Active History

Development, Community, and Citizen Activism in Toronto’s Kensington Market: 1960s and 2013

March 7, 2013 3 Comments

By Daniel Ross

Photo by Dominique Russell

A few dozen locals braved the cold on February 16^th to march in the streets of Toronto’s iconic Kensington Market. They were protesting plans to open a big-box supermarket in the neighbourhood. Developer Tribute Communities plans to break ground soon on a condo development on College Street—just east of the market’s northern entrance—that will include a 20,000-square foot Loblaws store.

Demonstrators from the group Friends of Kensington Market fear that Loblaws will damage the community by driving the small shops that give the market its character out of business. As they marched down Augusta Ave., the Friends held signs reading “No Loblaws No” and “Save Small Kensington Businesses”. In an interview with the CBC, market shop owner Anna Cecilia Espinoza worried that the arrival of big retail could spell the end of small businesses like hers. A “Save Kensington” petition has since been started on Activism.com. News of the development comes at a time of acute insecurity about how rising property values are changing the area (by bringing in more chain stores, higher rents, etc.). The recent closure of local café Casa Acoreana has led some to speculate that the area has reached a “tipping point” for gentrification.

Flyer by Damien Boyer

Recently, my own research has led me to read about community responses to urban planning and development in Toronto in the 1960s and 1970s. I’ve been struck by the degree of success of certain downtown communities during that period at organizing and having their voices heard on projects that threatened their homes and neighbourhoods. One was Kensington Market.

This post fits the Loblaws protest into a larger history of people in Kensington speaking up about the market’s future. In the 1960s shop owners and residents organized to have their say in neighbourhood planning. While they weren’t able to follow through on many of their own plans to improve the area, they did set up an innovative community-based planning model, and blocked or altered several projects that would have dramatically changed the neighbourhood. Today’s Kensington owes a lot to those efforts to keep the area’s character intact. And that may be one of the best arguments for taking opposition to big-box retail in Kensington Market seriously.

Continue reading →

History Slam Episode Fourteen: Tim Stanley

March 6, 2013 No Comments

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

By Sean Graham

B.C Premier Christy Clark has spent the better part of the last week apologizing for the provincial Liberals’ classified plan to win the “ethnic vote.” While the scheme had clear ethical issues by using provincial staffers for political purposes, what has garnered the most attention is the disingenuous manner in which the party hoped to get “quick wins” from minority groups. One of the ways they hoped to do this was to officially apologize for racist policies and acts from the past. And while not mentioned specifically, one of these racist policies that may have been considered was school segregation in the 1920s and 1930s.

In this episode of the History Slam I talk with Timothy Stanley, author of Contesting White Supremacy: School Segregation, Anti-Racism, and the Making of Chinese Canadians. Professor Stanley provides a unique take on the social construction of race and the power dynamics that lead to racism. We also chat about the Victoria school strike and the creation of a Chinese community in the region. The conversation also touches on the “history wars” as we debate how regional and national histories interact.

In addition to the podcast, be sure to check out this interview with Professor Stanley from 2011.

Sean Graham is a doctoral candidate at the University of Ottawa where he is currently working on a project that examines the early years of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. He has previously studied at Nipissing University, the University of the West Indies, and the University of Regina and like any red-blooded Canadian his ultimate dream is to be a curling champion while living on a diet of beer and poutine.

Why Maritime Union Is a Bad Idea: An Environmental Historian’s Perspective

March 5, 2013 No Comments

Fraser Companies Ltd.’s pulp mill in Edmundston, New Brunswick, circa 1950s. Fraser was one of several large pulp and paper companies in New Brunswick that benefitted from the regional economic development programs in the 1960s and 1970s, particularly through increased control of the province’s Crown (public) forests. (Provincial Archives of New Brunswick, P225-1929)

By Mark McLaughlin

[Originally published on the Historians of the Environment of the Atlantic Region blog]

Maritime Union, or one united Maritime province, is an idea that predates Canada. The original rationale for the 1864 Charlottetown Conference, which eventually led to Canadian Confederation (1867), was a meeting of Maritime leaders to discuss some form of union between their respective colonies. The idea has resurfaced periodically ever since then, often proposed as a solution for what are perceived as the region’s economic woes. The most recent revival occurred in November 2012, when three Conservative senators, Nova Scotia’s Stephen Greene, New Brunswick’s John Wallace, and Prince Edward Island’s Mike Duffy, offered Maritime Union as a way to combat soaring provincial deficits and high unemployment.[i] Media commentators, such as John Ibbitson in The Globe and Mail and the editorial board of the National Post, wholeheartedly endorsed the idea in the days and weeks that followed.[ii]

