Canadian literary and cultural studies
Our group builds upon a strong commitment to the literary historical study of Canada through the lens of canonical and non-canonical texts, including traditional genres of poetry and fiction as well as explorer narratives, travel literature, intellectual essays, and works of literary criticism. At the same time, our individual research interests often branch out from the literary to critically engage with the ways "Canada" is refracted through cultural and social texts, practices, performances, and theory, across a range of (neo)colonial times and spaces.
We have a particular interest in representations of the natural world and in contemporary debates that have shifted the premises of national literature (multicultural, aboriginal, working-class); authors of interest to us include Charles G.D. Roberts, Sara Jeannette Duncan, Emily Carr, Al Purdy, Bill Gaston, Beatrice Culleton Monsionor, Robert Bringhurst, and Don McKay.
Current research projects
Current projects by members of the Canadian Literary and Cultural Studies research group include:
- An exploration of the way the concept of a "forest fetish" illuminates the contingency of Canada upon arboreal figures and flesh;
- An analysis of cultural performances of ecological citizenship;
- A study of the mobilization of the canoe in discourses of English-Canadian nationalism;
- A collection of essays on hockey culture and hockey literature;
- A study of representations of aboriginal women and the law;
- Theorizing the reading practices of settler colonial ecocriticism.