College News

Dr. Gregory Klages, a long-time instrutor for the Department on our main campus and at the Guelph-Humber campus, has just published a new book. Published with Toronto's Dundurn Press, The Many Deaths of Tom Thomson: Separating Fact from Fiction weighs in on the mysterious death of a well-known painter associated with the famed "Group of Seven" artists.

from the jacket:  How did Tom Thomson die in the summer of 1917?

Was he shot by poachers, or by a German-American draft dodger? Did a blow from a canoe paddle knock him unconscious and into the water? Was he fatally injured in a drunken fight? Did he end his life out of fear of being forced to marry his pregnant girlfriend?

Commemorating the one hundredth anniversary of the death of the renowned Canadian landscape painter, The Many Deaths of Tom Thomson offers an authoritative review of the historical record, as well as some theories you might not have thought of in a hundred years. Cultural historian Gregory Klages surveys first-hand testimony and archival records about Thomson’s tragic demise, attempting to sort fact from legend in the death of this Canadian icon.

This week Dr. Susan Nance is interviewed in a piece on VICE, "Ringling Bros. Elephant Sanctuary is Hardly a Paradise." The story explains the nature of and controversy over the Ringling Brothers, Barnum & Bailey Circuses' decision to retire the company elephants and keep them at a facility in Florida in which the animals will be bred with artificial insemination and employed in cancer research. 

In an interview with Peter Holslin, Nance explains why the future of these particular elephants is so hotly contested, and the history of public interest in the lives of the elephant population in North America. 

Read the story at VICE.

HIST*1050 Invitation to History is a new, mandatory course for all first year History majors and minors. 

Invitation to History introduces students to the basics of the historian’s craft including interpreting primary sources, locating and critically analyzing secondary sources and writing for History. It will provide you with the tools you need for success in your History major, minor or area of concentration. Choose any one of the following four classes. 

Fall 2016 - Hist*1050*01  Licit and Illicit Drugs   (instructor: Dr. Catherine Carstairs)
This course will examine the history of the use of licit and illicit drugs across the world, and examine why some have been forbidden and others permitted. 

Fall 2016 - Hist*1050*02  Polar Encounters   (instructor: Dr. Alan Gordon)
This course will trace the history of northern American exploration, including the mysteries of the disappearance of the Franklin and Hudson expeditions, as well as encounters among various peoples in the North and between people and the environment.

Winter 2017 - Hist*1050*03  Crime and Culture   (instructor: Dr. Elizabeth Ewan)
This course will study criminal acts such as homicide, witchcraft, theft and slander and how they were defined and prosecuted in past centuries, and the class will employ historical court records to recover the experiences of people in the past.

For more, visit our First Year Courses page

The Council of Ontario Universities has named the research on the Sanders portrait of Shakespeare headed by SETS professor Daniel Fischlin as one of its top 50 game changing research undertakings in Ontario over the last 100 years:

http://yourontarioresearch.ca/game-changer/revealing-identities/

http://www.guelphmercury.com/opinion-story/6251373-shakespeare-yet-lives...

Congratulations to Alexa Gilker, Nicole Chin, Justina Elias, Andrew Kaufman, Jules Lewis, Nikolai Ostonal, Andrea Perry, and Nick Tooke, who all successfully defended their MFA Creative Writing theses this summer!

For those interested in early modern studies and digital humanities, Prof. Mark Kaethler will be leading a course in which students will have the opportunity to partake in the creation of a digital edition of a Lord Mayor’s Show. Students will receive recognition as contributors or creators, will be able to devise their own readings, and will have the opportunity to apply cultural approaches that suit their individual research interests.

Congratulations to SETS PhD student Gregory Shupak, who successfully defended his doctoral dissertation on May 22, 2015.

Celebrate Black History Month and try your hand at transcribing. We suggest the Shadd Diary.

A journey into the Shadd Diary covers the years 1881-1889 and introduces the reader to a variety of fascinating individuals. Garrison is the son of Abraham Doras Shadd, the famed abolitionist and “conductor” of the Underground Railway, and brother of Mary Ann Shadd, the first black woman in North America to publish a newspaper. Garrison oversees his sons taking extended turns writing the diary, first William, then Charles, then others. You'll notice the change in hand-writing. They are fully engaged in farming and the community life of North Buxton.

The diary can be found here: https://ruraldiaries.lib.uoguelph.ca/garrison-william-shadd

We hope you'll join us!
- Erin Elizabeth Schuurs, PhD Candidate on behalf of Rural History at Guelph

The program for the 22nd Annual Tri-University History Conference on March 5, 2016 is here .pdf

Please join us for the 22nd annual Tri-University History Conference on 5 March 2016 at the Best Western Plus Royal Brock Hotel & Conference Centre in Guelph, ON. Organized by the history departments of Wilfrid Laurier University, the University of Guelph and the University of Waterloo, the theme of this year’s conference is “Contesting History: Reflections on Perspective and Approach.”

This year’s conference will also feature the inaugural Tri-University “Rapid Fire” Competition. Participants will have 3 minutes to deliver an overview of their dissertation, thesis or major paper to a panel of esteemed professors and conference attendees. The event will take place during the final session of the day and a number of prizes will be up for grabs.

Get the poster .pdf