… Read more »

“Government Mail Free of Postage”: Scholars’ letters to Parliament Hill

Erin Corber In the introduction to his 1993 Reith lectures, Edward Said reflects on the role and representations of the intellectual. Taking Gramsci’s inclusive vision of a broad and expansive intellectual class populated increasingly not only by producers but also by distributors of knowledge, Said argues that the intellectual’s role in society “cannot be reduced simply to being a faceless… Read more »

The Meaning of DoFo – how Doug Ford took Ontario

James Cullingham Ontario – wake up and sniff the kitty litter. Doug Ford aka DoFo, is premier-elect of Canada’s most populous province. That will make DoFo arguably the second most powerful politician in the country after Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. There can be no denying the political accomplishment and screaming yelp for CHANGE this proclaims. Doug Ford, elder brother of… Read more »

History and the Perils of Inevitability

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By Jonathan McQuarrie Not long after Donald Trump’s victory, Hillary Clinton sought to reassure her supporters, and perhaps herself. Echoing President Obama, who in turn drew on Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., she said “the arc of history is long, but it bends towards justice.” This is a reasonable and comforting thing to assert, and it may well be right…. Read more »

Was Laurier Canada’s Obama?

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Laurier, were he alive today, would probably point to the parallels between his situation and that in the United States in 2016. The election of both Obama and Laurier signaled a new political era, where the old “race” hostilities could be turned into something more consensual and progressive. But in both countries, something different happened.

Masculinities and the Culture of Parliament

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By Matt Barrett Without a hint of hyperbole, the House of Commons descended into a scene resembling a Blue Jays–Rangers dugout-clearing brawl on the afternoon of May 18th. According to Peter Mansbridge, “We’ve never seen anything like this in the House of Commons.” Prior to a vote on the assisted-dying bill, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau crossed the floor, entered a… Read more »

The European Extreme Right Yesterday and Today

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Alban Bargain-Villéger Studies on the European ultra-nationalist right are not exactly rare. Over the last couple of decades, many a tree has been felled and much ink has been spilled on the extreme right in our day and age and its connections (or lack thereof) with the fascist movements and parties of old. But despite the abundance of works on… Read more »