Canadian Studies

Noted historian Pierre Anctil takes a deep dive into editorials devoted to Jews and Judaism in Quebec's daily Le Devoir in the first half of the twentieth century. Long one of the most discussed historiographical issues in Canadian Jewish history, these editorials are of great significance as they are representative of the reaction of the nationalist Francophone elite to the Jewish presence in Montreal, to German Nazi State anti-Semitism and to the Shoah. Pierre Anctil proposes a new reading of the editorials published in the pages of Le Devoir from 1910 to 1947-from the founding of the newspaper by Henri Bourassa until the death of its second director, Georges Pelletier. During that time, some two hundred editorials were devoted to Jews and Judaism, of which Anctil has selected sixty for inclusion in this volume. Although many of the editorials conveyed the clearly anti-Semitic views of Le Devoir's editorialists and of Quebec society at large, a number of the editorials did express positive views of Jewish activities and accomplishments in Quebec society. Readers will find this to be an in-depth analysis and nuanced treatment of an important aspect of Canadian Jewish history. This book is published in English, translated from the original "À chacun ses juifs".

Who are, au féminin, the legends who shaped radio in Canada? What did they contribute locally, regionally, and nationally? How was their experience in radio broadcasting different from that of their male counterparts? Women in Radio presents the women who built careers in the radio industry-yet whose contribution has often been overlooked simply because they were women. This collection of stories highlights the multi-faceted contributions they made to their field and explores issues specific to them. Academic research, interviews, personal reflections and accounts, historical reviews, and hybrid texts combine neatly in this eclectic yet well—researched edited volume to reflect the fast-paced world of radio broadcasting. Whether through storytelling, direct quotes, or quasi transcriptions best read aloud, the reader will come away with a real sense of the aural nature of radio, of the voice unaccompanied, of the pure spoken word and how it differs from the printed word.

Based on original historical tables, Northern Ontario in Historical Statistics, 1871–2021 offers an overview of major long-term population, social composition, employment, and urban concentration trends over 150 years in the region now called "Northern Ontario" (or "Nord de l'Ontario"). David Leadbeater and his collaborators compare Northern Ontario relative to Southern Ontario, as well as detail changes at the district and local levels. They also examine the employment population rate, unemployment, economic dependency, and income distribution, particularly over recent decades of decline since the 1970s. Although deeply experienced by Indigenous peoples, the settler-colonial structure of Northern Ontario's development plays little explicit analytical role in official government discussions and policy. Northern Ontario in Historical Statistics, 1871–2021, therefore, aims to provide context for the long-standing hinterland colonial question: How do ownership, control, and use of the land and its resources benefit the people who live there? Leadbeater and his collaborators pay special attention to foundational conditions in Northern Ontario's hinterland-colonial development including Indigenous relative to settler populations, treaty and reserve areas, and provincially controlled "unorganized territories." Colonial biases in Canadian censuses are discussed critically as a contribution towards decolonizing changes in official statistics. This study aims to provide an overview of major population, employment, social composition, and urban concentration trends since 1871 in the region now called "Northern Ontario" (or "Nord de l'Ontario" or "Ontario-Nord"). The study pays special attention to the pattern of decline in population and employment that has been occurring in the last several decades not only in aggregate, but also at the district and community levels. The study raises some structural issues of economic development underlying the labour market and distributional disparities described as well as discusses certain measurement issues particularly related to economic dependency.[A1] More detailed analysis of the economic conditions of decline is beyond the present task. Nor is the study focused on immediate policy issues but rather on contributing to a deeper empirical basis for policy discussion. To heighten the importance of the larger trends treated here for policy, the study will refer to some aspects of current dominant policy thinking, such as in the Province's Growth Plan for Northern Ontario (2011) and some publications of the provincially funded Northern Policy Institute. The early development of Northern Ontario occurred in the context of a vast Canadian colonial expansion in territory and settlement westward and northward, particularly following Canadian transcontinental railway development from the 1880s. As established at Confederation (1867), the then province of Ontario occupied a smaller territory of about 263, 000 km2 above the St Lawrence River and Lakes Ontario, Erie, Huron, and Superior (Map 1). But by 1912, when Ontario's boundaries reached their current limits, the province had more than tripled its size to over 900, 000 km2, most being through colonial expansion into Northern Ontario. This territorial and settlement expansion was based mainly in southern Ontario and grew out of its earlier colonization. Northern Ontario came to cover approximately 87 percent of the land area of Ontario (Table 2 data). Typical of settler colonial place-naming patterns, the area was also called "New Ontario" (or "Nouvel-Ontario") . This study uses the term "Northern Ontario" (or "Nord de l'Ontario") reflecting more contemporary common terms. The process of defining the region of Northern Ontario has been a matter of contention. For purposes of the present study, we need to address particularly the issue of the southeastern boundary, w

