Native Content in the Alberta Social Studies Curriculum

When I was one of the researchers on the Decore Report, an examination of the portrayal of First Nations in Alberta Social Studies Curriculum back in the late 1980s, we identified four problems: (1) discussion of the native people disappeared by turn of last century...there were the dinosaurs, then the natives then the explorers...and that's it for native content. As if no native contributed to WWII or hockey or whatever, so forget about 'em. When we complained to guys who wrote the textbooks on WWII or etc that there was no native content they just looked at us like we were crazy and asked, why would we have native content in book on WWII? (2) a lot of the content that was there was racist--e.g., Champlain's description of how Iroquois lived makes kids shiver with how primitive they were, but of course, Champlain's point was that these were admirable traits and ideas that the French should maybe adopt--but kids miss that Europeans were that primitive in Champlain's time too, because material not placed in context for them; (3) whenever there was First Nations content, it was THE SAME CONTENT over and over and over. At first I thought it was a deliberate attempt to bore kids into ignoring Native cultures, but quickly realized it was laziness. Authors looking for a picture of a teepee for their chapter would choose the first one they came across, rather than take their own or look around, and apparently they all used the same photo service. The result is that every mention of First Nation content is Jerry Potts-- and the same photo of him every time-- and the same one teepee. How could kids not be bored by the message that there are four Natives worth talking about and only 11 photos of Native content? And (4) what we came to call the 'dancing minority trick' which was that any time authors wanted to show First Nations or Ukrainian culture or whatever, they inevitably did so by showing said minority in traditional garb, dancing. And I understand that if you are looking for a picture of a Ukrainian or a Blackfoot, then a guy in a suit doesn't seem like much of a photo, even though that's what they actually look like. If you want someone who looks Ukrainian then doing the dance in traditional garb is the photo you use, but the message that kids get is consequently really distorted. Because First Native culture isn't just teepees and dances. But kids only ever get the superficial stuff about teepees and dancing around a campfire, not the deeper stuff about spirituality or different ways of looking at the world etc.

The situation has improved somewhat since then, but while the blatant racism is gone and the absence of First Nations content after 1900 is gone, I think we may still have the problem with the dancing minority trick and the repetition of the same limited material over and over again.

And now we have another variation of #1, which is the intrusion of native content...the need to get authors to stop ignoring First Nations after 1900 led to Departments of Education having to say, "include First Nations content or else!" to textbook writers, and that was a necessary and good thing, because authors writing about WWII discovered that there were First Nation's heroes in both WWI and WWII worth writing about, once they thought to look. So that worked out. But now that "First Nation's content?" is one of the items on textbook checklists, publishers are sticking it in whether it is relevant or not. So, I'm re-editing a series of biographies on Canadian PMs from another publisher, and in the middle of a discussion of this or that PM, there suddenly appear a couple of pages on native people of that era...and it's just kind of inserted at random. Not, "what was this PM's policies on First Nations?", but just sort of, "Meanwhile, back on the reserve..." What the hey? And of course, these fact pages are the exact same 'facts' as in every other book...creating mind-numbing repetition to turn kids off any possible interest in First Nations. Head:Desk. So nice try, but no cigar.

On Canadian History

Kasia (my almost-10 yr old): "I finished my report for Canadian history."

Me: "That was fast. What did you write on?"

Kasia: "How I feel about Canadian history. " Hands me an 8.5X11 sheet of paper covered on both sides with a continuous row of "Z"s.

Point taken.

But the thing is, Canadian history is actually really interesting. Fascinating piece on Albertan Two-gun Cohen this morning on CBC morning a case in point. After listening to his story, interviewer asked, "How come we never heard of this guy before? It's a fantastic story!" And the journalist essentially shrugged on air and said, "it's how Canadians teach history: they leave out all the interesting characters".

Drives me crazy.

My students never found Canadian history boring, but then the story of confederation is one of bribery, booze, and backstabbing when I tell it. And McKenzie King! Who could find King boring? How cool is it to find out that Canadian foreign policy was dictated by his dead mother (via a psychic)? "Conscription if necessary, but not necessarily conscription" is one of the great bafflegab statements of all time. And compare King's handling of the Bing scandal with say, Watergate. And what other world leader stole stones out of Buckingham palace for their private estates as King did with Kingsmere?

I'm telling you, Canadian history is engrossing if you actually know any of it.

