Avie Bennett Conference. September 29-30, 2016

A 2016 workshop/conference, and 2017 scholarly book publication, that explores Canadian Confederation from global perspectives. The conference will host scholars from around the world (as well as Canadians with expertise in non-Canadian settings) to present research findings on the ways in which peoples, colonies and foreign governments understood and considered the changes that were taking place in British North America in the 1860s. Was the emergence of the Canadian nation an issue of interest during this period? How was the new colonial government perceived by others – with enthusiasm, disregard or trepidation? To what extent was the creation of Canada considered a possible threat or model for future nation-building?

Conference Organizers:
Adrian Shubert (History)
Jacqueline Krikorian (Political Science)
Marcel Martel (History)

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PROGRAM/PROGRAMME

Globalizing Confederation: How Governments, Nations and Communities Around the World Viewed the Emergence of Canada in 1867/La Confédération dans une perspective planétaire : perception de l’émergence du Canada en 1867 par les gouvernements, les peuples et les collectivités du monde entier.

Thursday, 29 September 2016 / Jeudi, 29 septembre 2016

Room / Salle  Archives of Ontario / Archives publiques de l’Ontario

9:00-10:45 / 9 h 00 – 10 h 45

1. Session/Séance Session/Séance
   The Americas and Canada /Les Amériques et le Canada
   Facilitator/ Responsable de la séance: Marcel Martel, York University

Participants:

Deborah McGregor (Aboriginal People’s perspective), York University, Toronto
Deborah McGregor joined the Osgoode Hall Law School faculty in 2015 as a cross-appointee with York University’s Faculty of Environmental Studies. Professor McGregor’s research has focused on indigenous knowledge systems and their various applications in diverse contexts including water and environmental governance, environmental justice, forest policy and management, and sustainable development. She co-edited Indigenous Peoples and Autonomy: Insights for a Global Age with Mario Blaser, Ravi De Costa and William Coleman (2010). She is co-editor (with Alan Corbiere, Mary Ann Corbiere and Crystal Migwans) of the Anishinaabewin conference proceedings series.

Carsten-Andreas Schulz (perspective of Brazil, Chile and Mexico), Catholic University of Chile
Carsten-Andreas Schulz is an assistant professor of International Relations at the Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile. His current research concentrates on regionalism and the historical transformation of international order. His most recent publication “Civilisation, Barbarism and the Making of Latin America’s Place in 19th-Century International Society” appeared in Millennium: Journal of International Studies.

David Cameron and Jacqueline Krikorian (United States perspective), York University, Toronto

David Cameron is Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Science at the University of Toronto. He has published widely in the areas of constitutionalism, federalism and Canadian government and politics. As an internationally renowned constitutional expert, he has flown into Iraq, Sri Lanka and Israel, among others, to act in advisory capacity on issues of governance and policy. Professor Cameron is also well known for his volunteer work with Out of the Cold and Portland Place.

Jacqueline Krikorian teaches in the Department of Political Science and in the Law & Society program at York University.  She is a member the bar of Ontario and undertakes research in the areas of constitutional law and policy, international law, and Canadian government.  She is the author of International Trade Law and Domestic Policy: Canada, the United States and the WTO and has published in a number of journals including the Canadian Journal of Political Science, the University of Toronto Law Journal, and the Journal of International Economic Law.

William Jenkins (Fenian Perspective), York University, Toronto
William Jenkins is an associate professor in the Department of Geography at York University. His current research focus is on the Irish diaspora in North America in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. His recent monograph Between Raid and Rebellion: The Irish in Buffalo and Toronto, 1867-1916 (McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2013) received awards from the American Conference for Irish Studies, the Geographical Society of Ireland, the Canadian Historical Association, and the Ontario Historical Society.

10:45 – 11:00 / 10 h 45 – 11 h 00  Nutrition Break /Pause-santé

11:00-12:00 / 11 h 00 – 12 h 00

2. Session/Séance
   Europe and Confederation/ L’Europe et la Confédération
   Facilitator/ Responsable de la séance: Adrian Shubert, York University

Participants:

Roberto Perin (Vatican perspective) York University, Toronto
Member of the History Department at Glendon College, Roberto Perin is known for his work on ethnicity, religion and national identity. Perin also authored two books and sixteen book chapters, co-edited four books and published fourteen scholarly articles. His new book, The Many Rooms of this House: Diversity in Toronto’s Places of Worship since 1840, looks at Toronto churches as markers of social and cultural change over the past century and will be published by the University of Toronto Press in the winter 2017.

