Jonathan F. Vance

Distinguished University Professor - J.B. Smallman Chair

Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada

PhD, York University, 1993

Email: jvance@uwo.ca
Telephone: 519-661-2111 ext. 84974
Office: Lawson Hall 2247

Supervision

Master's & Co-Doctoral Level supervisory privileges

Teaching: Fall/Winter 2026-27

Course Code	Course Title
HIST 1810E	Wars that Changed the World
HIST 2144B	"Anarchy in the UK": Postwar Britain Through Popular Music
HIST 4889F	Social Memory: How Societies Remember - New Course

Reasearch and Specialization

Professor Vance teaches military history, Canadian history, and social memory. His current research focuses on the First World War, commemoration and social memory, and prisoners of war.

Major Research Projects

The Ley and Lois Smith War, Memory, and Popular Culture

Research Collection

The collection is now available to researchers working in the fields of military history, cultural studies, war and society, and prisoners of war. It is a heterogeneous collection of archival materials, microforms, published and printed documents, and secondary sources relating to the cultural dimensions of conflict and the collective memory of war. Its holdings, which might be broadly classed as ephemera, are strongest in a number of areas:

popular culture artifacts
materials relating to veterans organizations
children’s literature and educational materials relating to war history
military training and instructional manuals
wartime publications

For more information, please see the collection guide.

Supervisons

Kristen Jeanveau, ‘Keep Calm and Type On: British Community Press in the Second World War’ (from 2026)

Rose Giles, ‘Between Sanitorium and Civvy Street: Postwar Tuberculosis Rehabilitation at Western Counties Veterans’ Lodge’ (from 2025)

Anna Lalli, ‘Those Who Survived: Attempted Suicides in the Canadian Army in the Two World Wars’ (from 2025)

Hazel Scott-Pankratz, ‘Experiencing Technological Systems in the Canadian Field Artillery, 1914-1918’ (from 2021)

Heather Smith, ‘Quilting for a Cause: Community Fundraising and Canadian First World War Quilts’ (from 2021)

Heather Ellis, ‘Aftershocks: The Psychological Cost of the Great War’ (2025)

Guy St-Denis, ‘An Enduring Popularity: Sir Isaac Brock and Canada, 1812 - 2012 (2023)

Bryan McClure, ‘”Gave His Life for the Empire”: Memory, Memorials and Identity in the British Empire after the First World War (2023)

Jordan Chase, ‘”For Weariness Cannot but Fill our Men after so long a Period of Hardship and

Endurance”: War Weariness in the Canadian Corps in the First World War’ (2019)

Samantha Desroches, ‘Tanks and Tinsel: The American Celebration of Christmas during World War II’ (2018)

Jeremy Garrett, ‘Tribute to the Fallen: The Evolution of Canadian Battlefield Burials During the First World War’ (2018)

Matthew McRae, ‘Remembering Rebellion, Remembering Resistance: Collective Memory, Identity, and the Veterans of 1869-70 and 1885’ (2018)

Ryan Flavelle, ‘Killing, Combat and the Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry: Legendary Soldiers’ Stories of the First World War, 1914-1918’ (2018)

Cayley Bower, ‘Dying to be Modern: Cataraqui Cemetery, Romanticism, Consumerism, and the Extension of Modernity in Kingston, Ontario, 1780-1900’ (2017)

Alex Souchen, ‘Peace Dividend: The War Assets Corporation and the Disposal of Canada's Munitions and Supplies, 1943-1948’ (2016)

Claire Halstead, ‘From Lion to Leaf: British Child Evacuees in Canada During the Second World War’ (2015)

Steve Marti (with Francine McKenzie), ‘Embattled Communities: Patriotism and Identity in Australia, Canada, and New Zealand, 1914-1918’ (2015)

Maggie Kubow, ‘Contemporary Reactions to Genocide with a Focus on the Role of the Foreign Language Press 1926-1945’ (2015)

Trista Grant, ‘”Soldiers First”: The Evolution of Training for Peacekeeping in the Canadian Forces, 1956-2000’ (2014)

Cindy Brown, ‘Marzabotto and Cassino: Divergent Memories of the Second World War in Italy’ (2013)