Chandler Davis

In Toronto for the Canadian History of Education Association's annual conference, and by lucky coincidence, tonight was also the launch of It Walks in Beauty: Selected prose of Chandler Davis at the Merril Collection (Toronto Public Library). Choosing between this evening's presentations on history at the conference, or meeting Chandler Davis, who is history, was easy. And I was not disappointed. The panel at the Merril was one of the most stimulating academic events I have attended in years.


Chandler Davis signing copies of his book at its launch, Merril Collection, Toronto, October 21, 2010.

Chandler Davis (Professor Emeritus, UofT, Mathematics) gave a short but perceptive talk on how speculative fiction is necessary to pose alternatives when dissent is discouraged, discredited or otherwise marginalized.


Josh Lukin, the collection's editor.

Josh Lukin (Temple University) made a brief, funny and insightful speech about the task of uniting the twin themes of Davis' sf fiction and social activism within a single volume, and his own role in analyzing and pitching Chandler's work. Judging by his remarks this evening, and my first impressions of his opening essay, I am definitely going to have to track down some of Lukin's other work documenting forgotten (suppressed?) protest writers.

Josh was followed by Emily Pohl-Weary, who brought greetings from the ghost of her grandmother, Judith Merril, the mother of modern SF and Chandler's contemporary. (I was later able to get Emily to sign my copy of Better to Have Loved, her outstanding biography of Judith Merril.)

Emily Pohl-Weary, author and co-editor of Broken Pencil (the only magazine to which I've ever subscribed).

Psychoanalyst and President of Science for Peace, Judith Deutsch (not pictured) gave a serious and moving speech about Chandler Davis social activism, reading several brief quotes from the collection to highlight both Davis' principles and exceptional insight.

There were two other excellent speakers, colleagues of Davis, but I unfortunately missed their names, and there was no printed program. Davis' wife (a historian) also spoke from the audience in response to a question about the role of science fiction in Davis activism.

[01/11/10: Chandler Davis provided the following update: "The two panelists whose names you didn't catchwere Peter Rosenthal & Peter Fitting. Both, it happens, were with me in sit-in against Dow Chemical recruiting on campus (1967) and have kept the faith. Fitting is also a science-fiction fan and critic, who initiated the first course on s-f on the U of T campus (teaching it without compensation at first), in which both Judy Merril & I have been guest lecturers. The third member of the panel not mentioned in your report was Metta Spencer, my old friend and fellow member of the exec of Science for Peace; she is a Prof Emeritus of Sociology at U of T and Editor of Peace Magazine"]

The discussion following the presentations was particularly fascinating, as the room was filled with activists from the 1940s, '50s and '60s contrasting their experiences with those of the current generation — some arguing that protest seems to have been successfully marginalized by hegemonic forces, while others argued that much had been achieved and that there was considerable reason for optimism about the future.

For myself, I was honored just to shake the hand of a man who had faced down the UnAmerican Activities Commmittee, refused to name names, and gone to jail for his principles. Of course, had he not been blacklisted in the States, he might never have come to Canada. Their loss, our gain.


An excellent turnout for the launch, though the majority were activists rather than SF readers. I don't think I've ever been in a room with so many prominent activists before.


Chandler's son, Aaron Davis, a renowned Toronto jazz pianist, provided the music for the launch.



Allan Weiss

As a bonus, I was able to briefly talk to Allan Weiss (Associate Professor, York University) about his current sabbatical project following the event; meet Annette Mocek (Merril Collection) with whom I have corresponded for years but never met in person before; and visit with Lorna Toolis (Head, Merril Collection) a friend for nearly 35 years (yikes!).

All in all, a very successful and enjoyable evening!

[01/11/10: Links to Aqueduct Press posts on the event:
Part 1
Part 2]

Galt Museum

I have been consistently impressed with the exhibits mounted locally by the Galt Museum, but I was particularly struck by the recent Treasures and Curiosities Exhibit (Feb 20-May 2010). I feel strongly that this exhibit was not only engaging and innovative, but a role model for other regional museums to follow (which is why it's worth mentioning here, since most of my readers cannot travel to Lethbridge, or back in time, to see it).

The Treasures and Curiosities Exhibit had staff, board, volunteer and community members select their favorite artifacts from the Galt’s collection. This resulted in a very eclectic and slightly eccentric collection of artifacts, but presented two connecting threads: first, everything was from the Galt collection so by definition had a Southern Alberta connection; second, every item had a personal connection to, or resonance for, the community member who had selected it for the display. The write up on each item devoted as much space to the story of why the community member made the selection as on the item itself. This made for an inherently fascinating exhibit because even if the particular object held little interest for the viewer (i.e., me), the story of why someone else felt connected to the object was often as engaging, or more so, than the object itself.