Natalie Tousignant (Belgian perspective), Université Saint-Louis, Brussels
Professor of European History at Université Saint-Louis-Bruxelles, her research agenda focuses on the European integration and attempts to create common knowledge through the development of a specific field of expertise, implementing new scientific journals, fellowships and networks. Also, her second research project looks at Belgium’s imperial past and relations between Belgium and Congo, specifically on the history of law and justice in colonial context.  Her recent publications include with  Nico  Wouters  (CEGESOMA),  Herbert  Reinke  and  Michael  Wildt (Institut für Geschichtswissenschaften, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin). Forced and Coerced Labour: Comparing Colonial Spaces and Global Conflicts. Springer, 2016. TOUSIGNANT  Nathalie  &  Sebastiaan  VANDENBOGAERDE,  “The  Journal  des Tribunaux during the Congo question (1902-1908). Revues et Empires, a thematic issue of Clio@Themis, edited by Florence Renucci (CNRS-Lille2), 2016.

12:00 – 13:30 / 12 h 00 – 13 h 30: Lunch/Déjeuner

13:30 – 15:00 / 13 h 30 – 15h 00

3. Session/Séance
   Europe and Confederation/ L’Europe et la Confédération
   Facilitator/ Responsable de la séance: Adrian Shubert, York University

Participants:

Alban Bargain (perspective of France) York University, Toronto
Alban Bargain-Villéger is a sessional instructor at York University. He defended his dissertation in European history in 2012. Known for his work on European socialism in France and Germany in the interwar period, his new research project focuses on how Canadians reacted to various European revolutions between 1830 and 1968. He has submitted a revised version of his dissertation entitled Red Missionaries: The French and German Socialist Press in Hostile Environments, 1919-1940.

Benno Gammerl, (Austria-Hungarian perspective), Max Planck Institute for Human Development, Berlin
Benno Gammerl is a researcher at the Max-Planck-Institute for Human Development’s Center for the History of Emotions in Berlin. He is just about to complete his second major research project which deals with the emotional history of homosexualities in West Germany. His first book compared the handling of ethnic heterogeneity in the British and the Habsburg Empires around 1900. His most recent publications include: “Can you feel your research results? How to deal with and gain insights from emotions generated during oral history interviews”, in: Flam/Kleres (eds.), Methods of exploring emotions (2015). “Quelles couleurs pour l’arc-en-ciel de demain? Tour d’horizon des homosexualités en Allemagne”, in: Stark/Wissmann (eds.): L’Allemagne change! Risques et défis d’une mutation (2015). “Wendy’s love”, in: Frevert et al.: Learning how to feel: Children’s literature and the history of emotional socialization 1870 – 1970 (2014).

Josep Fradera (perspective of Spain), Pompeu Fabra University, Barcelona
Josep M. Fradera is a professor of Modern History at the Universitat Pompeu Fabra in Barcelona. He is also the coordinator of the GRIMSE (Research Group on Empires, Metropolis and Extra-European Societies) and co-director of the journal Illes i Imperis. He has published articles and book chapters in Catalan, Spanish, French, English and Portuguese. He has also been the sole author of the following publications: La nación imperial. Derechos, representación y ciudadanía en los imperios de Gran Bretaña, Francia. España y los Estados Unidos (1750-1918) (Barcelona, Edhasa, 2015, 2.vols), La pàtria dels catalans (Història, política, cultura) (Barcelona, RBA, 2009), Cultura nacional en una societat dividida (Patriotisme i cultura a Catalunya, 1838-1868) (Barcelona, Curial, 1992).

15:00 – 15:15 / 15 h 00 – 15 h 15: Nutrition Break /Pause-santé

15:15 – 16:45 / 15 h 15 – 16h 45

4. Session/Séance
   Imperial Perspectives on Canada/ L’Empire et le Canada
   Facilitator/ Responsable de la séance: Jacqueline Krikorian, York University

Participants:

Edward Beasley (UK perspective), San Diego State University
Professor of British History at San Diego State University, Edward Beasley is known for his work on the British Empire. His publications include Empire as the Triumph of Theory:
Imperialism, Information, and the Colonial Society of 1868 
(Routledge 2005); Mid-Victorian Imperialists:
British Gentlemen and the Empire of the Mind
(Routledge 2005); The Victorian Reinvention of Race:
New Racisms and the Problem of Grouping in the Human Sciences
(Routledge 2010), and The Chartist General: Charles James Napier, the Conquest of Sind, and Imperial Liberalism (Routledge, forthcoming November 2016).

Ann Curthoys (Australian perspective), University of Sydney
Ann Curthoys researches Australian history, set in a broad transnational and imperial history frame. She also writes about historical theory and writing, co-authoring with John Docker Is History Fiction? and with Ann McGrath How to Write History that People want to Read. She is currently completing for Cambridge University Press a book with Jessie Mitchell, provisionally titled Taking Liberty: Indigenous Rights and Settler Self-Government in the Australian Colonies. She is an honorary professor at the University of Western Australia and the University of Sydney.

