Thursday, January 29, 2009
Louis Riel by Chester Brown
Hey everyone. This website has legally posted some exerts from Chester Brown's extremely popular graphic novel on Louis Riel. In case anyone was interested...
Wednesday, January 28, 2009
Louis Riel
Who was Louis Riel? It depends on who you are asking...
Historica, our one and only producer of the Heritage Minutes we love so much has dedicated some of their bandwidth to Canadians to submit their own Louis Riel minutes. Here is the clip for the original "official" Louis Riel minute in English and in French
The reason that I have made a point to include both is that for Louis Riel's representation, language can be an important factor. A unilingual Canadian studying Riel will only get one side of the representation because they just cannot make sense of the French or English information. The French and the English in Canada have typically had very different feelings toward Riel and so have presented very different depictions, stories, and memories of him.
The linguistic differences are very apparent if you look at old newspaper clippings. Manitobia has an extensive collection and easily searchable index if you are interested in this topic. This seems to be the best laid out website of this sort---however it has its limitations. Being based in Manitoba, it has a very limited scope of newspapers to select from. As the home of Louis, we are certainly assured of excellent coverage of local and perhaps federal sentiments, we do not get much information about how the rest of Canada feels. There is always Early Canadiana Online, The Globe and Mail, and even The Times(London) that are all searchable from the MacOdrum Library website.
It is important to keep in mind when using newspapers as reference material that there is an inherent bias in the information. The "same story" can be published in five different papers and have five different spins on it. Question where the paper, story, or writer is from. Some articles may have been American or British in origin. Was the story even published for Canadians? or was it "news" for abroad? If it is domestic news, does the paper have an agenda? Sometimes it is easy to notice this with a paper such as The Canada Christian Advocate or The Protestant but when a paper is entitled The Saint John Star or The Gazette it is not readily apparent. Some papers are owned by specific industries, religious factions, or just particular individuals in order to push certain causes be it Monarchy or Métis rights. Louis was named a murderer and a saint and everything in between by the press---and this was not done without rhyme or reason.
This is a short video by Josh Martin and Riley Osterlund from youTube. It was a social studies project that they had done. Their attempt was to be as non-bias as possible. Were they successful?
Here is another "more official history" of Louis and the Métis from the 1970's. Notice the language. Do you find there to be a strong bias? What do you make of Riel ??
And then of course there are always the CBC Archives--a neat place to poke around if you are interested in virtually anything Canadiana. They are funded by the Canadian government but managed at arm's length. They are often criticized for their bias. They have a phenomenal amount of radio and video footage on countless topics. Unfortunately, they do not allow embedding like youtube but they have a fine list of sources on Riel spanning several decades. It is interesting to examine how one media source's portrayal of a topic can change so much over time.
And if you are really keen, you can even test your knowledge in a crossword puzzle. Is there a bias in the questions?
Louis Riel is not limited to archives either. Chester Brown, has written a popular graphic novel on him. Ironically--or maybe not---the first review of the book on Chapters claims there to be a strong bias in the work. If you are interested in this book it is available at Chapters and most local bookstores.
Whether you think Louis is a hero or a villain, make sure to check your local calendar because Canada has a few Louis Riel days, that vary depending on whether you are in Manitoba or Ontario, so you can go out and celebrate or shake your fist at Riel!
Historica, our one and only producer of the Heritage Minutes we love so much has dedicated some of their bandwidth to Canadians to submit their own Louis Riel minutes. Here is the clip for the original "official" Louis Riel minute in English and in French
The reason that I have made a point to include both is that for Louis Riel's representation, language can be an important factor. A unilingual Canadian studying Riel will only get one side of the representation because they just cannot make sense of the French or English information. The French and the English in Canada have typically had very different feelings toward Riel and so have presented very different depictions, stories, and memories of him.
The linguistic differences are very apparent if you look at old newspaper clippings. Manitobia has an extensive collection and easily searchable index if you are interested in this topic. This seems to be the best laid out website of this sort---however it has its limitations. Being based in Manitoba, it has a very limited scope of newspapers to select from. As the home of Louis, we are certainly assured of excellent coverage of local and perhaps federal sentiments, we do not get much information about how the rest of Canada feels. There is always Early Canadiana Online, The Globe and Mail, and even The Times(London) that are all searchable from the MacOdrum Library website.
