National Network for Equitable Library Service

In Phoenix: The Life of Norman Bethune Roderick and Sharon Stewart provide the intriguing details of Bethune's controversial career as a surgeon, his turbulent personal life, his passionate crusade to eradicate tuberculosis, and his pioneering commitment to the establishment of medicare in Canada.

Norman Bethune (1890-1939) was a man who had everything, and yet had nothing. Although he had achieved international prominence as a surgeon, he was unhappy in his personal life and deeply frustrated by a failed attempt to introduce medicare to Canada. An uncompromising humanitarian in search of a cause, Bethune became immersed in the Spanish Civil War. In Bethune in Spain, Roderick Stewart and Jesús Majada recount Bethune's achievements in Spain and the events that led to his decision to assist the Loyalist forces.

Between 1867 and 2000, the Canadian government sent over 150,000 Aboriginal children to residential schools across the country. Government officials and missionaries agreed that in order to “civilize and Christianize” Aboriginal children, it was necessary to separate them from their parents and their home communities. For children, life in these schools was lonely and alien. Discipline was harsh, and daily life was highly regimented. Aboriginal languages and cultures were denigrated and suppressed.

What does it mean to become a man in the Arctic today? Becoming Inummarik focuses on the lives of the first generation of men born and raised primarily in permanent settlements. Forced to balance the difficulties of schooling, jobs, and money that are a part of village life with the conflicting demands of older generations and subsistence hunting, these men struggle to chart their life course and become inummariit - genuine people. Peter Collings presents an accessible, intelligent, humorous, and sensitive account of Inuit men who are no longer youths, but not yet elders.

The Arctic is ruled by ice. For Inuit, it is a highway, a hunting ground, and the platform on which life is lived. While the international community argues about sovereignty, security, and resource development at the top of the world, the Inuit remind us that they are the original inhabitants of this magnificent place - and that it is undergoing a dangerous transformation. The Arctic ice is melting at an alarming rate and Inuit have become the direct witnesses and messengers of climate change.

The Fighting Newfoundlander is a vivid history of the Royal Newfoundland Regiment - the "Blue Puttees" - and its heroic contributions to the war effort. Gerald Nicholson details the harrowing experiences of the Newfoundland Regiment (the only Canadian unit) at Gallipoli and later at Beaumont Hamel where 710 of the 801 officers and men who took part in the assault were casualties. He also follows them to the Third Battle of Ypres and Cambrai, for which they were granted the title "Royal" - the only army unit to receive such a distinction during World War I.

David Thompson's Travels is one of the finest early expressions of the Canadian experience. The work is not only the account of a remarkable life in the fur trade but an extended meditation on the land and Native peoples of western North America. The tale spans the years 1784 to 1807 and extends from the Great Lakes to the Rockies, from Athabasca to Missouri. A distinguished literary work, the Travels alternates between the expository prose of the scientist and the vivid language of the storyteller, animated throughout by a restless spirit of inquiry and sense of wonder.

An exciting Canadian collection of feminist articles that provide cutting-edge gender analysis for understanding diverse personal and political challenges and opportunities in our fast-changing global world. Canadian and international authors offer varied social justice, anti-racist, Indigenous, and subsistence perspectives on environmental, social, cultural, and political issues in women’s local and global struggles and visions for another world.

At Odds in the World: Essays on Jewish Canadian Women Writers brings together a series of essays by Ruth Panofsky that probe the articulation of Jewishness and femaleness through the lens of literature. Showing how female Jewish identity is constructed in Canadian prose works that span the years 1956 to 2004, collectively the essays speak to the writers’ preoccupation with cultural identity and unearth a literary portrait of how it feels to be Jewish, Canadian, and female in a world, both new and old, that often is hostile and unaccommodating.

Theorizing Empowerment: Canadian Perspectives on Black Feminist Thought is a collection of articles by Black Canadian feminists centralizing the ways in which Black femininity and Black women’s experiences are integral to understanding political and social frameworks in Canada. What does Black feminist thought mean to Black Canadian feminists in the Diaspora? What does it means to have a feminist practice which speaks to Black women in Canada?