The resulting display presented, therefore, several unique aspects:

First, just as Wikipedia includes entries on many topics the Britannica editors would never have deemed worthy of inclusion, the use of ordinary community members (as well as staff and board members) in choosing items for display created a wonderfully democratic process. Although the display was delimited by the fact that everything necessarily came from the Galt collection, and so all the artifacts were appropriate and of museum quality, the selection criteria still pretty broad! I find it highly unlikely that any expert curator would have put together this particular selection of items, and it is that very aspect of random juxtaposition that made the display so stimulating and such a creative success. Where else would you find a WWII model tank (made by a German POW interned near Lethbridge) next to a multilith, a grand piano, and six really creepy nurse dolls?

Similarly, given the broad sample of individuals included in the selection process, the criteria of personal resonance produced an extremely representative sample of time periods, topics, and Southern Alberta lifestyles. The greatest unifying theme was the sense of browsing through the Galt collections oneself and stumbling upon item after item with their own personal resonance for the viewer.

Second, I had a very strong emotional connection to several of the items. I would not normally have expected a multilith machine to be included in a museum display, and was strongly reminded of my mother, who ran that exact model of multilith for many years when the technology was still new. A far higher percentage of items in this exhibit had that effect on me than any other exhibit I can remember.

Third, I had a very strong impulse to donate to the Galt collection. Seeing, for example, the Gestetner 120 included in the display, I was reminded that I have a working condition Gestetner from two generations earlier in my basement – one of only a few dozen of that particular model left in the world. (Gestetner recalled and destroyed all the others when they realized the ‘perpetual guarantee’ they had been sold with was costing them too much money.) Indeed, there were any number of artifacts which gave me pause to think that I too had something similar, something better, or something missing from the display that could be offered to the Galt.

Beyond the association with particular artifacts, I think I and others become much better educated about the sorts of items museums actually collect when we see an exhibit such as this one. Most of us make the mistake of preserving the unusual – the commemorative coin, the souvenir, etc. – rather than the every day, common place items that are in fact the representative artifacts that museums require. Seeing this eclectic collection of everyday items, and feeling the strong emotional response such familiar objects trigger, educates potential donors about what they could be passing onto the Galt. This is especially timely given current demographics and that many of my generation are dealing with elder care and the disposition of estates. The range of items included in this exhibit – from a widower’s hooked rug of the ‘big bang’ (a nice example of both eccentricity and the concretization of abstract theory held in a particular age) to a ‘compact radio’ the size of trunk to first nation artifacts – was unusually helpful in demonstrating the scope of museum collections.

Further, as a celebration of the breadth and depth of the Galt Collection, one cannot help but feel a certain level of pride in and appreciation of -- and therefore the desire to contribute to -- that collection.

Fourth, and perhaps most importantly, the display served to highlight the purpose of collections and museums such as the Galt. A local exhibit of local history that teaches us all that this stuff matters. That there is indeed a personal connection to local history for all of us at some level, even if we originally came from and have roots somewhere else. This is what museums are about.

The extremely simple (I mean conceptually – I’m sure it was an immense effort to organize) design of this exhibit is exemplary – there is no museum that could not adopt this particular democratic and populist approach to mounting a display from their own collections. That I have never seen or heard of anything similar elsewhere suggests to me that the collections team at the Galt has hit on an extremely useful, applicable, and transferable innovation which others would be well advised to adopt.

So, go forth to your local museum and suggest that they attempt a similar exhibit -- and be sure to volunteer as one of those to pour through their hidden collection rooms to make your own selection for the display.

Self-Publishing and the Exception to the Rule

It's easy to see that the publishing industry, like the music industry before it, is undergoing major changes where in future it may not be uncommon to see writers simply bypassing the publishers altogether to sell directly to their readers. The new print-on-demand publishers (like Lulu) make it extremely easy and economical for writers to self-publish, especially where these have immediate access to on-line distribution through Amazon or Chapters. This is good, because in cutting out the middleman (publishers, retailers) costs can be kept down, yet with a much higher return from the cover price going directly to the writer. But this is also very bad, because without a publisher acting as 'referee', the reader has almost no way of navigating through the storm of self-publishing that is threatening to overwhelm us.

