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Visiting Canadian Scholars at the UW
Every year the Canadian Studies Program is invigorated and strengthened by the residency of visiting scholars from Canada. These scholars work with graduate students, offer courses, speak in classes, participate in UW faculty symposia and generally infuse the program with new energy and cutting-edge research from Canada. Thanks to funding from the Canada-US Fulbright Program, the Québec government, and other sources, our academic and outreach programming benefits significantly from the dedication of our Canadian guests.
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2007-08 Canada-US Fulbright Scholar Pamela Sing, University of Alberta Recovering Franco-Métis Communities in Canada and the United States |
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2006-07 Pacific Northwest Québec Professorship Thierry Giasson, Université de Montréal SISCA 341/ POL S 341: Government and Politics of Québec |
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Summer 2006 Pacific Northwest Québec Professorship Claude Couture, University of Alberta SISCA 356: The Ideological Distinctiveness of Québec in North America |
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2005-06 Pacific Northwest Québec Professorship Daniel Dickey, First Nations of Québec and Labrador Health and Social Services Commissions SIS 350/ENVIR 360: The Remapping of Environmental Politics |
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2005-06 Canada-US Fulbright Scholar Susan Neylan, Wilfrid Laurier University Aboriginal Identities, Spiritual Borderlands, and Cultural Exchange Across the Canada-US Border |
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2004-05 Independent Visiting Scholar Yasmeen Abu-Laban, University of Alberta Migration, Borders and Ethics in Canada and the US |
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2004-05 Canada-US Fulbright Scholar Claude Couture, University of Alberta Napoléon Lajoie and Canada-US Identity |
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2004-05 Canada-US Fulbright Scholar Lyana Patrick, University of Victoria Impact of the Border on Indigenous Peoples in Canada and the US |
2007-08 Canada-US Fulbright Scholar
Pamela Sing, Faculté St.-Jean, University of Alberta
Recovering Franco-Métis Communities in Canada and the United States
Pamela V. Sing is a professor of Québec and Franco-Canadian literatures at the French campus of the University of Alberta in Edmonton, the Campus Saint-Jean, and the Associate Director of that University’s Faculty of Arts Canadian Literature Centre/Centre de littérature canadienne that was inaugurated on November 1st, 2006. Her ongoing research interests involve writing by Western Canadian Francophones, and written and oral stories by Métis of French ancestry.
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| Pamela Sing, Visiting Canada-US Fulbright Scholar, takes time out from her research to enjoy breakfast and a visit with the Honourable Michael Wilson (right), Canada’s Ambassador to the US, and Bruce Bare, Dean of the College of Forest Resources. |
The title of my research project is "Multiculturalism, Nation-building and the Poetics of Identity Construction: Recovering Franco-Métis Communities in Canada and the United States." This project seeks to contribute to ongoing discussions on the interrelationship of multiculturalism, nation-building, and the processes of identity construction. I am interested in a specific facet of that question, one that can be studied in the form of identity construction practices contained in written and oral texts belonging to a little-known people whose reality has been one of multiple belongings since its very inception: the Franco-Métis. Born of the union between French Canadian men engaged in the fur industry and Native women, the Franco-Métis and their descendents are grounded in a history that has evolved from a sense of nationhood in Manitoba to multiple communities scattered across the North American continent.
In Canada, they constituted a "Forgotten People" for almost a century. Today, the production and study of works by Aboriginal writers in general constitute a burgeoning component of Canadian literature. While Métis writers are recognized as such, the academy tends to not underscore the distinct character of their literary practices. Furthermore, writers, researchers and critics alike seem little inclined to establish connections between the voices and perspectives of contemporary Métis, most of whom are unilingual Anglophones, and those of their nineteenth-century Francophone ancestors. My research intends to show that the failure to lend any historical depth to an original culture not only makes it impossible to address issues of continuity and of discontinuity alike, but also raises the question of what constitutes a "legitimate culture."
In the United States, where Métis are not recognized as an aboriginal people by the federal government, one is hard put to find a writer who identifies as Métis. Nevertheless, they do exist. During my Fulbright year, I will be working on the recovery of their stories.
By offering valuable insight into Franco-Métis language and subjectivities, the project will ultimately expand upon existing knowledge of their historical development, ethnicity, conceptual "order," and cultural persistence as well as change. The study of the processes of re-definitions of identity parameters as a response to increased diversity and evolving norms of citizenship will increase our awareness of the consequences of nationhood for ordinary men and women, and contribute to encouraging collaborative attitudes and community efforts towards reconciliation.
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Summer 2006 Pacific Northwest Québec Professorship
Claude Couture, Faculté St.-Jean, University of Alberta
SISCA 356: The Ideological Distinctness of Québec in North America: Surveys, Authors, Institutions and History
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Professor Couture was the 2004-2005 Fulbright Professor at the Canadian Studies Center, Henry M. Jackson School of International Studies. He is the author of eight books including, L’Alberta et le multiculturalisme francophone, (Edmonton, CEC, 2002), Discours d'Étienne Parent (Presses de l'Université de Montréal, 2000), Pierre Elliott Trudeau, Etienne Parent and Canadian Liberalism: Paddling with the Current (University of Alberta Press, 1998), Espace et differences: Histoire du Canada (Presses de l'université Laval, 1996) and La banale trahison d’un laïc (Paris, L'Harmattan, 1996). He has also published numerous book chapters and articles in academic journals. He is Director of the Canadian Studies Institute of the University of Alberta and, since May 2005, chief editor of the International Journal of Canadian Studies. In 2007-2008, he was Killam Annual Professor.