Brandon Dimmel, ‘Outside Influences: Great War Experiences Along the Canada - U.S. Border’ (2012)

Richard Holt, ‘Filling the Ranks: Training and Reinforcements within the Canadian Expeditionary Force, 1914-1918’ (2011)

Dorotea Gucciardo, ‘Wired!: How Canada Became Electrified, 1882-1945’ (2011)

Liam van Beek, ‘”We Leave You our Deaths, Give Them Meaning”: Memory, Identity and the Vietnam Veterans Memorial’ (2010)

Teresa Iacobelli, ‘Arbitrary Justice?: The Application of the Death Sentence in the Canadian Expeditionary Force during the First World War’ (2009)

Mark Humphries, ‘The Duty of the Nation: Public Health and the Spanish Influenza in Canada, 1918-1919’ (2008)

Forrest Pass, ‘Pacific Dominion: British Columbia and the Making of Canadian Nationalism, 1858-1958’ (2008)

Graham Broad, ‘A Small Price to Pay: Canadians and Wartime Consumerism, 1939-45’ (2008)

Heather Moran, ‘Stretcher-Bearers and Surgeons: Canadian Front-Line Medicine in the First World War’ (2008)

Dean Ruffilli, ‘The Car in Canadian Culture, 1898-1983’ (2006)

Stephen Burgess-Whiting, ‘Lest We Remember: Canadians and the Spanish Civil War’ (2006)

Amy Shaw, ‘“These Strange, Ridiculous and Contradictory Creatures”: Conscientious Objection in Canada during the First World War’ (2005)

Jeff Vacante, ‘The Search for Manhood: Locating Masculine Identity in Early Twentieth-Century Quebec’ (2005)

Richard Walker, ‘The Political Management of Army Leadership: The Evolution of Canadian Civil-Army Relations, 1898-1945’ (2003)

Claire Campbell, ‘Shaped by the West Wind: Nature and History in the Eastern Georgian Bay’ (2001)

MA Theses

Emma Kuiack, ‘Unsung Equine Heroes: An Analysis of Equine Care and Management during the Great War’ (2022)

Ryan McLachlan, ‘The Empire Strikes Back: Memory, Meaning and the Falklands War’ (2022)

Grace Rosien, ‘Canadian Prisoners of the Great War: Changing Perceptions’ (2022)

Benjamin Gladstone, ‘Making the Mandates System’ (2021)

Brigette Farrell, ‘Shell Shock in the First World War: An Analysis of Psychological Impairment in Canadian Soldiers’ (2020)

Sarah Hart, ‘Muddying the Lens: Photographs of the Canadian Expeditionary Force’ (2020)

Jordyn Bailey, ‘Arrival of the Fittest: German POWs in Ontario during the Second World War’ (2019)

Gord Cavanaugh, ‘The Knights of the Air and the Myth of Chivalry’ (2001)

MA Cognates

Seth Bradfield, ‘Surviving Stalag VII A: Inequality, Ingenuity, and the POW Barter Economy’ (2025)

Emily Amarelo, ‘“It Were a Great One ‘Fer The Gals!”: The First World War Memoirs of Canadian Nursing Sisters Constance Bruce and Mabel Clint’ (2024)

Natan Penner Andrade, ‘Cowards, Slackers, and Shirkers: Canadian Soldiers, the Great War, and Those Who Stayed at Home’ (2023)

Meaghan Buchanan, ‘Equal in Death: Commemoration of Executed British Empire Soldiers in World War I’ (2023)

Justin Szechy, ‘A New Look at Nazi Armament Policy’ (2022)

Kaitlyn MacDonald, ‘Canada’s Indigenous Veterans of the First World War’ (2020)

Cara Faganello, ‘Forever in Ink: The Canadian War Experience through One Man’s Eyes’ (2021)

Josh Lomax, ‘Jews in the Canadian Military in the Second World War’ (2019)

Haley Kalous, ‘The Americans Are Coming Home: Battlefield Tourism & Pilgrimages to the Western Front in the 1920s and 1930s’ (2018)

Erika Blok, ‘The Influenza Epidemic in London, Ontario, 1917-1919’ (2017)

