Making History In Canada

As I am apt to do each and every Tuesday evening, I watch the CBC. In particular, I enjoy the comedic punditry of Rick Mercer. In last night’s episode Mercer had a compelling rant that sent me in a mad-dash of passion and frustration to my computer. As I sat there poised, preparing to applaud Mercer’s poignant wit and deplore Canada’s current political farce, I slowed my breath to come to terms with the fact that my blog is neither an outlet for my personal ravings – none of which I’m sure anyone really needs to read – nor a forum for current events outside of history. So, I cursed my historical occupation and then began to pick my brain in order to find some way to link what I had learned with some form of public history. Here goes.

But first, a little background. Each week Mercer reserves a portion of his half-hour time slot for a rant. These quick and biting monologues are most frequently aimed at the Federal Government of Canada and its routinely embarrassing acts; this week was no exception. Recently, the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and Al Gore were awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in Science for their work in climate change. Apart of the IPCC were Canadian scientists who were thusly awarded this prestigious prize for their work on this study and their commitment to raising awareness of the global predicament. And how did the current Canadian government respond to the recipients of this worldly award? Well, Mercer has a wonderful, exploratory rant here.
In short, a reception for these recipients was held on parliament hill last week, but neither Stephen Harper, nor his cabinet, specifically Environment Minister, John Baird, were present to honour this achievement. The Conservatives snubbed the commemoration.

Most are familiar with the regressive environmental policies of the current Conservative government, but this is not a rant about Harper and Baird and their war on environmental science which has seen the Cabinet's science adviser relieved of his position and Environment Canada's scientists' lips sealed. This is about the history we make today and the history we celebrate.

In a recent post, a peer of mine, Helen Button, discussed the sometimes controversial art of historical commemoration. As Helen discusses, there are many lesser known figures and peoples who often go unnoticed but are nonetheless deserving of commemoration. In Canada, we often struggle with, and tip-toe around, historical idolatry for fear of alienating a specific group in an ever-growing multicultural country. Our holidays often walk the line of political correctness with days such as 'Civic Holiday' and it's new counterpart 'Family Day'. But it's not all like this. Kudos to Manitoba and the realization of its first 'Louis Riel Day'. Of course, there's Québec which has long recognized such days as 'Saint-Jean-Baptiste' and 'Dollard des Ormeaux'. Commemoration can often be controversial and Riel and Ormeaux are not without their critics and differing interpretations, but the commemoration in itself creates awareness of the impact and influence these individuals and groups have had on our history and concomitantly heritage. Yet, we still strain to create national and provincial holidays that recognize our past. And so we "observed" our first 'Family Day' in Ontario this past Monday.

Maybe part of the problem is our national government's inability to embrace our best and brightest. Governments of the past, Liberal and Conservative, have notoriously shrunk before opportunities of national recognition and unity, never committing without realizing the populist feelings of the day or presently, ignoring a commemoration of our finest minds for a static environmental platform. How are we expected to honour the achievements of the past when our current government will not honour the achievements of today? Even George W. Bush embraced Al Gore's decoration.

Whether you are a Tory or a Liberal, climate change is a reality and the Nobel Committee has recognized these Canadians' work on this study. Dealing with the reality of the environmental impact we have on Earth should not be a part of a political ideology; it should be something any government works progressively for to ensure a bright future for generations to come - this isn't Liberal environmentalism, this is foresight. And sure, the Conservative reply is that too harsh of sanctions on such things as industry and consumerism would sharply alter our way of life. But, the changes we must confront now will pale in comparison to those our children will have to face if we don't attempt to make history in a positive direction now.

Commemoration has its critics and some would argue that it does little in educating the public on history, but I argue that it is in the act of commemoration that we grow our historical awareness. Little is learned from a plaque or a statue in the park, but the presence of these historical landmarks cultivates a sense of history and heritage in communities that may lead to historical inquiry, if only amongst the few. Furthermore, these commemorations help to foster a sense of Canadian history that is so important to maintaining a strong and unified country. The Conservative response to climate change is not only damaging to Canada's reputation globally, but it cuts at the social fabric that ties Canada together through acts of commemorating our brightest. Commemorations of the past and of today do not have to place a figure or group on a pedestal, but should act as a forum for understanding. Snubbing the winners of the Nobel Peace Prize not only fails to honour that which a global committee honours, but it also hides from the discussion generated by these people and their commemoration. In my opinion, this is just plain bad for history.

Welcome to the Sky: It's Big, Don't Worry if You Find Yourself Lost

Sometimes we should just not care so much.

In a previous post I discussed one of the informal mottoes for my digital history course - it's better to fail in order to learn. The class has divided into 4 smaller groups and in April we plan on putting forth an "exhibit" under the ambiguous title, the Sky.

In my sub-group, we'll be assembling a presentation on comets in history. We've broken it down into four place-specific events: the Jesuits' portents in New France, 1618 and James I, the theorized impact in the age of the dinosaurs, and past interpretations of Halley's Comet. For our presentation, we've decided to create an interface with a globe. Each place-specific comet sighting etc. will have a corresponding touch-point on the globe which will activate a Google Earth display on an accompanying monitor. The display will contain images and text to describe the event specific to the location chosen by the viewer. Professor Turkel has done the leg-work for assembling the hardware that will connect the interactive globe to the computer and explains it here.

For myself, this exhibit is an opportunity to play around with, and develop something that is both new and challenging. Trying to understand what Professor Turkel has done may be out of my league, but learning to develop material for presentation in the xml-Keyhole Markup Format that Google Earth uses will be both new and challenging. But that's the point. This is a chance to work with something new, possibly fail at it, and still pass the course. Traditional forms of presentation in public history still hold merit, but we're familiar with them. This is a chance to experiment with new media to present history. Sure, there will be sound historical content, maybe even a thesis or historical question, but more importantly, not only our audience, but us the creators, will see and work with something new that holds a wealth of potential in our future as public historians. If it ends up looking like a science fair, so be it, that's kind of what it is. If someone asks what we're doing, unable to see a coherent link between the various histories being presented, we'll simply tell them what it is we're doing - learning/experimenting/presenting new ways of interactive history. It's not really about the sky - that just happens to be the historical element that was agreed upon in class - it's about the digital.

Why the quotations around exhibit in the opening paragraph? Well, in my opinion, this isn't an exhibit; calling it such is problematic. We are presenting disjointed histories. By calling it an exhibit, we succumb to a desire to create cohesion, maybe a statement, but this is too narrow for our purposes. We are experimenting. For all intents and purposes, this is a presentation on digital history, not a thesis about the sky and history.

So I say, lose the inhibitions, try something new and be less concerned with the history and more with the medium. Besides, if all else fails, we can slap up some text panels and photos of our wonderful attempt at trying to present history off the beaten path.