On War & Society

Christopher Nolan’s film Dunkirk hit theatres this past summer. It was met with critical acclaim and made hundreds of millions of dollars at the box office. It is arguably one of the greatest war films Hollywood has ever produced and certainly gave its viewers an authentic portrayal of the Battle of Dunkirk from the air, the water and the beach in the spring of 1940. It was a film that as Terry Copp explains “makes your blood boil.” But what we learn from Dunkirk is more raw emotion, fear and suspense of being a soldier, a pilot or a civilian crew member sailing the waters of the British channel. What the viewers do not get from the film is the broader history of the Second World War. What led these British troops to the beaches of Dunkirk? What role did the Royal Navy or the Royal Air Force play in the battle? Where were the French? Terry Copp, an eminent military historian in Canada, has been researching the Second World War for decades and has some insight into what exactly constitutes this broader histori

The Battle of Vimy Ridge was fought in April 1917 during the First World War. Four divisions of the Canadian Expeditionary Force attacked the German stronghold of Hill 145 on the morning of 9 April, and three days later, had successfully pushed the German army off of the ridge. Since those cold and wet April days one hundred years ago, Vimy has for many Canadians emerged as a symbol of Canadian nationhood. Ian McKay and Jamie Swift last year published The Vimy Trap: Or, How We Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Great War. Its exploration of the “childish irrationalism” of ‘Vimyism,” has been met with much praise; one recent view maintains that the Vimy Trap is a “necessary book.” But not all the reviews have been positive. Dr. Geoffrey Hayes of the University of Waterloo has concerns with the book’s arguments and approach. References Fussell, Paul. The Great War and Modern Memory. Oxford University Press, 1975. Mckay, Ian and Jamie Swift. The Vimy Trap: Or, How We Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Grea

Dr. Matthew Wiseman just finished his Ph.D. on Canadian science during the early Cold War. And he is a bit concerned about the developing nuclear crisis between the United States and North Korea, as many of us are too. President Donald Trump’s fiery rhetoric has agitated Kim Jong Un and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea to the point where they are threatening to bomb Guam, an unincorporated territory of the United States. Matthew explains how Canada has responded to nuclear crises in the past, and how it might maneuver in this current, heated climate.  The Cold War was a pivotal event in the twentieth century, and Matthew tells us how Canada was ‘pulled’ into it following the Second World War. Although pursuing independent and separate agendas, Canada, the United States and Great Britain all looked to the Arctic as a ‘mutual interest point’ when preparing for a potential northern attack from the Soviet Union. For Canada, the Defence Research Board established a facility at Churchill, Manitoba, and beg

Who is Wilfrid Laurier University’s Cleghorn Fellow in War and Society? Mary Chaktsiris dropped by the studio this month to talk about her new position, teaching in a different environment, and her research into Toronto and the Great War. Mary became the Cleghorn Fellow in 2016, following a two-year stint at the Council of Ontario Universities. Teaching four classes at a new university this past year, Mary still finds that community-building is one of the most important parts of being a professor wherever one may be. Focusing on Toronto during the Great War-period in her dissertation, Mary insists that gender is a key component of understanding Torontonians’ responses to the war effort. In doing so, her short but stellar publishing career has been marked by challenging or as she puts it, “complicating” the literature on the First World War. Certainly, patriotism and pro-war sentiment existed in Toronto, but so did the voices of ambivalence. As she moves on as a scholar in history, Mary is now looking into the

What happened to Montreal during the Great War? For the past three years, distinguished military historian Terry Copp has been researching Canada’s metropolis––Montreal––from 1914 to 1918. In our conversation, Terry discusses the various social, religious and political cleavages within the city beyond the divide between English and French-speaking populations. Although the war intensified many of these cleavages and sewed deep divisions between communities residing within Montreal, Terry is hesitant to argue that the war fundamentally changed the city. Manuscripts published in university presses are the ‘gold standard’ for those working in the field of history, but Terry has decided not to pursue his project on Montreal in traditional manuscript form. He and a student-research assistant have been creating a website for his project, which will allow him the freedom to include (and exclude) short vignettes, stories, maps and databases, which would be nearly impossible to do in a manuscript. It has given him the

Eric Story sits down with Dr. Alex Souchen, a post-doctoral fellow at the Laurier Centre for Military Strategic and Disarmament Studies in Waterloo, ON, to discuss his research on munitions dumping in Canada during the 1940s. Alex helps explain the destructive environmental legacies of munitions dumping in Canada and around the world, and speaks about the growing scientific debate surrounding these legacies. Where does the historian fit in these discussions? In a small role, perhaps, says Alex, but an essential one if we are to understand the ecological impacts of munitions dumping.  Towards the end of the conversation, Alex provides some helpful advice for soon-to-be graduating PhDs about how to market yourself as you enter the workforce and the difficult transition from academics to a profession outside of the field of history.  Music credits: Lee Rosevere