The next instalment of the series will be delivered by , a professor in 91��ɫ's Faculty of Environmental Studies and . The lecture will take place Monday, March 21, in 001 Vanier College from 6 to 7pm.

Sandilands is the author of numerous publications in environmental literature, history and cultural studies, including writings on national parts, queer and feminist ecologies, ecocriticism and environmental public cultures.

Sandilands' lecture, titled "A State of Nature? National Parks and Canadian National Identity", places a different kind of lens on Canada's national parks. Anyone who has ever visited one and wondered why there are so many rules, trails and signs in the "wilderness" should consider coming to this free public lecture.

Above: Cate Sandilands and the unnatural signage in the Bruce Peninsula National Park

"Canadian national parks are often referred to as 'national treasures', part of a public understanding of heritage that view them as a sort of repository of the essence of Canada. In this view, parks 'preserve' a nature that is the origin of the nation, a key part of our collective identity as Canadians," says Sandilands.

"In fact, national parks are deeply political creations. They 'organize' nature in specific ways, and have served a variety of economic and other agendas since the first Canadian national park – Rocky Mountains Park, now Banff – was established in 1887," she says.

"This presentation will consider the politics of national parks over the last 125 years, with a particular focus on the dynamics of 'national natures' as they are a part of different economic, political and ideological trajectories for Canadian identity," says Sandilands. "Thinking about parks solely as sites of preservation obscures a far more interesting history."

The Canada Like You’ve Never Heard it Before Lecture Series series showcases the breadth and depth of Canadian scholarship and research at 91��ɫ. The series was organized by Jon Sufrin, coordinator of the Canadian Studies Program. This academic year, several senior faculty and two Canada Research Chairs have delivered presentations.

Sponsors of the series include: the Dean's Office, Faculty of Liberal Arts & Professional Studies; Stong College; Vanier College; Winters College; New College; Calumet College; Founders College; Students for Canadian Studies; and the Canadian Studies Program.

For upcoming lectures and speaker bios, visit the Canada Like You’ve Never Heard it Before Lecture Series website.

Republished courtesy of YFile – 91��ɫ’s daily e-bulletin.

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His is a life dedicated to the study of literature and writing, but above all working towards establishing steady dialogue between various cultures that led to the creation of 91��ɫ’s Canada-Mediterranean Centre and the birth of the concept of “transculturalism”, wrote Tandem.

At 80 years of age, Bouraoui is still travelling and feels just as at home in Toronto as he does in Paris and Africa. And he recently received his honorary citizenship from Acquaviva delle Fonti – one of the cities of the Puglia [region] that have welcomed him with “open arms” during the Italian stopover of his international project from Canada to Puglia under the Sign of Dialogue, launched by Canada-Mediterranean Centre and by WIP Edizioni, and thanks also to the invaluable collaboration of Nicola D’Ambrosio, professor of francophone literature at the University of Bari.

Bouraoui is proud of being part of the “heart and soul of this new family midway between the Adriatic Sea and the Gulf of Taranto.” This is a citizenship to add to his Canadian one and that enriches his Tunisian origins and plural identity, which functions in terms “of addition, not subtraction.”

“Africa, Europe, North America – it’s all stratified within me,” he says from his Paris home shortly before departing on his fifth trip to Puglia. “And you can’t take any of it away because Hédi Bouraoui is the sum of his parts. Otherwise, I would no longer be me.”

For him, transculturalism is not an abstract concept, but something he experienced firsthand. “When I transferred from the United States to Toronto, I was eager to contribute to the great Canadian mosaic, which I saw as being the opposite of the American ‘melting pot’, which wants to cancel all cultural differences in the name of a stars-and-stripes recognition. But early on, during the early ’70s, I realized that multiculturalism doesn’t work because each community is shut off within itself, while government, then as now, was more interested in gaining votes rather than getting the various fabrics of the mosaic to truly communicate with each other. Transculturalism, instead, is the ongoing search of dialogue between the various cultures, not a monologue.”

And that is a cornerstone of Bouraoui’s works, which often focuses on the Mediterranean, “cradle of Eastern and Western civilization and of the three monotheistic religions par excellence, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam.”

Posted by Elizbeth Monier-Williams, research communications officer, with files courtesy of YFile – 91��ɫ’s daily e-bulletin.

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Podruchny’s talk, “Tough Bodies, Fast Dogs, Well-Dressed Wives: Measures of Manhood Among French-Canadian Voyageurs in the North American Fur Trade”, will take place tomorrow, from 2:30 to 4pm, at 010 Vanier College, Vanier Senior Common Room, Keele campus.

She will discuss French Canadian and Métis voyageurs working in the fur trade. In the 18th and 19th centuries, the voyageurs developed a range of masculine ideals that worked together to promote a particular trope of manhood among this workforce. Men were expected to perform near miraculous feats of labour by paddling continuously for weeks on end, barely stopping to sleep and eat, carrying impossibly heavy packs across slippery and steep portages, and shooting through dangerous rapids, says Podruchny.

They challenged each other to develop bodies that were as tough as possible through games of speed, endurance and strength. They distinguished categories within the workforce. Pork eaters were denigrated as lesser men; North men were considered to be tougher; Athabasca men the toughest, she says.

Tough man ideals included taking risks, being jovial and stoic in the face of hardship, and standing up to the dangers of the wild. Voyageurs also idealized largess, spending money on luxury goods, such as decorating their possessions, feasting and drinking, and wooing women with extravagant gifts. The range of these ideals created distinct values in fur trade and Métis communities that stood out sharply from their bosses, missionaries, and later white settlers who began to intrude in the northwest starting in the 1870s.

Podruchny work focuses on the history of French and indigenous contact in early Canada. She is the author of and co-editor of .

The 2010-2011 Canada: Like You’ve Never Heard It Before Speakers' Series features public lectures by prominent 91��ɫ Canadianists. Co-sponsored by the Canadian Studies Program and the Canadian Studies club, this interdisciplinary series demonstrates the breadth and depth of both Canadianist research at 91��ɫ and the work of outside authors.

This series is co-sponsored by Vanier College, Winters College, New College, Stong College, Calumet College and Founders College, as well as the Office of the Dean of the Faculty of Liberal Arts & Professional Studies.

Republished courtesy of YFile– 91��ɫ’s daily e-bulletin

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