Going to Congress

The panel of the Canadian Network on Humanitarian history at the Annual Meeting of the Canadian Historical Association in Regina, in May 2018, was on “Histories of Humanitarianism and (Visual) Media”.  For my presentation, “‘CIDA Brings you the World! ‘Children’s Reception of Humanitarian Photographs of Children: 1980-2000”, I used the educational collection of the Canadian International Development Agency now at Carleton’s Archives and Research Collections.  Listen to the podcast of the panel is HERE.

The CNHH met for a day of workshop in Regina, to share ideas, projects and local knowledge.  We  brought back Carleton’s Visiting Fellow Valérie Gorin to Ottawa for a week at Carleton, which included a workshop of her own work, and visits to the archives.  The minutes of the meeting are HERE.

I was invited to chair the wonderful round table “So, What Will That Get You? Becoming a Historian in a Changing Job and Academic Market | Qu’est-ce que ça donne ?  Devenir historien ou historienne dans un marché d’emploi en mutation pour les universitaires”, Annual Meeting of the Canadian Historical Association, University of Regina, 27 May 2018.  More work will follow to update the publication.

Writing in the works

• “Conclusion”, in Greg Donaghy and David Webster, dir. “A Samaritan State” Revisited: Historical Perspectives on Canadian Foreign Aid, 1950–2016, University of Calgary Press, 2018.
• “Ten keys to make sense of traditions in the non-profit sector in Canada” Historical Context For Intersections and Innovations: Change for Canada’s Voluntary Nonprofit Sector, edited by Susan Phillips and Bob Wyatt, in preparation.
• Revue du Musée Canadien de l’histoire, Salle d’histoire canadienne, Canadian Historical Review.
• Blogs on simultaneous translation and Canadian NGOs; NGOs and Canada’s centenary; etc.
• Paper on the history of the Ethiopian Red Cross, for 2019

New supervisions

This year, I am glad to start supervising the following projects:

• post-doctoral project of Dr. Jill Campbell Miller on foreign aid through the lens of settler colonialism using two particular hydro-electric dams constructed during the 1950s: “the Whitehorse Rapids hydroelectric project in the Yukon Territory, a long an important fishing site and meeting place for many nations in the area. And the Umtru hydroelectric project, in Meghalaya, in an area populated primarily by the indigenous Bhoi-Khasi people, a constitutionally-defined Scheduled Tribe.”
• doctoral thesis of Helen Kennedy on Médecins sand frontières, in collaboration with Candace Sobers; and of Andriata Chironda, an oral history of the Canadian refugee regime, in collaboration with James Milner.;
• honours supervision of Kyleigh Gault, on the T4 Program in Nazi Germany;
• research assistantship of  Dr. Ryan Patterson, on the Mennonite Central Committee and the history of disability;
• research assistantships of undergraduate students LuiXia Lee, on the history of Canadian nurses in China, together with Sonya Grypma; and Nicholas Leckey and Shannon Pendregast on the history of disability and technology, in collaboration with Beth Robertson.

New research projects and news from ongoing projects

The collaborative project on “Civil society and the global refugee regime: Understanding and enhancing impact through the implementation of global refugee policy” was successful (SSHRC Partnership Development Grant, 2018-2023) As the historian co-applicant, I will devise training, archiving and public history tools.

I now work with an inter-university team on “Power and humanity: contexted notions of human rights and humanitarianism in North America”.  We met in Berlin at the JFK Institute in February.  2018 will bring virtual co-teaching, one workshop, etc.

The CUDRG  is in full operation, with new virtual exhibitions in preparations on its transnational front on the Mennonite Central Committee,  participation at Spring events such as Life Science Day and the Canadian Association of the Refugees and Forces Migrations Studies, and new panels on the history of technology and deaf and blind people; and additions to the wheelchair history of Canada.

Publications

• “Préface”, Artefact. 16ème colloque international étudiant du Département d’histoire de l’UniversitéLaval s’est tenu du 17 au 19 février 2016 à l’Université Laval, 2017, Québec, pp. 15-19.
• Book review of “Lisa Pasolli Working Mothers and the Child Care Dilemma: A History of British Columbia’s Social Policy Vancouver: UBC Press, 2015. xii, 240 pp.”,  Historical Studies in Education, 29, 2 (Fall 2017), pp. 153-155.
• Seventh bulletin of the CNHH, March 2018.