Narrating a Nation: Canadian History Pre-Confederation

Narrating a Nation: Canadian History Pre-Confederation is a lively, narrative approach to pre-confederation history. Events are followed chronologically, focusing on a story developing over time. The chronological approach allows students to makes sense of our history, and grounds their knowledge of the past in a clear political context. The focus on key events allows readers to appreciate the social, economic, and ideological complexities and develop a sense of linkage and causality that is at the bedrock of historical understanding.

Discussion questions at the end of each chapter reinforce the reader’s understanding of the material and provide an opportunity for reflection.

Raymond B. Blake completed this book while being Chair of Canadian Studies at the University College Dublin in Dublin, Ireland. Also professor of history at Regina, he has taught Canadian Studies at Mount Allison University and was for several years the director of the Saskatchewan Institute of Public Policy. His research interests include nationalism and identity, social policy, and 20th century Canadian politics. He is the author and editor of a dozen books, including Beyond National Dreams: Essays on Canadian Nationalism, Citizenship, and Identity (with Andrew Nurse), Social Fabric or Patchwork Quilt? The Development of Social Welfare in Canada (with Jeffrey Keshen), From Rights to Needs: A History of Family Allowances in Canada, 1929-92, and Canadians at Last: Canada Integrates Newfoundland as a Province.

Norman Knowles is a professor of history at St. Mary's University College and holds an adjunct appointment in the Department of History at the University of Calgary. He has written or edited half a dozen books and more than a dozen articles or book chapters on nineteenth and early twentieth-century Canadian social, cultural and religious history. His works include Seeds Scattered and Sown: Studies in the History of Canadian Anglicanism and Inventing the Loyalists: The Ontario Loyalist Tradition and the Creation of Usable Pasts. He currently serves on the editorial board of the Journal of the Canadian Church Historical Society.

Barbara Messamore teaches Canadian history at University of the Fraser Valley in Abbotsford, British Columbia. She completed her PhD at the University of Edinburgh in 2003, and is the author of Canada's Governors General, 1847-1878: Biography and Constitutional Evolution. She has published a number of articles on related topics, edited Canadian Migration Patterns from Britain and North America, and is co-founder and editor-in-chief of the Journal of Historical Biography.

Jeffrey Keshen, a professor of history at the University of Ottawa, specializes in post-Confederation Canadian political, social and military history. Jeff has written or edited a dozen books on modern Canadian history, including Saints, Sinners, and Soldiers: Canada’s Second World War (translated as Saints, Salauds et Soldats: Le Canada et la Deuxième Guerre mondaile), and Propaganda and Censorship during Canada’s Great War.