Pubs, Pulpits and Prairie Fires

Elroy Deimert

History professor Paul Wessner hangs out at BJ’s Bar and Cue Club on Tuesday nights sharing his accounts of the On-to-Ottawa Trek and the Regina Riot in 1935. Due to local interest in his research, he invites Doc Savage and Matt Shaw, real-life leaders on the Trek, to deliver first-hand accounts of the Trek and the Riot. He encourages listeners to contribute when no guests are scheduled to tell their stories. The narratives broaden to the evolution of the Social Credit and CCF prairie fires… (more information)

A Threat from Within

A Century of Jewish Opposition to Zionism

Yakov M. Rabkin

His profound and extensive grounding in history and political science enabled the author to examine a variety of Judaic scholars whose views, however diverse, reflect the supremacy of Torah ethics over nationalism. I hope that their views, expressed mostly before the establishment of the State of Israel, will, in our post-Zionist times, help reduce anti-Semitism and show the way towards peace and security in the Middle East. —Rabbi Baruch Horovitz, Dean, Jerusalem Academy of Jewish Studies… (more information)

African Nova Scotian – Mi’kmaw Relations

Paula C. Madden

The Indigenous people of Nova Scotia, the Mi’kmaq, have been dispossessed of their lands and, since the early 1820s, confined to reserves. African Nova Scotians have also been dispossessed of lands originally granted to them by white colonial governments and settled in communities with names like Africville, Preston or Birchtown. Yet “the story of Africville, and other stories of dispossession,” argues author Paula C. Madden, “cannot be told and understood outside the context… (more information)

Black Canadians Second Edition

History, Experience, Social Conditions, Revised Edition

Joseph Mensah

Black Canadians provides an authoritative reference for teachers, students and the general public who seek to know more about the Black Diaspora in North America. Arguments made in this book may be unpleasant for those with little appetite for pointed, provocative views and analysis from the standpoint of Black people. For those with a genuine interest in venturing beyond established orthodoxies and simplistic solutions to the contentious ethno-racial problems in Canada, this book will be insightful… (more information)

Butterbox Babies

Baby Sales, Baby Deaths o New Revelations 15 Years Later

Bette L. Cahill

A young woman in Nova Scotia gives birth to a child out of wedlock. A childless couple in New Jersey desperately searches for a baby to adopt. These people never meet but their lives become forever linked through a tiny baby girl. Natalie, that baby, spent the first two years of her life in the Ideal Maternity Home on Canada’s rocky East Coast. Louis and Mabel Goldman of Newark adopted her in August 1945. Natalie was one of the survivors. Many babies born at the home were not adopted. They… (more information)

Down But Not Out

Community and the Upper Streets in Halifax, 1890-1914

David Hood

An examination of poverty and homelessness in Halifax at the turn of the twentieth century, this book challenges the notion that the poor are deviants who are responsible for their own misfortune. Historians have too often accepted this characterization of poverty without question and, in so doing, have allowed for its perpetuation into current discourse. Through an exploration of public records and the stories of real people, David Hood breathes life into Halifax’s sordid past — and… (more information)

History in the Making

Raymond Williams, Edward Thompson and Radical Intellectuals, 1936-1956

Steven Woodhams

For a generation of political activists growing up in the 1930s opposing fascism was a priority. The policy of appeasing Hitler and the non-partisan stance of the Labour Party in the face of the Spanish Civil War made the Communist Party an attractive alternative. From this generation emerged key figures in academia and publishing: Eric Hobsbawm, Ralph Miliband, John Saville, Martin Eve, Dorothy and Edward Thompson and Raymond Williams. Woodhams studies the experiences of this generation, the motives… (more information)

John Saville

Memoirs from the Left

John Saville

John Saville has been one of the most influential writers of the second half of the twentieth century in the field of British Labour History. He was a Professor of Economic and Social History at the University of Hull. He has written or edited over twenty books including 1848, The Consolidation of the Capitalist State, and the Dictionary of Labour Biography. His political memoirs touch upon: • Early life; joining the Communist Party at the LSE, travels in France and Nazi Germany • Stories… (more information)

Myth, Migration and the Making of Memory

Scotia and Nova Scotia, c.1700-1990

Edited by Marjory Harper, Michael E. Vance

The essays in this volume, which are drawn from a wide range of disciplines, challenge us to consider critically the commonly held assumption that Nova Scotia is essentially Scottish in character. They do so by exploring the origin of the mythic understanding of the link between Scotland and Nova Scotia, by expanding the examination of Scottish influences from the customary focus on Highland migrants to also include mercantile, philanthropic and professional transatlantic connections, and by studying… (more information)

Out of the Depths (New Extended Edition)

The Experiences of Mi’kmaw Childrn at the Indian Residential School at Shubenacadie, Nova Scotia

Isabelle Knockwood

“The Residential School experience had serious negative consequences for many of our people who have suffered in silence for too long. It is time to take the first step and let others know they are not alone in their suffering. No matter how painful, the stories of our people must be told and heard. Through sharing our past, we can begin to heal ourselves, our communities, our people as we look to a better tomorrow.” —Phil Fontaine, Grand Chief, Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs, former… (more information)

The Gardens of Their Dreams

Desertification and Culture in World History

Brian Griffith

Over the past 7,000 years, a desert slowly spread through the center of the Old World. Our ancestors watched as patches of desolation appeared in the landscape like holes in worn-out cloth. The affected regions had been wastelands before in previous arid ages, but this time human civilizations were on hand to intensify the effect. Eventually, the “true deserts” came to resemble the moon or the sandstorm plains of Mars. Where the web of life is stripped to the bone, this is how it looks… (more information)

The People’s Co-op

The Life and Times of a North End Institution

Nancy Kardash, Jim Mochoruk

Located in the heart of Winnipeg’s Northend, the most class-conscious and ethnically diverse part of the city, the People’s Co-op was always a different kind of institution. Founded and then successfully run for over sixty years by members of Winnipeg’s vibrant left-wing Eastern-European community, this co-op mixed Marx, milk and the masses into a heady brew of social activism and co-operative enterprise. Beginning with a small coal and fuel yard in 1928-and a much larger dream… (more information)

Voices of Nova Scotia Community

A Written Democracy

Scott Milsom

From Birchtown and Harbourville, Kennetcook and Oxford, Lincolnville and Orangedale, these stories explore why the people of small communities across Nova Scotia value the quality of life they enjoy. The author ensures that it is the voices of the people who live in these communities that ring truest, allowing both neighbours and those visiting for the first time a better understanding of life in rural and small-town Nova Scotia. “The plain-spoken, visionary journalist Scott Milsom reminds… (more information)

Zapatistas

Rebellion from the Grassroots to the Global

Alex Khasnabish

In 1994 a guerilla army of Indigenous Mayan peasants in Southeast Mexico emerged and declared ‘Enough!’ to 500 years of colonialism, racism, exploitation, oppression and genocide. The effects of the Zapatista uprising were profound and would be felt beyond the borders of Mexico. At a time when state-sponsored socialism had all but vanished and other elements of the left appeared defeated in the face of neoliberalism’s ascendancy, the Zapatista uprising sparked a powerful new wave… (more information)