History News

Call For Papers: Artifacts in Agraria Symposium
University of Guelph, 17-18 October 2015

A pottery jug, rag rug, handmade nightdress, coal-oil lamp, plow, buggy, barn…. Some experiences of the agrarian past have escaped being put into language but survive long after the period under study as artifacts.

We invite proposals that begin with a material artifact of everyday life, either made or used, and explore it as a valid historical source that gathers meaning when understood in the context of surviving written records, family history, fashion trends and international commerce. How is the artifact conceived and used by particular groups? How does it connect aesthetic and cultural beliefs, symbolize self-identity, affirm values, tell stories, purvey heritage and have meaning ascribed to it through display? We encourage papers that provide a better understanding of rural life in and beyond Canada, and that explore new methods or ways of viewing and contextualizing artifacts. Though organized by historians, we welcome ethnologists, archaeologists, art historians, cultural geographers, museum professionals and connoisseurs.

Please submit a 400 word proposal and 1 page CV to C. Wilson, cawilson@uoguelph.ca
For more information visit: www.uoguelph.ca/ruralhistory/
Deadline for proposals is 26 January 2015.

Sponsored by the Redelmeier Professorship in Rural History

Happy New Year and welcome to another season of Rural History Roundtable Talks!

Our Winter 2015 RHRT Speaker Series features:

Lisa Cox, Postdoctoral Fellow, Ontario Veterinary College
“Canada's War Horses: The OVC, Veterinary Medicine, and the Great War, 1914-1918” (Wednesday, February 4, 3:30pm-5:00pm, MacKinnon Building 132)

Jack Little, Professor, Department of History, Simon Fraser University
“History of Oxen and Horse Power in Rural Canada from the 17th to the 20th Centuries” (Thursday, February 26, 1:00-2:30pm, MacKinnon Building 132)

David Zylberberg, Postdoctoral Research Fellow, University of British Columbia Okanagan
"Warm, Well-fed and Employed? Fuel Prices and Regional Lifestyle Divergences in Rural England, 1750-1830" (Thursday, March 12, 1:00-2:30pm, MacKinnon Building 132)

Mike Commito, PhD Candidate, Department of History, McMaster University
“Yvon and the Five Bears: Rural and Urban Attitudes Towards Black Bear Hunting in Northern Ontario” (Tuesday, March 31, 1:00-2:30pm MacKinnon Building 132)

When History Masters student Emily Pauw worked at U of G’s library, she often read crime stories in the newspaper during her lunch break. When she couldn’t find enough current crimes to read about, she turned to archival newspapers from the mid-1800s and became interested in how crimes were reported back then.

“I’ve always been interested in reading about crime,” says the 2014 master’s graduate in history. And since working in the library, she developed an interest in old newspapers.

Pauw focused her master’s research on Scotland’s Aberdeen Journal between 1845 and 1850 because of the many social and legal developments happening in the country at that time...

read the rest of the story @Guelph

Dr. Alan McDougall is interviewed for an article on hockey and politics in the cold war this weekend. "German Hockey Star Recalls Missing Shot at Edmonton Oilers Glory - Twenty-five years after fall of Berlin Wall, former East German star Dieter Frenzel recounts tale of rich offer by NHL powerhouse hidden by communist authorities."

The Department extends a very warm welcome to Dr. James Fraser, who joins our Department in January as our new Scottish Studies Foundation Chair. James comes to us from the Department of History at the University of Edinburgh where he is a Senior Lecturer in Early Scottish History. He is the author ofFrom Caledonia to Pictland: Scotland to 795(Edinburgh University Press, 2009); The Roman Conquest of Scotland: the Battle of Mons Graupius AD 84 (Tempus Publishing, 2005); and The Battle of Dunnichen 685 (Tempus Publishing, 2002). He has extensive teaching experience at the graduate and undergraduate level, and is also a graduate of the University of Guelph (MA '99).  

November 6, the ASA and Mess proudly presentNorman Finkelstein, renowned political scientist, author, commentator, and lecturer, who will offer his insight on conflict in the Middle East. Tickets $5 at the door. See attached flyer .pdf

Rural History Roundtable Speaker Series - Fall 2014

We have another great lineup this season! Mark your calendars and please join us for talks by
Elizabeth Jewett: “Cultivating the Course: Golf Course Knowledge and Technology in Canada, 1873-1945”
Ken Sylvester: “Making Green Revolutions: Kansas Farms, Recovery and the New Agriculture, 1918-1981”
Ben Bradley: "Food, Gas, Lodging, and More: The Roadside Economy in Rural British Columbia, 1920-1960"
Jon Weier: “The Soldiers of the Soil and YMCA War Work in Rural Canada during the First World War”

get the poster .pdf or see our events feed

The 2014 Scottish Studies Fall Colloquium will be held at the University of Guelph, UC 103 on October 4 from 9.30am to 4.30pm. This year, the Jill McKenzie Lecture will be given by Professor Michael Lynch, Emeritus Sir William Fraser Chair of Scottish History and Palaeography at the University of Edinburgh and we will also feature a lecture by Ken McGoogan, author of "How Scots Invented Canada," among other lectures.

Registration for the Colloquium can be done online through https://www.uoguelph.ca/scottish/events/fall or in person on the day of the Colloquium (from 9am to 9.30am). Do contact us for more information at scottish@uoguelph.ca

Get the program .pdf

The 2015 Tri-University History Conference takes place March 7 at the Balsillie School of International Affairs in Waterloo, Ontario. Our theme this year: War, Memory, and Commemoration.

The conference features a keynote address by Sir Hew Strachan, Chichele Professor of the History of War at All Souls College, Oxford, UK.

Paper proposals from graduate students, emerging and established scholars welcome. Please send inquiries or proposals (200 - 300 words) to Darren Mulloy at dmulloy@wlu.ca by Nov. 7, 2014. All proposals should be accompanied by a brief (50 words) biographical note.

Some suggested topics, although papers will not be limited to these: the centenary of World War I; the politics of remembrance; technology and commemoration; the culture of warfare; education and nationalism; home fronts; transnational perspectives 

Get the poster .pdf

Toronto’s reggae roots are explored this weekend with Harbourfront’s Island Soul festivities and the Irie Music Festival (with a ceremonial opening at Nathan Phillips Square on Friday with appearances by acts from the Queen Street West reggae scene in the 1970s and ’80s). We spoke with Juno-nominated reggae-jazz keyboardist and historian Jason Wilson about the city’s Jamaican dance music past.

Read the interview at the Globe and Mail