Joseph Ives, ‘Loving the Alien: Tracing the Presentation of David Bowie’s Collective Memory as a Hero of the Outcast’ (2017)

Desaree Rosskopf, ‘The Myth of Canada’s Citizen Soldier’ (2017)

Vincent Yam, ‘Making a National Memory: The Dieppe Raid on Film and Television’ (2017)

Vanessa Medeiros, ‘Juvenile Deviancy: Ethnicity and the Medicalization of Bad Behaviour in Canadian Education’ (2016)

Emily Usher-Speedie, ‘Rationing for Vitamins: The British Government’s Attempts to Scientifically Feed the Population during the Second World War’ (2016)

Alison Brown, ‘Celebrating Maple Time: Nostalgia for a Simpler Past’ (2015)

Lisa Marie Murphy-Gemmill, ‘The Failed Polish Mission in Canada and the Community Success of The Tadeusz Kosciuszko Polish Soldier Armed Unit, Owen Sound, Ontario, 1941-42’ (2015)

Brendan Carey, ‘”They were like tigers”: History of the 91^st Battalion CEF’ (2014)

Nickolas Daneliak, ‘Real Cavalry Work: The First Hussars and the Canadian Light Horse in the Great War’ (2014)

Lauren Gilfoyle, ‘”When whiskey was as free as water”: Local Identity, Rural Relevance, and the ‘Ol’ Stage Coaching Days’ in Westerly Lambton’ (2014)

Katrina Pasierbek, ‘”With reverent hearts and shining eyes”: Canadian Battlefield Tourism on the Western Front, 1916‑1939’ (2014)

Blake Van Santen, ‘Gunner Town: The Artillery in Guelph, Ontario’ (2014)

Colleen Molloy, “‘Finding their way into a world of citizenship’: The Students and Schools of London, Ontario during the Second World War” (2013)

Oskar Ahopelto, ‘The Conscription Crisis at the Front: Manpower Problems in Canadian Infantry Battalions and the Military Basis for Overseas Conscription in World War II’ (2012)

Doug Lefler, ‘The Revolution of Canadian Artillery during the First World War’ (2011)

Robin Barker‑James, ‘Training in the Royal Flying Corps’ (2011)

Birgul Akgol, ‘The Male Body at War: The Classifying, Screening and Searching of Masculine and Healthy Canadian Soldiers during the Second World War’ (2011)

Charles Mackenzie, ‘”Our part to play’: Machine Gun Fund‑Raising in Sydney, Nova Scotia, during the First World War’ (2010)

Steve Marti, ‘Forged by Wire: The Creation of Canadian Identity during the Great War’ (2010)

Sarah Shore, ‘The First World War, The Times, and the Role of Women’ (2010)

Jessica Hanbidge, ‘The Greatest Women of Their Time: Symbolic and Realistic Representations of Women in Canadian Wartime Visual Popular Culture’ (2009)

Molly MacDonald, ‘Staking a Claim for Canada: Identity Building and the Legacy of the Klondike Gold Rush’ (2007)

Anne Millar, ‘The University of Western Ontario in the First World War’ (2007)

Helmi Trotter, ‘Dogs and the Evolution of a Consumer Culture’ (2007)

Allan O’Hagan, ‘Roland Arthur Allbutt: One Man’s War’ (2006)

Jane Whalen, ‘Memory and the Marketplace: De‑Historicizing the Hudson’s Bay Company in the 21st Century’ (2006)

Select Publications

Books

(2019) The True Story of the Great Escape: Stalag Luft III, March 1944. Yorkshire, England: Greenhill Books.
(2018) A Township at War. Waterloo: Wilfrid Laurier University Press.

(2015) The Great War: From Memory to History. Waterloo: Wilfrid Laurier University Press.

(2011) Maple Leaf Empire: Canada, Britain and Two World Wars. Don Mills, ON: Oxford University Press.

(2009) Bamboo Cage: The P.O.W. Diary of Flight Lieutenant Robert Wyse, 1942-1943. Fredericton, NB: New Brunswick Military History Project / Goose Lane Editions.

(2009) A History of Canadian Culture. Oxford University Press.

