Active History

The king in a car park: Digging up Richard III

January 26, 2015 1 Comment

By Daniel Ross

“Bloody thou art; bloody will be thy end.” Duchess of York, Act IV, Scene IV, Richard III

Not such a bad guy after all? Olivier as Richard III, 1955.

Shakespeare’s Richard III is one of fiction’s classic villains, a schemer who knocks off one family member after another on his way to the crown. Even his mother the Duchess would rather he was dead, and she gets her wish by the end of the play. King of England for just two years, Richard died at the battle of Bosworth Field in 1485, making him one of the last victims of the War of the Roses.

Opinions differ as to how nasty the historical Richard was, but it’s safe to say that, until recently, he hasn’t had a very positive cultural legacy (although he did make 82 of 100 in a 2002 poll of greatest Britons). That might be changing. In 2013 archaeologists digging under a parking lot in the English Midlands made international news when they claimed to have found the king’s remains. In this post, I take a look at Richard III’s extraordinary return to the public eye over the past two years: it’s a story about much more than archaeology and historical inquiry, as it turns out. Continue reading →

Review of Photography, Memory, and Refugee Identity: The Voyage of the SS Walnut, 1948 by Lynda Mannik

January 23, 2015 No Comments

By Phil Gold

For Estonians, the twentieth century was a tug-of-war between political independence and social freedoms and repressive subjugation under the Soviet boot. Lynda Mannik’s book, Photography, Memory and Refugee Identity: The Voyage of The SS Walnut, 1948 provides a fascinating snapshot of one moment in that tumultuous history: the journey of the 347 Estonian refugees from Communism who sailed from Goteborg, Sweden to Pier 21 in Halifax and a new life in Canada. The book is a clear and well-written historical monograph that uses the narrative power of photographs to immerse readers. The author also reminds the reader that Estonian refugees have a significant place in Canadian history. As Canada’s first “boat people,” their story is part of a permanent exhibit at Pier 21 that highlights the immigrant experience and arrival in Canada. For Mannik, narrating the Walnut’s voyage also provides an opportunity to explore a period of transformation in Canadian immigration policy. Continue reading →

Five Things You Might Not Have Known About Canadian Environmental History

January 22, 2015 No Comments

“Dynamic Serenity” by Andrew E. Larsen

By Sean Kheraj

Canadian environmental history is a burgeoning sub-field of Canadian history, but it is not very well known outside of academia. This is my own research speciality. On many occasions, I have had to answer the question: what is environmental history? Periodically, this is a question that environmental historians ask themselves. There have been several reflective articles about Canadian environmental history, including a recently published forum in Canadian Historical Review, edited by Alan MacEachern. You can actually read MacEachern’s full introduction to that forum here.

In short, environmental history is the historical study of the changing relationships between people and the rest of nature. It is an alternative way of thinking about the past that can offer new insights into understanding Canadian history. To help illustrate this point, I thought I would share five open-access journal articles that reveal things about Canadian environmental history that you might not have known about. Continue reading →

Spoils of the War of 1812: Part I: The Importance of Michilimackinac

January 21, 2015 3 Comments

By Alan Corbiere

This post is part of a series of essays – posted once a month – by Alan Corbiere focusing on Anishinaabeg participation in the War of 1812.

The Anishinaabeg (Ojibwe, Odawa, Potowatomi) have always revered the island of Michilimackinac. So much so that at the conclusion of the War of 1812, the Odawa tried to keep it in their possession. The Odawa suggested that the British negotiators offer the Americans a greater quantity of Anishinaabe land on the mainland in order to keep Michilimackinac in the possession of the Anishinaabeg with trading access allowed to the British. We know that this did not happen, but was it possible? This is the first in a series of posts that explore this question; first by examining Michilimackinac’s importance and then by focusing on British policy as explained to the Anishinaabeg in Council (second part of series) and the final installment in the series will focus on Anishinaabe reactions to the news that Great Britain and USA had entered into a peace treaty.

There are two versions of the meaning of the name Michilimackinac. Continue reading →

Charlie Hebdo in Historical Context

January 20, 2015 4 Comments

By Geoff Read

Paris Rally in Support of the Victims of the Charlie Hebdo Shootings, 11 Jan 2015

One of the courses I teach at Huron University College is called “Current Crises in Historical Context,” wherein we use the tools of historical analysis to try to shed light on the origins of some of the crises confronting the world. This year we are looking at topics such as the Russian annexation of the Crimea, the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, and Global Warming.