It is important to keep in mind when using newspapers as reference material that there is an inherent bias in the information. The "same story" can be published in five different papers and have five different spins on it. Question where the paper, story, or writer is from. Some articles may have been American or British in origin. Was the story even published for Canadians? or was it "news" for abroad? If it is domestic news, does the paper have an agenda? Sometimes it is easy to notice this with a paper such as The Canada Christian Advocate or The Protestant but when a paper is entitled The Saint John Star or The Gazette it is not readily apparent. Some papers are owned by specific industries, religious factions, or just particular individuals in order to push certain causes be it Monarchy or Métis rights. Louis was named a murderer and a saint and everything in between by the press---and this was not done without rhyme or reason.
This is a short video by Josh Martin and Riley Osterlund from youTube. It was a social studies project that they had done. Their attempt was to be as non-bias as possible. Were they successful?
Here is another "more official history" of Louis and the Métis from the 1970's. Notice the language. Do you find there to be a strong bias? What do you make of Riel ??
And then of course there are always the CBC Archives--a neat place to poke around if you are interested in virtually anything Canadiana. They are funded by the Canadian government but managed at arm's length. They are often criticized for their bias. They have a phenomenal amount of radio and video footage on countless topics. Unfortunately, they do not allow embedding like youtube but they have a fine list of sources on Riel spanning several decades. It is interesting to examine how one media source's portrayal of a topic can change so much over time.
And if you are really keen, you can even test your knowledge in a crossword puzzle. Is there a bias in the questions?
Louis Riel is not limited to archives either. Chester Brown, has written a popular graphic novel on him. Ironically--or maybe not---the first review of the book on Chapters claims there to be a strong bias in the work. If you are interested in this book it is available at Chapters and most local bookstores.
Whether you think Louis is a hero or a villain, make sure to check your local calendar because Canada has a few Louis Riel days, that vary depending on whether you are in Manitoba or Ontario, so you can go out and celebrate or shake your fist at Riel!
Tuesday, January 27, 2009
War of 1812 Overview
Cross-posted on behalf of the War of 1812 Group
Hello fellow Historical Representations students,The following is a brief over view of what we will be talking about on thursday, If you have any questions or comments please add them, or be sure to bring them up after our presentation.
The year 1812, saw the development of tensions between the United States and Britain, until war was finally declared. What is now called the War of 1812 lasted from 1812 to 1815, and has come to play a fundamental and interesting role in the development of Canadian Nationalism. One of the main tensions behind the eventual war itself was the trade relations that the Untied States had with France. Britain, who was at war with France at the time, passed various trade limitations in an effort to prevent this trade from proving profitable to either party. This issue was one of the reasons that the United States and Britain eventually declared war on each other.
The war itself was carried out in several theatres, the American coast, the open waters of the ocean and along the American – Canadian border, especially in Upper and Lower Canada, modern day Ontario and Quebec. Canadians came to play a large role in this war not only because of their proximity to the actual fighting, but also because of their vested interest in the interests of the British Empire, as Canada was still under British rule at this time.Interestingly, of the three main players in the War of 1812, the war itself is held to be of large importance with only one. Neither Britain nor the United States – despite their roles as instigators – show any great continuing interest in the war. Debate still remains over the identity of the winner of the war itself, and it seems as if Americans and Canadians will continue to be at odds until the Americans admit their folly. This question of denial and the destruction of what is now know as the White House, are possibly the only remaining elements of public history on the war in the United States today. The British are even less influenced by the war, probably because of the distance of its location, and the fact that its events must be over shadowed by the ongoing fighting with France.
Canada, however, has come to hold the War of 1812 in a position of supreme importance and influence. It is during this war that a rallying sense of nationalism can be seen to develop. This can be partly seen in what is now termed the ‘Militia Myth’, which boasted the fact that far from the British doing most of the fighting, it was in fact the Canadian militia that fought the hardest and played the most pivotal role in the defence of the British colony.
From the War of 1812, Canadians have also gained national heroes that have been carried through the ages. Laura Secord, and Isaac Brock are just two of the names which have come to play a central role in the development of Canadian nationalism and identity, despite their origins not always being initially Canadian.This national focus on the War of 1812 has given rise to different interpretations and presentations of the events and the accounts of various personages. From childrens books to academic historical studies, from public history clips on television networks to documentaries and movies, from commemorative statues to collectable action figures, the War of 1812 has and continues to serve a pivotal role in the Canadian identity and nationalism.