Pacific Northwest Québec Professorship, 2005-06
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Daniel Dickey, First Nations of Québec and Labrador Health and Social Services
SISCA 350 / ENVIR 360: The Remapping of Environmental Politics
Daniel Dickey is currently a researcher for the First Nations of Québec and Labrador Health and Social Services Commissions. Dickey is responsible for providing training sessions to First Nations communities to empower the communities and to create jobs. He developed, in conjunction with the First Nations of Québec and Labrador Sustainable Development Institute, the First Nations of Québec Research Protocol, which was adopted by the Québec and Labrador Assembly of First Nations. In 2004 Dickey worked for an environmental, urbanism and socio-economics consultants’ firm (Vincent Roquet and Associates) as part of a study to measure the impact of hydroelectric projects on the Cree Nations of the James Bay region. He has also worked for Makivik Corporation conducting interviews with Inuit hunters and elders on their traditional knowledge of use of the land. Dickey applied for and was awarded the Pacific Northwest Québec professorship for Winter 2006.
During the Winter 2006 quarter, Dickey taught SIS 350: The Remapping of Environmental Politics, a core requirement for a degree in International Studies in the Henry M. Jackson School of International Studies. The course focused on Québec's energy network and its management of the environment. The course included an overview of Québec history, hydroelectricity, forestry, mines, nuclear energy, the Kyoto Protocol and its impact on Québec and Québec’s aboriginal communities, and alternative energy sources. As water and forest products are the main riches of the province, clashes are inevitable with aboriginal people as most of their communities are located in natural environments. Throughout the course, a recurrent theme was the use of partnerships as a new way to deal and work with aboriginal people. Québec’s energy and environmental relationships were examined through the lens of sustainable development. Twenty-five international studies students took the course.
2005-06 Canada-US Fulbright Scholar
Susan Neylan, Wilfrid Laurier University
Aboriginal Identities, Spiritual Borderlands, and Cultural Exchange Across the Canadian-American Pacific Northwest
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Dr. Neylan's historical research project explored the British Columbia/Washington state border as a permeable zone of spiritual exchange among Salishan Aboriginal peoples. Dr. Neylan is interested in the Pacific Northwest borderlands, and how religious ideas, both old beliefs and new, were disseminated from native group to native group in the multiethnic, cross-cultural environment of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. By locating the extent to which Aboriginal cultures and individuals shaped Christianity at the local level, in ways that did not negate the influence of pre-existing forms of spirituality, she seeks to better understand the process of religious change. Moreover, her project explored how imbalanced power relations and Christian colonialism worked within a region and across an international border.
Dr. Neylan has established herself as one of the foremost authorities on the missionary aspect of Canadian native history and as one of the leading young scholars in Canadian religious history. She has published widely and has given numerous conference presentations in this field, earning her a SSHRC Standard Research Grant to continue her work in the Tsimshian area. Dr. Neylan holds a Bachelor of Arts in English and History from the University of Toronto, a Master of Arts in History from the University of Toronto and a Ph.D. in History from the University of British Columbia.
2004-05 Independent Visiting Scholar
Yasmee Abu-Laban, Political Science, University of Alberta
Migration, Borders and Ethics in Canada and the US
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Yasmeen Abu-Laban is an Associate Professor in the Department of Political Science at the University of Alberta. Her research interests center on the Canadian and comparative dimensions of gender and ethnic politics, nationalism and globalization, diversity and public policy, and citizenship theory. She is the co-author (with Christina Gabriel) of Selling Diversity: Immigration, Multiculturalism, Employment Equity and Globalization (2002).Other publications include articles in International Politics, Citizenship Studies, The International Journal of Canadian Studies, The Canadian Journal of Political Science, Canadian Public Policy, and Canadian Ethnic Studies. Abu-Laban is currently completing an edited volume on North American politics (which analyzes the impact of the North American Free Trade Agreement on institutions, policies and identity in Canada, the US and Mexico) as well as an edited volume on gender and the nation-state in Canada and comparatively. During her year at the UW she will be undertaking a new project examining migration, borders and ethics with a particular focus on Canada and the US.
2004-05 Canada-US Fulbright Scholar
Claude Couture, Faculté St.-Jean, University of Alberta
Napoléon Lajoie - Québec's Greatest Baseball Player - and Canada-US Identity
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Claude Couture is Professor of Social Sciences and Canadian Studies at the Faculté Saint-Jean (French Campus) of the University of Alberta in Canada, and spent the 2004-2005 academic year as Fulbright Professor at the Center. He is the author of numerous books including, Pierre Elliott Trudeau, Etienne Parent and Canadian Liberalism: Paddling with the Current (University of Alberta Press, 1998) and Espace et differences. Histoire du Canada (Presses de l'université Laval, 1996). He has also published extensively in academic journals and contributed chapters to edited books. He is Director of the Canadian Studies Institute of the University of Alberta and associate editor of the International Journal of Canadian Studies. His Fulbright project was to write a book about national identity in Canada and the US through an analysis of the media accounts of early 20th Century baseball star Napoléon Lajoie. In 1901, Lajoie batted .423, still the best average for a single season in the history of the American League. While Lajoie had French-Canadian origins, Americans and English-speaking Canadians claimed him as a national hero.
Canada-US Fulbright Scholar, 2004-05
Lyana Patrick, Indigenous Governance, University of Victoria
Impact of Border on Indigenous Peoples in Canada and the US
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Lyana Patrick, Canada-US Fulbright Scholar, recently completed her MA in Indigenous Governance at the University of Victoria and for the next seven months will participate in graduate classes in documentary filmmaking through the UW Native Voices Program. Patrick is working on a documentary film project that looks at the impacts of the Canada/US border on indigenous peoples whose homelands crossed the border, and the international treaties that protect the rights of indigenous peoples to freely cross geopolitical divides.
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