(2008) Unlikely Soldiers: How Two Canadians Fought the Secret War Against Nazi Occupation. Toronto: HarperCollins.

(2006) Building Canada: People and Projects that Shaped the Nation. Toronto: Penguin Canada.

(2006) Encyclopedia of Prisoners of War and Internment (editor), Second ed. Millerton, NY: Grey House Publishing.

(2003) A Gallant Company: The True Story of "The Great Escape". Third ed., New York: Simon and Schuster/iBooks.

(2002) High Flight: Aviation and the Canadian Imagination. Toronto: Penguin Canada

(1997) Death So Noble: Memory, Meaning and the First World War. Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press.

(1994) Objects of Concern: Canadian Prisoners of War through the 20th Century. Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press.

Book Chapters

(2024) ‘The Korean War’s Prisoners,’ in Canada and the Korean War: Histories and Legacies of a Cold War Conflict, ed. Andrew Burtch and Tim Cook (Vancouver: UBC Press, 2024): 213-33.
(2021) ‘”When told to advance, they advanced”: War Culture and the CEF,’ in Portraits of Battle: Courage, Grief, and Strength in Canada’s Great War, ed. Peter Farrugia and Evan Habkirk (Vancouver: UBC Press, 2021): 45-62.
(2020) ‘”Our Gallant Employees”: Corporate Commemoration in Postwar Canada,’ in Canada 1919: A Nation Shaped by War, ed. Tim Cook and J.L. Granatstein (Vancouver: UBC Press, 2020): 278-90.
(2017) ‘"Some Great Crisis of Storm and Stress": L.M. Montgomery, Canadian Literature, and the Great War,’ in L.M. Montgomery and War, ed. Andrea McKenzie and Jane Ledwell (Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2017): 41-55.
(2015) ‘A Moment’s Perfection,’ in Amanda Betts, ed., In Flanders Fields, 100 Years: Writing on War, Loss and Remembrance (Toronto, ON: Knopf Canada): 189-205.

(2014) ‘Bill Karn’s War,’ in Mark Reid, ed., Canada’s Great War Album: Our Memories of the First World War (Toronto, ON: Harper Collins): 173-179.

(2012) ‘An Open Door to a Better Future: The Memory of Canada’s Second World War,’ in Geoffrey Hayes, Mike Bechthold, and Matt Symes, eds., Canada and the Second World War: Essays in Honour of Terry Copp (Waterloo, ON: Wilfrid Laurier University Press): 461-477.

(2007) ‘Battle Verse: Poetry and Nationalism After Vimy Ridge,’ in Geoffrey Hayes, Andrew Iarocci, and Mike Bechthold, eds., Vimy Ridge: A Canadian Reassessment (Waterloo, ON: Wilfrid Laurier University Press): 265-277.

(2005) "Documents in Stone and Bronze: Monuments and Memorials as Historical Sources," in Jeff Keshen and Sylvie Perrier, eds. Building New Bridges / Bâtir de nouveaux ponts: Sources, Methods, and Interdisciplinarity / Sources, méthodes et interdisciplinarité (Ottawa: University of Ottawa Press): 185-195.

(2005) "Remembering Armageddon," in David MacKenzie, ed., Canada and the First World War: Essays in Honour of Robert Craig Brown (Toronto: University of Toronto Press): 409-433.

Awards and Distinctions

2025 - Distinguished Alumni Award for Arts, McMaster University
2019 - Floyd S. Chalmers Award for Ontario History
for his book A Township at War
2019 - Charles P. Stacey Prize, Canadian Committee for the History of the Second World War
for his book A Township at War
2012 - Distinguished University Professor
2010 - Lela Common Award Winner, Canadian Authors Association
for his book A History of Canadian Culture

2000-10 - Canada Research Chair in Conflict and Culture

2008 - Elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada
2003 - Premier’s Research Excellence Award
1997 - Charles P. Stacey Prize, Canadian Committee for the History of the Second World War
1997 - J.W. Dafoe Foundation Book Prize
1997 - Sir John A. Macdonald Prize, Canadian Historical Association
for his book Death So Noble: Memory, Meaning and the First World War.