With this course in mind, and particularly as an historian of modern France, I have been thinking a lot about the historical context of the Charlie Hebdo shootings in Paris on 7 January, and the murder of four customers at a Jewish grocery two days later. This seems to me to be a case that cries out for some historical analysis. Typical of such instances, while “History” can teach us a great deal, the answers it provides are complex and defy simple explanations for these violent outbursts. Continue reading →

Who/What Really Is Charlie?

January 19, 2015 2 Comments

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 fighting for freedom of the press. Overnight, the slogan “Je suis Charlie” thus became a rallying cry for free speech and the refusal to concede defeat to intolerance and terrorism. Canada was no exception to the rule, with numerous messages of support on Twitter and several rallies in major Canadian cities.

As a Frenchman born and raised, I could not help but feel simultaneously touched by and surprised at the wave of support for an extremely politically incorrect satirical newspaper. Continue reading →

Podcast: The Future of the Past: Transmitting History to Future Generations

January 16, 2015 No Comments

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

On 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 Lévesque (University of Ottawa), Jo-Ann McCutcheon (University of Ottawa), and Jean-Pierre Morin (Aboriginal and Northern Development Canada).

Activehistory.ca is pleased to present a recording of this roundtable.

“We Are the People:” Nativism in Germany?

January 15, 2015 2 Comments

By Aitana Guia

PEGIDA Rally in Dresden, Fall 2014

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 its days were numbered. Instead the new menace, as these ordinary Germans see it, is not the power structure, a physical dividing line, or even a political ideology; it’s immigrants, especially Muslim immigrants.

During a televised address to the nation on New Year’s Eve, Chancellor Angela Merkel took the opportunity to criticize the emerging movement Patriotische Europäer Gegen die Islamisierung des Abendlandes (Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamization of the West, PEGIDA). She told Germans that a resounding feature about their country was that “children of the persecuted can grow up here without fear” and asked them to ignore the calls of those who have “prejudice, coldness, and even hatred” in their hearts.

After various terrorist attacks in France in January 2015 that targeted the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo, a kosher supermarket, and French police, and despite repeated calls by German politicians not to join the Islamophobic movement, PEGIDA’s rally in Dresden reached a record number of 25,000 attendees on Monday, January 12, 2015. Continue reading →

History Slam Episode Fifty-Seven: Unlikely Diplomats: The Canadian Brigade in Germany 1951-1964

January 14, 2015 1 Comment

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

By 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 the Second World War, the evolution of Canada’s Army in the second half of the 20th century, African Canadians serving in the American Civil War, and the Canadian Brigade in Germany.

In the latter, Isabel Campbell examines how the Canadian army and their families served a key diplomatic role while serving in Germany through the 1950s and early 1960s. Living in Ottawa – and being constantly surrounded by diplomats (Hi Norwegian Embassy curling team!) – makes the idea of soldiers and their families as diplomatic tools rather intriguing as it goes against the common conception of diplomats as career civil servants who get dedicated street parking spaces and inexplicable police escorts.

Canada’s German mission is also notable because of its significant domestic legacy. It is not uncommon to meet someone in this country who has spent a portion of their life living in Germany. As a result, the culture and values fostered by the Canadian brigade and their families has been brought back with returning members and has played a role in shaping Canadian life through the second half of the 20th century.

In her book, Campbell explores the brigade in a new and unique way. Capitalizing on newly declassified documents, she examines the diplomatic roles spouses and children played while accompanying soldiers while also re-assessing the notion that Canadian officials were fully united with their NATO allies in Germany.
Continue reading →

Let’s talk about something other than Ebola

January 13, 2015 1 Comment

Or, the perils of teaching the history of disease amid global health crises

Casey Hurrell

Wikipedia Commons

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 Ebola crisis. This is particularly challenging, as my newshound students are generally well-informed and frequently raise points of discussion that I would happily entertain in a different context.

When my students want to talk about Ebola, I resist the urge to turn our history seminar into a forum for debate about trendy health issues. I find myself thinking: let’s talk about something that matters, and let’s give it a historical context. Rather than focusing our attention on a scourge that is exceedingly unlikely to ever affect your daily lives, let’s talk about some equally harrowing disease that you all think is a relic of the past, but most certainly is not. Let’s talk about tuberculosis, and the place that diseases occupy in the historical record.

Continue reading →

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