2026 Graduate Conference
Spaces and Places: Exploring the Physical and Conceptual Environments of History
Jennifer Bonnell is a historian of public memory and environmental change in nineteenth and twentieth-century Canada. She is the author or co-editor of four books, including Reclaiming the Don: An Environmental History of Toronto’s Don River Valley, released in second edition by the University of Toronto Press in 2024, and Stewards of Splendour: A History of Wildlife and People in British Columbia, published in 2023 by the Royal BC Museum. Her current book project, Foragers of a Modern Countryside: Honeybees, Environmental Change, and Beekeeper Advocacy in the Great Lakes Region, 1880-1940, will be published by the University of Washington Press’s Weyerhaeuser Environmental Books series. Jennifer teaches Canadian and environmental history at York University.
9:30am: Opening Remarks and Housekeeping
9:45 – 10:45am:
Session One: Imperial and Colonial Spaces
Moderator: Shaun Hislop
Spencer Paddock [University of New Brunswick] – A War amongst Ruins: Right-Wing Political Violence in an Imposed Decolonial Space
Sophia Galvao [McMaster University] – Connaissez-vous les Zoniers? A Taxonomy of Marginality in the Zone, 1890-96
Scott MacGregor [Western University] – Beneath the Picturesque: The Making of a ‘Benign’ Highlands
10:45 – 11:00am: Coffee and Snacks
11:00am – 12:00pm:
Session Two: Built Environments and Material Culture
Moderator: Charan Mandur
Étienne Chevalier [University of Waterloo] – Shaping the City for Textile: The Draperie jurée and Montpellier’s Urban Ecosystem (1493–1499)
David Seston [Western University] – The Cultural Significance of the “Canadian Whites” Comics During the Second World War
12:00 – 1:00pm: Keynote - Prof. Jennifer Bonnell - "Foragers of a Modern Countryside: Honey Bees, Beekeepers, and Changing Agricultural Landscapes in the Great Lakes Region, 1880-1940."
1:00pm – 2:00pm: LUNCH
2:00 – 3:00pm:
Session Three: Institutions and Sites of Governance
Moderator: Kristen Jeanveau
Alexander Fitch [Western University] – Scouts Canada and Residential Schools
Thomas Vukovic [University of Toronto] – “Every Time I Smoke, I Become a White Man”: Social Determinants of Health in New Osnaburgh and the Sioux Lookout Zone
Andrew Rice [Western University] – The American and Canadian Decisions to Boycott the 1980 Moscow Olympics: A Comparative Analysis
3:00 – 3:15pm: Coffee and Snacks
3:15 – 4:15pm:
Session Four: Places of Memory
Moderator: Katelyn Stieva
Ben Albrecht [Dalhousie University] – Gandhi’s South African Years: A Third Space, a Third Gandhi, and his Lieux de Mémoire
Beth Zentner [Western University] – The Relationship Between Canada and the Netherlands After World War II
Huanyu Li [Western University] – The Lusitania and International Law
4:15pm: Concluding Remarks