Kenton Storey (New Zealand), University of Manitoba
Kenton Storey is a historian of the British Empire and a legal researcher working in the field of First Nations history. He completed a PhD in comparative history at the University of Otago in 2011 and then worked as a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Manitoba with Professor Adele Perry. His first monograph entitled Settler Anxiety at the Outposts of Empire. Colonial Humanitarian Discourses, and Imperial Press (UBC Press, 2016) looks at race relations in British colonies and newspaper coverage in New Zealand and Vancouver Island. As stated in the description of the book, this monograph “offers fresh perspectives on the history of race relations, while it deftly explores the intersections between settler anxiety, the perceived threat of indigenous violence, and the public use of humanitarian language”.

17:00-19:00 / 17 h 00-19 h 00
Dinner/ diner
Room / Salle: Executive Dining Room Schulich Building / Pavillon Schulich

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Friday, 30 September 2016 / Vendredi, 30 septembre 2016
Room / Salle  Archives of Ontario / Archives publiques de l’Ontario

9:15 – 10:45 / 9 h 15 – 10 h 45

5. Session/Séance
   Imperial Perspectives on Canada/ L’Empire et le Canada
   Facilitator/ Responsable de la séance: Jacqueline Krikorian, York University

Participants:

Franklin Knight (Caribbean perspective), Johns Hopkins
Franklin W. Knight is Leonard and Helen R. Stulman Professor Emeritus and Academy Professor at the Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore. Knight’s research interests focus on social, political, and cultural aspects of Latin America and the Caribbean, especially after the 18th century, as well as on American slave systems in their comparative dimensions. Knight’s major publications include: Slave Society in Cuba during the Nineteenth Century (Wisconsin, 1970); The African Dimension of Latin American Societies (Macmillan, 1974); The Caribbean: The Genesis of a Fragmented Nationalism (Oxford, 1978; 3rd Edition, revised 2012) and with Henry Louis Gates, Jr.  Dictionary of Caribbean and Afro-Latin American Biography ( Oxford, 2016).

Thomas Mohr (Irish perspective),  University College Dublin
Dr Thomas Mohr is a lecturer at the School of Law, University College Dublin. He is honorary secretary of the Irish Legal History Society and book review editor of the Irish Jurist, Ireland’s oldest law journal.  His publications on Irish legal history range from the medieval brehon law to the law of the independent Irish state in the 20^th century.  His latest publication is Guardian of the Treaty – The Privy Council Appeal and Irish Sovereignty (Four Courts Press, 2016).  This concerns an important aspect of the Irish Free State’s relationship with the British Empire in the inter-war years.

Kamala Sankaran (Indian perspective), University of New Delhi
Kamala Sankaran is Professor at the Faculty of Law, University of Delhi. Her research interests include constitutional law, international labour standards, informal economy, and gender and the law. She is currently working on the informal economy and law, and equality and discrimination issues in South Asia.

Timothy Stapleton (Southern Africa), University of Calgary
Based at the University of Calgary, Tim Stapleton is a professor in the Department of History and a senior research fellow at the Centre for Military, Security and Strategic Studies.  He is an historian of war and society in Africa, and has taught in South Africa and held research appointments in Zimbabwe and Botswana. His recent books include African Police and Soldiers in Colonial Zimbabwe, 1923-80 (Rochester: University of Rochester Press, 2011), The Military History of Africa, 3 vols. (Westport, CT: Praeger Security International, 2013) and Warfare and Tracking in Africa, 1952-90 (London: Pickering and Chatto/Routledge, 2015).

10:45 – 11:00 / 10 h 45 – 11 h 00  Nutrition Break /Pause-santé

11:00 – 11:45 / 11 h 00 – 11 h 45

6. Session/Séance
   Conclusion and Presentation of Family Ties: Ontario Turns 150/Les liens familiaux : l’Ontario a 150 ans (New Exhibit, Archives of Ontario)

Facilitators/ Responsables de la séance: Jacqueline Krikorian, Marcel Martel and Adrian Shubert, York University

Participants:

Allison Little, Archives of Ontario
Jay Young, Archives of Ontario

Thank you for their support – Remerciements pour leur appui

Archives of Ontario
Avie Bennett Historica Canada Chair in Canadian History
Dean’s office, Osgoode Hall Law School
Department of History, Faculty of Liberal Arts & Professional Studies
Department of Political Science, Faculty of Liberal Arts & Professional Studies
Department of Social Science, Faculty of Liberal Arts & Professional Studies
Embassy of Spain in Canada
Graduate History Program, Faculty of Liberal Arts & Professional Studies
Graduate Program in Socio-Legal Studies, Faculty of Liberal Arts & Professional Studies
Robarts Centre for Canadian Studies