Self-publishing is often legitimate when dealing with small niche or regional markets. As small publishers have increasingly been bought out by larger national publishers, and national publishers consolidated into global megapublishers, the big publishers have taken on so much debt acquiring their former competition, that they can no longer survive publishing books with limited appeal. To survive, they increasingly rely on economies of scale, and have been dropping even their formerly profitable midlist authors (those who sell 50,000-75,000 copies). So when authors I know turn up in limited editions from small regional presses or their own personal imprint, no problem. But finding new authors worthy of attention amongst the recent tidal wave of self-published titles is another matter entirely.

Most self-published work is -- not to put too fine a point on it -- dreadful. As a reviewer these last 30 years, a lot of self-published titles have crossed my desk on their way to landfill, and they have generally ranged from dreadful to appalling. There was one author I recall who had a certain naive charm, in an amateurishly painful way, but she was the exception to the rule, and even her work wasn't good enough for me to actually review -- I don't see the point of really negative reviews when there are so many good titles worthy of recommendation.

This history of self-publishing as synonymous with bad writing is a problem for those trying to catch the wave of the future, because professional reviewers have been conditioned to simply ignore any self-published work sent into them. Indeed, not only is it unlikely to be worthy of review space even in the local paper or niche market newsletter, the sort of individual that self-publishes is often the sort who takes personal affront at bad reviews, and there is only so much crank mail, tire-slashing, and death threats a reviewer can put up with before just deciding not to bother. Which sometimes leaves good writers who can't sell to the mega-publishers an uphill battle for acceptance.

Once such title is Lorina Stephens' Shadow Song. From the perspective of the major publishers, Shadow Song is unmarketable for three reasons: (1) as a Historical Romance, it has way too many fantasy elements; as a fantasy novel, it reads too much like a Historical; and as a Canadian novel, it's too down beat for either. So when a marketing department can't figure out which imprint to bring it out under, the project just doesn't go forward. (2) There are elements here that could lead to charges either of cultural appropriation or subtle racism. Both charges would be false, the first person narration merely expressing the authentic views of a European from 1830, but from the publisher's point of view, why take on any controversy when there are a hundred other manuscripts that won't raise any flags. (3) I think this book has real potential as a companion to high school history / novel study classes, but there are three sex scenes that essentially block it from that market. So, I appreciate why the big publishers looking for an easy, surefire hit, passed on Shadow Song.

But none of those considerations should matter to actual readers. It's simply a marvelous book, the exception that proves that sometimes self-published can be great. Indeed, I go so far as to say that the superior writing, backed by meticulous research and authentic characterization, elevates this cultural fantasy to candidate for Great Canadian Novel. As a historical romance, it features a ten year old girl thrust into life in 1830s Upper Canada (after sheltered aristocratic upbringing in England) and eventually into learning from First nation's shaman. The fantasy elements based on First Nation's culture are as convincing and riveting as any based on usual Celtic/Anglo traditions; the historical detail so finely rendered you can reach out to touch the settings; and the authentic voice of 1830s heroine gives narration fine Jane Austin feel-- with maybe touch of Black Donnellys thrown in. Definitely in the best tradition of dark, slow Canadian fiction, Shadow Song packs a powerful punch.

Highly recommended. (If you buy it, go for the green cover pictured here, rather than the original blue cover.)

The Old New Romans

Canadians have had a long history of comparing America to the Roman Empire (e.g., The New Romans, Hurtig, 1968.), so I couldn't help drawing a parallel between the election of the first black (well, he's a bit black anyway) President yesterday, and the election of Trajan as the first non-Roman emperor. Trajan revitalized the empire simply by being Emperor (though he was also a pretty good organizer, general, and etc. as it happens) because he proved that the extension of Roman citizenship to everyone in the Empire was authentic. You no longer had to be a Roman to work your way up to the seat of power. This immediately united the Empire because every general and governor stopped dreaming about rebelling and setting up their own little fiefdom, and instead took seriously the thought that one day they might get to be Emperor of the whole thing. Listening to CBC's The Current this morning interviewing social workers in Chicago and how, knowing that Obama had started as an activist in their community, they were all saying that his election proved that anyone could make it to President, that the next generation of kids could look to him and think, all I have to do is work and it is possible to make it in America. It's complete nonsense, of course, you still have to come from a rich and powerful family to make it and everything else is just ideology and statistical outriders, but the reinstatement of one of the central hegemonic ideals of American democracy might just save that nation from going further down the dark road (Weimar republic parallels!) it appeared to be on.