Thanks for reading,
The War of 1812 Group!
Hello fellow Historical Representations students,The following is a brief over view of what we will be talking about on thursday, If you have any questions or comments please add them, or be sure to bring them up after our presentation.
The year 1812, saw the development of tensions between the United States and Britain, until war was finally declared. What is now called the War of 1812 lasted from 1812 to 1815, and has come to play a fundamental and interesting role in the development of Canadian Nationalism. One of the main tensions behind the eventual war itself was the trade relations that the Untied States had with France. Britain, who was at war with France at the time, passed various trade limitations in an effort to prevent this trade from proving profitable to either party. This issue was one of the reasons that the United States and Britain eventually declared war on each other.
The war itself was carried out in several theatres, the American coast, the open waters of the ocean and along the American – Canadian border, especially in Upper and Lower Canada, modern day Ontario and Quebec. Canadians came to play a large role in this war not only because of their proximity to the actual fighting, but also because of their vested interest in the interests of the British Empire, as Canada was still under British rule at this time.Interestingly, of the three main players in the War of 1812, the war itself is held to be of large importance with only one. Neither Britain nor the United States – despite their roles as instigators – show any great continuing interest in the war. Debate still remains over the identity of the winner of the war itself, and it seems as if Americans and Canadians will continue to be at odds until the Americans admit their folly. This question of denial and the destruction of what is now know as the White House, are possibly the only remaining elements of public history on the war in the United States today. The British are even less influenced by the war, probably because of the distance of its location, and the fact that its events must be over shadowed by the ongoing fighting with France.
Canada, however, has come to hold the War of 1812 in a position of supreme importance and influence. It is during this war that a rallying sense of nationalism can be seen to develop. This can be partly seen in what is now termed the ‘Militia Myth’, which boasted the fact that far from the British doing most of the fighting, it was in fact the Canadian militia that fought the hardest and played the most pivotal role in the defence of the British colony.
From the War of 1812, Canadians have also gained national heroes that have been carried through the ages. Laura Secord, and Isaac Brock are just two of the names which have come to play a central role in the development of Canadian nationalism and identity, despite their origins not always being initially Canadian.This national focus on the War of 1812 has given rise to different interpretations and presentations of the events and the accounts of various personages. From childrens books to academic historical studies, from public history clips on television networks to documentaries and movies, from commemorative statues to collectable action figures, the War of 1812 has and continues to serve a pivotal role in the Canadian identity and nationalism.
Thanks for reading,
The War of 1812 Group!
Sunday, January 25, 2009
Thinking about Experiential History: Reenactments, 'Living History', and Pagents
Note: This is another post from the teaching assistant. I was thinking about the projects and happened to spy Nelles' book on my shelf (it's a good read if you get the chance!) and spun off from there. I know I had promised a few groups a post on land rights and aboriginal history in museums, from an Australian angle, but I may hold off that until the next project.
-----------------------------
Historical reenactments were (and in some communities, are) an important form of group remembrance. In the United States to this day groups reenact battles from their civil war and the annual Riverfest in Lindsay Ontario often includes a camp of men and women reenacting the lives of soldiers during the War of 1812. (Not so surprisingly, no link for this one. But trust me, as a little kid I thought this was the best part!)
Similarly, historical plays (such as Unity, 1918 that looks back at life on the Prairie after the First World War and during the outbreaks of Spanish Influenza), living history sites (such as Colonial Williamsburg, Virigina, Old Fort Henry, in Kingston, Louisbourg, Cape Breton, and various pioneer villages), and festivals (such as the Robin Hood Festival in Nottingham Forest) offer viewers a chance to relive, or at least watch people pretend to relive, the experience of our predecessors--both real and imagined.
Unlike with movies and other media, the living history exhibition, plays, and reenactments allow the past to be represented in space and time. That is, when one visits the Lock Keeper's house and blacksmith shop at Jones Falls in the Rideau Canal system it is possible to interact with history by physically experiencing the spaces in which others lived, set up as they lived it, with guides or interpreters dressed and, in some cases, living as if they were from the time period being represented.