In this volume are gathered articles published by Yolande Cohen and her team, offering for the first time a global perspective on Moroccan Jews' post-colonial migrations to France and Canada. Having herself migrated from Morocco to Montreal, Cohen is uniquely attuned to the difficulties of living through such a massive exile. Why did members of the Jewish community leave Morocco? When did this migration happen? And how can we analyze their journey? Cohen explores the many vivid memories of departures that she encountered when collecting oral histories of migrants both in France and in Quebec. She notes the deep attachment some of them have to their King and to Morocco, making this an exception in the Arab Muslim world. The main disruptive forces in the displacement of these populations were French colonialism and its emancipatory promises and Zionism, both messianic and modern. After the establishment of the State of Israel and the subsequent Israel-Arab wars, most of them joined in the mass exodus of Jews from Arab lands, leaving their countries for Israel. With the demise of the French colonial empire and the decolonization process, a minority of westernized Jews went to France and to Canada, with the help of transnational Jewish organizations. In Montreal, a city with a strong multi-ethnic Jewish community, those migrants understood the crucial aspect of French language as an essential factor of integration. Yet, analyzing their trajectories and the words they used to represent their exile, allows us to understand the underlying traumas. Why did they leave Morocco? When did this migration happen? And how can we analyze their journey? The period and context of their departure are fraught with complex issues. As colonial subjects of the French Empire, they were treated as "indigenes" in need of "regeneration." Yet if some of them believed in French emancipation, it came to a brutal end with the implementation of the Vichy regime's antisemitic laws in Morocco in 1942. With the ending of the French colonial empire and the decolonization process, Moroccan Jews' rupture with France was (almost) complete. After the establishment of the State of Israel and the subsequent Israel-Arab wars, they joined in the mass exodus of Jews from Arab lands, leaving their countries to join refugee camps in the post-Shoah resettlement of survivors in Europe. In this context, the fate of the large Moroccan-Jewish community became an object of interest for the French, Moroccan, and Israeli states, as well as international Jewish organizations (Cohen and Tortel, 2025). Canada had not yet begun to become an active player, reacting only when the federal government came under mounting pressure from the Canadian Jewish Congress to open its doors to North African Jewish refugees. Yolande Cohen (Author) Yolande Cohen is Full Professor of Contemporary History at the Université du Québec à Montréal and Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada. Knight of Quebec's Ordre national and of France's Légion d'honneur, she received an honorary doctorate from Université de Montréal and the 2024 ACFAS André-Laurendeau prize for humanities, arts and letters. In this book, the post-colonial migration of thousands of Moroccan Jews is analyzed. Based on oral histories and historical archives, these essays show the importance of colonialism and Zionism as disruptive forces that precipitated their massive exile and their settlement in France and Canada during the post-Shoah period. In a brilliant retrospective, Canadian historian Yolande Cohen revisits her life-long fascination with the mid-century resettlement of Moroccan Jews in Montreal, where they not only found refuge, but also novel expressions for their own rich heritage. Elaborated with scientific data as well as highly personal recollections, her story of the integration of African-born Jews into an unfamiliar multicultural environment is a tale of amazing adaptability on one