This recent national discussion about Maritime Union lacked historical perspective and was saturated with neoliberal assumptions. While many reasons have been offered as to why Maritime Union is a good idea, I want to address one policy area that has not received much attention — natural resource management. My interest in the matter stems from my doctoral research on the environmental history of forest management in New Brunswick at the University of New Brunswick, and the fact that I am a New Brunswicker, born in Perth-Andover and raised nearby on a small family farm. As an environmental historian, I am concerned that this latest discussion about Maritime Union is relying upon the same type of reasoning that has been used to manage natural resources in the region. Continue reading →

Mapping the World: Perspective, Artistry, and Map Making

March 4, 2013 2 Comments

By Krista McCracken

World map by Heinrich Bèunting, 1581.

You ask for directions from a friend. They respond by drawing you map. The map you are given is hurriedly scribbled on the back of a napkin. At the time you graciously thank them for the effort. But, when you have to actually use the map you realize the jumble of crossing lines lacks proportions and is far from clear. The map makes you wonder about your friend’s ability to think logically.

The act of creating a good map is both a science and an art. Good maps can provide directions, details about landscapes and say a great deal about the world around us. Good maps illuminate the important details while minimizing distractions and extraneous information. Poorly designed maps are often frustrating, confusing, and at times misleading. The science behind maps can easily been seen in modern surveying techniques and commonly used cartographic standards.

What about the artistry of map making? The earliest maps fall more into the category of works of art than works of science. When cartographers had neither the geographical or cartographic knowledge to make accurate maps artistic license was used to express worldviews in map form. Maps during the middle ages and renaissance eras were often aesthetically pleasing and closely related to painting. Many of these early maps were in fact landscape paintings drawn with new perspectives. Continue reading →

Black Nova Scotian Women Working in Service: The Invisible History

February 27, 2013 1 Comment

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

On Thursday February 7 Professor Wanda Thomas Bernard delivered this lunchtime lecture to the Lifelong Learners program at Acadia University.

Bernard’s lecture builds on her work with Judith Fingard on Black Nova Scotian domestic workers in the mid-twentieth century. In this lecture Bernard discusses the hardships these women faced and the complex worlds in which they lived. Interested readers should see their joint essay “Black Women at Work: Race, Family and Community in Greater Halifax” in Judith Fingard and Janet Vey Guildford’s Mothers of the Municipality: Women, Work and Social Policy in post-1945 Halifax. Continue reading →

#IdleNoMore, Histories, and Historians

February 26, 2013 2 Comments

By Adele Perry

Idle no more protesters marching along Government Street in Victoria on December 21, 2012

Recently, there have been some good cases for the utility of history as a discipline in explaining #IdleNoMore. Here I want to add to, and shift, the terms of this discussion by urging historians who study Canada, and the societies that preceded it, and who presume a connection between scholarship and social change, become active allies of #IdleNoMore.

Historians study change over time. A lot of the time the historical record seems to offer up a compelling but deeply depressing litany of horror and trauma: plagues, slavery, dispossession, war, relentless and deadening structures of patriarchy that stunted and ruined lives. Sometimes it seems to go on and on without much respite. But history also shows us that things change, sometimes in ways that we might never anticipate. For those of us committed to social change, history can provide remarkable evidence that however seemingly intransigent and unmoveable, political and economic structures can also give way, shift, and alter, sometimes when they seem perhaps least likely too. Continue reading →

What’s So Funny About Sexism, Racism and Harassment?

February 25, 2013 3 Comments

By Christine McLaughlin

Photo credit: Liz Henry
http://www.flickr.com/photos/lizhenry/

When I ask my students who identifies as a feminist, usually only a few hesitantly raise their hands. I appreciate their reluctance to label themselves. As Ruth Rosen aptly illustrates in a recent article, feminism has been forcefully infused with negative connotations. Students of women’s history learn how cartoons and other forms of humour have been a key means of demonizing suffragists and feminists, reinforcing negative perceptions of women seeking equal rights.