In many ways this can feel like walking back into time, or at least that is the idea behind the genre. At the same time, however, by refusing to move forward in time and circumstance, by always being a 1812 soldiers' camp, these exhibitions freeze time in space and get caught up in a kind of cyclical time where the past is always here and now.
How do we, as historians, write about these spaces of representation? What does one have to keep in mind when exploring the reenactments at Louisbourg or Fort Ticondaroga (New York State)? Further, how do we get at the experiences of audiences who attended these exhibitions in the past, especially if they no longer exist?
H.V. Nelles' most recent book, The Art of Nation Building, examines the 1908 Québec tercentary from the view point of organizers, politicians (including Lord Grey, the Governor-General, and, to a lesser extent, the Prince of Wales), participants, and visitors. What was striking about the tercentary, for the purposes of this post, was that it included a historical pageant with a cast of thousands as well as a "historical" native village.
By exploring each layer of experience (and by no means exhausting them), Nelles provides historians, and especially Public Historians, with a series of vivid accounts of life in Québec City just over one hundred years ago. As the title suggests, he was concerned with how the event was used to promote the imagination of a Canadian nation--whether Québecois or as an integral part of the British Empire--and how those who physically participated in the reenactments, or witnessed characters from their past stroll through the streets, felt about the act of 'reliving' the past.
My purpose with this post is not to come to any firm conclusions, but to open up a potential genre of representation that was not mentioned in any of the group meetings last week. Feel free to add any comments or suggestions or other such 'sites of memory' (not used in the sense of Pierre Nora's lieux de mémoire--I couldn't find an English wiki page, here's a translation of the book) that could help other groups.
A closing point, the special characteristic of this genre (only partially including plays, which are in someways closer to movies but in other ways not so much) is that the past is being replayed in an interactive environment intricately connected to the space in which past events occurred. It allows us, as historians, to think of the past both in terms of social experiences and in terms of spatial relationships--instead of merely as events.
The Hitler Group: Disney Nazism
Hey guys,
The Hitler group would like you all to see this anti-Nazi short firm made by Disney during WWII. We will hopefully show a shortened clip of it on thursday but it is worth your time to watch the entire cartoon. Please post any questions or comments you have and we can discuss them in class.
Thanks,
Group Hiter
The Hitler group would like you all to see this anti-Nazi short firm made by Disney during WWII. We will hopefully show a shortened clip of it on thursday but it is worth your time to watch the entire cartoon. Please post any questions or comments you have and we can discuss them in class.
Thanks,
Group Hiter
Thursday, January 15, 2009
'Too silent to be real': The Railroad as Civilization in Gordon Lightfoot's "Canadian Railroad Trilogy"
Note, this is a sample post. While I have by no means been exhaustive with what I have written, feel free to use it as a guide for your own posts. Especially important is your use of the web-environment (i.e. hyperlinks, imbedded images, ect). This technology is powerful and easy to use: put it to work for your advantage.
Also, the idea behind writing these is to be able to muse aloud and publicly, though relatively informally, about one or two representations you have come across in your group projects and to get comments and suggestions from your classmates, myself, and Professor Muise.
As a result I have tried to tease out some questions about the ultimate narrative being presented, and placed them in the context of the production of the piece [i.e. commissioned by the CPR], its reception [by the CBC and in mass culture], and its possible historiographic significance [through social history and the idea of 'silences'].
A final point: yours doesn't have to be as long as mine, but feel free to take as much time and space as you need!
--------------
Before reading further, have a listen to Gordon Lightfoot's "Canadian Railroad Trilogy."
The CBC webpage linked to above describes Lightfoot's song as "stirring" and able to "tug on our heartstrings with this unmistakeably Canadian narrative." The lyrics celebrate the hard work of the navvies, who "bended [their] backs until the railroad was done" while "living on stew and drinking bad whiskey" for as little as a dollar a day to build the Canadian Pacific Railroad in the late nineteenth century.
This song, with its catchy and uplifting tune, was actually commissioned by the CPR, and their bias is found throughout the song. The forest and mountains, before the railroad, are imagined as being silent, living in a primordial peace. It isn't until people, explicitly "white people," "to this verdant country...came from all around" that any sense of meaningful activity was brought to the landscape being described.