"With my jingle in your brain, Allow the Bridge to arch again" How are we to understand Leonard Cohen's plea? Who speaks to whom in this oeuvre spanning six decades? In search of an answer to this question this study considers the different guises or "demons" that the Canadian singer-songwriter adopts. The countless roles assumed by Cohen's personas are not some innocent game, but strategies in response to the sometimes conflicting demands of a "life in art": they serve as masks that represent the performer's face and state of mind in a heightened yet detached way. In and around the artistic work they are embodied by different guises and demons: image (the poser), artistry (the writer and singer), alienation (the stranger and the confidant), religion (the worshipper, prophet, and priest), and power (the powerful and powerless). Ultimately, Cohen's artistic practice can be read as an attempt at forging interpersonal contact. The wide international circulation of Cohen's work has resulted in a partial severing with the context of its creation. Much of it has filtered through the public image forged by the artist and his critics in concerts, interviews, and reflective texts. Less a biography than a reception study-supplemented with extensive archival research, unpublished documents, and interviews with colleagues and privileged witnesses-it sheds new light on the dynamic of a comprehensive body of work spanning a period of sixty years. This book is published in English. - Qui parle dans l'œuvre de Leonard Cohen ? En explorant les nombreuses apparences sous lesquelles Cohen se présente à son public, Francis Mus s'efforce de formuler une réponse à cette question. Les rles innombrables assumés par Cohen ne doivent pas être considérés comme un simple jeu, mais plutt comme une stratégie visant à répondre de la manière la plus efficace possible aux attentes parfois conflictuelles d'une « life in art » : ces rles font office de masques qui traduisent les expressions et l'état d'esprit de l'artiste de façon exacerbée autant que détachée. Omniprésentes dans et autour de son œuvre artistique, les thématiques fondamentales de Cohen sont parfaitement incarnées par ces différents masques ou « démons » : l'image (le poseur), la dimension artistique (le chanteur et l'écrivain), l'aliénation (l'étranger et le confident), la religion (le croyant, le prophète ou le prêtre), et le pouvoir (les puissants et les impuissants). En définitive, la pratique artistique de Cohen peut être interprétée comme une tentative d'établir des relations interpersonnelles. La vaste diffusion de l'œuvre de Cohen à l'échelle planétaire a entraîné une rupture partielle des liens qui la reliaient au contexte initial de sa création. De ce fait, la réception de cette œuvre repose largement sur l'image publique forgée par l'artiste et par ses critiques, au fil des concerts, des entrevues et des textes réflexifs. En conséquence, cette monographie n'est pas tant une biographie, mais plutt une étude de la réception critique de l'artiste et de son œuvre littéraire et musicale, complétée par des documents d'archives inédits et des témoignages recueillis auprès de collègues et de proches de Cohen. Parallèlement, l'approche thématique privilégiée dans l'ouvrage apporte un éclairage nouveau sur la dynamique de cette œuvre si vaste qui s'étend sur une période de soixante ans. Ce livre est publié en anglais.

Born in the Ukraine in 1896, and settling in Montreal in 1910, Segal became one of the first Yiddish writers in Canada. His poetry, infused with lyricism and mysticism, along with the numerous essays and articles he penned, embodied both a rich literary tradition and the modernism of his day. Pierre Anctil has written so much more than a biography. For the first time, Segal's poetic production is referenced, translated and rigorously analyzed, and includes over 100 pages of appendices, shedding light on the artistic, spiritual, cultural and historical importance of his oeuvre. By introducing the reader to the poet's work through previously unpublished translations, Anctil demonstrates that in many respects it reflects the history of the Jewish immigrants who arrived in North America from Russia, the Ukraine and Poland at the beginning of the 20th century, as well as the tragic experiences of Jewish intellectual refugees of the interwar period. This admirably written, sweeping yet subtle, work will appeal both to scholars and to a broader audience.