My focus here is on one tool for maintaining a language of masculine empowerment and feminine and racist oppression: the joke. Uh-oh! Here we go! Another “man-hating,” “over-reacting” “feminazi” who “can’t take a joke.” On the contrary, I love a good joke. But I believe that good jokes should be funny to everyone in the room, not just a historically privileged group. I think good jokes should not make anyone feel demeaned, afraid, hurt or like lesser of a human being. This is not just a personal opinion; many human rights’ codes clearly define jokes about historically oppressed groups as harassment. Continue reading →

History Slam Episode Thirteen: Musician Del Barber

February 20, 2013 No Comments

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Last Saturday night in Ottawa, a young musician took the stage at the National Arts Centre and sang about a dream he had had. The dream was interesting because all his favourite historical figures – from Friedrich Nietzsche and Jean-Jacques Rousseau to Bob Dylan and Woody Guthrie – had shown up for a party at his house. The Party Song is a terrific example of how history has an active presence in our lives and how pop culture can be a great disseminator of historical references.

In this episode of the History Slam I talk with singer/songwriter Del Barber about the use of history in his songs as well as how history has influenced his career. Apart The Party Song, we chat about personal histories and how the past plays a role in our daily lives. Given my affinity for the Prairies from my days in Regina and Del’s Winnipeg roots, we also talk about the changing face of the West.

It has often been said that you shouldn’t meet the people of whom you are a fan, because inevitably you will be disappointed. Some of the greatest tales I’ve ever heard have been horror stories about meeting a celebrity who turned out to be less than affable. Fortunately, my experience with Del Barber was the exact opposite of that. Apart from the fact that his show was great, he’s a great guy – generous with his time, gracious in his attitude, and sincere with his answers. It was an interview that I really enjoyed, and hopefully you will too.

New Paper by J.R. Miller: Residential Schools and Reconciliation

February 19, 2013 No Comments

ActiveHistory.ca is pleased to announce the publication of J.R. Miller’s paper, Residential Schools and Reconciliation

“Reconciliation” is a word that has gained great currency of late. It has been frequently used in discussions surrounding the Idle No More movement during the winter of 2012-13. But the term has a longer history in discussions in Canada concerning Native-newcomer relations. Notably, Chief Justice Antonio Lamer in the Supreme Court of Canada’s rulings in both the Van der Peet and Delgamuukw cases in 1996-97 made the point that the purpose of Section 35 of the constitution adopted in 1982 was “the reconciliation of the pre-existence of aboriginal societies with the sovereignty of the Crown.” That conception of the place of reconciliation in Canadian life is also relevant to the topic of residential schools and their legacy.
Read More

Editors Note: In addition to our group blog, ActiveHistory.ca strives to provide timely, well-written and thoroughly researched papers on a variety of history-related topics. This is an area of our website that we would like to develop further. If you have a paper that you think resonates well with our mandate please consider submitting a paper to us. Expanded conference papers or short essays that introduce an upcoming book project are great starting points for the type of paper we publish. With a current readership of about 10,000 people per month we can assure that you will find an interested audience through our site.

For more information visit our Papers Section or contact papers@activehistory.ca. All of our papers are peer reviewed to ensure that they are accurate and up-to-date.

History Wars: The Danger of the Broad Brush

February 18, 2013 2 Comments

By Jim Clifford
Is Stephen Harper, as Terry Glavin argues, right to “not trust the history establishment“? Posts on this website and elsewhere do suggest that a broad spectrum of Canadian historians disagree with Harper’s use of history. Does this vocal minority represent the establishment? If not, who makes up the establishment? The Canadian Historical Association’s executive members? Leading historians at the large graduate programs?

Glavin’s column pivots from mentioning the concerns of Tom Mulcair and Scott Simms with the Conservative’s efforts to re-brand Canadian history to rehashing Jack Granatstein’s critique against “faddish social histories” from the 1990s (a fad that appears to have outlasted three to four generations of popular culture fads). Glavin, an author who has written a number of books about indigenous history, laments:

If it’s “a proud national story rooted in the great deeds of our ancestors” you’re after, the very last place to go looking for it would be the history faculty of a Canadian university.

To bolster his argument, Glavin interviewed Christopher Dummitt (the author of a great history blog, Everyday History), who began his career as a historian of masculinity, to confirm the Conservatives are

“right not to trust us… The historical profession has become kind of an activist organization. The result is we have lost authority, as a discipline, and we can’t talk about history writ large.”

Continue reading →

Last »