These individuals, in various points gendered as male, "built the mines, the mills, and the factories for the good of us all." [Emphasis mine, more below.] Soon a group, in Central Canada (though this is not made explicit in the song), "grew restless to hear the hammers ring" and from this restlessness eventually came the CPR--though it required bringing in workers who, seemingly, happily laboured on the project for the "railroad men" and thereby participated in bringing productive civilization (the mines, mills, and factories) to "the dark green forest too silent to be real."
This civilizing process is implicitly, in the song--but very explicitly on the CBC page linked to above, represented as one of the, if not the, defining activity that created Canada and one that should be remembered as such.
Indeed, various video tributes [see three examples below--I apologise to music lovers for the last video] have captured this theme in recent years as the internet, and particularly Youtube.com, have provided individuals with increasingly powerful ways to re-represent this song to a mass audience.
Thinking about the song, especially after watching the videos above, I was struck by the line "too silent to be real." As young historians today, we have inhereted a rich and diverse historiographic tradition that not only includes political histories but also social and cultural history. One of the lessons of social history from its establishment as Marxist labour history in the 1970s (and in its subsequent development, that includes by and large an abandonment of that Marxism) has been an effort to recover lost voices, otherwise termed "silences."
Lightfoot sings that the "Long before the white man and long before the wheel, the green dark forests were too silent to be real" questioning the reality of the activity that happened in those "silent" forests, essentializing 'sound' to that of industrial civilization (I am also struck by an absense of farm labour, but that is for another post). He unequivicobly writes off the First Nations, Métis, and, indeed, European settlements (in the form of HBC forts) that existed across the country and, especially in the context of the CPR, the West, before the coming of the railroad.
Also, while he does acknowledge labourers, he represents them without a voice past an expression of satisfaction, for "a dollar a day, a bed for my head, a drink for the living and a toast to the dead" and, after the work is done, for "open[ing] up the soil with our teardrops and our toil." Resistance is precluded in this song. Similarly, the only people explicitly mentioned are European--though one could take "came from all around," to include Chinese workers; however given the feel of the rest of the song this is unlikely.
I am also left wondering what happened to the workers after the railroad was built? [For one take see: The United Steelworkers of Montreal "Goddamn the CPR" Track 8 Kerosene and Coal (2005)--I could only find a small sample online, here are the lyrics.]
I'll end with a series of questions for further reflection and, I hope, discussion: What is the Canada represented in this song? Certainly it is one that can be linked to our modern nation-state. But by making this a 'national' story and excluding so many individuals and groups directly affected by it, by focusing on white male industrialists and, seemingly content, workers who does this song implicitly exclude from being counted among "us all"?
With this in mind, can it truly be said to be an "unmistakeably Canadian narrative" and, if so, what exactly does that mean? What does it say about 'Canadian narratives'?
In many ways on deeper reflection I'm left with the feeling that Gordon Lightfoot's "Canadian Railroad Trilogy" is, itself, "too silent to be real."
Further reading:
David J. Jackson, "Peace, Order, and Good Songs: Popular Music and English-Canadian Culture." In The American Review of Canadian Studies 25.1 (Spring 2005): 25-44.
Also, the idea behind writing these is to be able to muse aloud and publicly, though relatively informally, about one or two representations you have come across in your group projects and to get comments and suggestions from your classmates, myself, and Professor Muise.
As a result I have tried to tease out some questions about the ultimate narrative being presented, and placed them in the context of the production of the piece [i.e. commissioned by the CPR], its reception [by the CBC and in mass culture], and its possible historiographic significance [through social history and the idea of 'silences'].
A final point: yours doesn't have to be as long as mine, but feel free to take as much time and space as you need!
--------------
Before reading further, have a listen to Gordon Lightfoot's "Canadian Railroad Trilogy."
The CBC webpage linked to above describes Lightfoot's song as "stirring" and able to "tug on our heartstrings with this unmistakeably Canadian narrative." The lyrics celebrate the hard work of the navvies, who "bended [their] backs until the railroad was done" while "living on stew and drinking bad whiskey" for as little as a dollar a day to build the Canadian Pacific Railroad in the late nineteenth century.
This song, with its catchy and uplifting tune, was actually commissioned by the CPR, and their bias is found throughout the song. The forest and mountains, before the railroad, are imagined as being silent, living in a primordial peace. It isn't until people, explicitly "white people," "to this verdant country...came from all around" that any sense of meaningful activity was brought to the landscape being described.
These individuals, in various points gendered as male, "built the mines, the mills, and the factories for the good of us all." [Emphasis mine, more below.] Soon a group, in Central Canada (though this is not made explicit in the song), "grew restless to hear the hammers ring" and from this restlessness eventually came the CPR--though it required bringing in workers who, seemingly, happily laboured on the project for the "railroad men" and thereby participated in bringing productive civilization (the mines, mills, and factories) to "the dark green forest too silent to be real."
This civilizing process is implicitly, in the song--but very explicitly on the CBC page linked to above, represented as one of the, if not the, defining activity that created Canada and one that should be remembered as such.
Indeed, various video tributes [see three examples below--I apologise to music lovers for the last video] have captured this theme in recent years as the internet, and particularly Youtube.com, have provided individuals with increasingly powerful ways to re-represent this song to a mass audience.
Thinking about the song, especially after watching the videos above, I was struck by the line "too silent to be real." As young historians today, we have inhereted a rich and diverse historiographic tradition that not only includes political histories but also social and cultural history. One of the lessons of social history from its establishment as Marxist labour history in the 1970s (and in its subsequent development, that includes by and large an abandonment of that Marxism) has been an effort to recover lost voices, otherwise termed "silences."
Lightfoot sings that the "Long before the white man and long before the wheel, the green dark forests were too silent to be real" questioning the reality of the activity that happened in those "silent" forests, essentializing 'sound' to that of industrial civilization (I am also struck by an absense of farm labour, but that is for another post). He unequivicobly writes off the First Nations, Métis, and, indeed, European settlements (in the form of HBC forts) that existed across the country and, especially in the context of the CPR, the West, before the coming of the railroad.
Also, while he does acknowledge labourers, he represents them without a voice past an expression of satisfaction, for "a dollar a day, a bed for my head, a drink for the living and a toast to the dead" and, after the work is done, for "open[ing] up the soil with our teardrops and our toil." Resistance is precluded in this song. Similarly, the only people explicitly mentioned are European--though one could take "came from all around," to include Chinese workers; however given the feel of the rest of the song this is unlikely.
I am also left wondering what happened to the workers after the railroad was built? [For one take see: The United Steelworkers of Montreal "Goddamn the CPR" Track 8 Kerosene and Coal (2005)--I could only find a small sample online, here are the lyrics.]
I'll end with a series of questions for further reflection and, I hope, discussion: What is the Canada represented in this song? Certainly it is one that can be linked to our modern nation-state. But by making this a 'national' story and excluding so many individuals and groups directly affected by it, by focusing on white male industrialists and, seemingly content, workers who does this song implicitly exclude from being counted among "us all"?
With this in mind, can it truly be said to be an "unmistakeably Canadian narrative" and, if so, what exactly does that mean? What does it say about 'Canadian narratives'?
In many ways on deeper reflection I'm left with the feeling that Gordon Lightfoot's "Canadian Railroad Trilogy" is, itself, "too silent to be real."
Further reading:
David J. Jackson, "Peace, Order, and Good Songs: Popular Music and English-Canadian Culture." In The American Review of Canadian Studies 25.1 (Spring 2005): 25-44.
Friday, January 9, 2009
HIST 3809A - Historical Representations
This blog has been set up as a venue for students from Carleton University's Historical Representations (HIST3809a) course to make preliminary presentations of materials undercovered while pursuing their group assignments.
The idea is to provide students with an interactive space where they can post musings, interesting or surprising finds, and discuss their progress as the term moves forward.
As the T.A. I will provide a sample post for the first assignment in the coming days and will be around regularly to provide feedback and participate in the conversations as they develop.
I ask that one member from each group emails me and I'll set up posting rights for the group. Gropus can either come up with unique posting names or use that of their first assignment. Also, I ask that you post your comments using your real name to avoid confusion.
The idea is to provide students with an interactive space where they can post musings, interesting or surprising finds, and discuss their progress as the term moves forward.
As the T.A. I will provide a sample post for the first assignment in the coming days and will be around regularly to provide feedback and participate in the conversations as they develop.
I ask that one member from each group emails me and I'll set up posting rights for the group. Gropus can either come up with unique posting names or use that of their first assignment. Also, I ask that you post your comments using your real name to avoid confusion.
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