National Network for Equitable Library Service

There is increasing pressure on university scholars to reach beyond the “ivory tower” and engage in collaborative research with communities. But what exactly is community-based participatory research (CBPR) and what does engagement look like? This book presents stories about CBPR from Manitoba Research Alliance projects in marginalized communities. Bringing together experienced researchers with new scholars and community practitioners, the stories describe the impetus for the projects, how they came to be implemented, and how CBPR is still being used within the community.

Drawing on the insights of Indigenous feminist legal theory, Emily Snyder examines representations of Cree law and gender in books, videos, graphic novels, educational websites, online lectures, and a video game. Although these resources promote the revitalization of Cree law and the principle of miyo-wîcêhtowin (good relations), Snyder argues that they do not capture the complexities of gendered power relations.

In this first-ever international history of the influential feminist movement Wages for Housework, Louise Toupin draws on extensive archival research and interviews with the movement’s founders and activists from Italy, England, Germany, Switzerland, the United States, and Canada. Featuring previously unpublished conversations with Silvia Federici and Mariarosa Dalla Costa, the book highlights the power and originality of the movement, detailing its theoretical and organizational innovations around the unrecognized forms of labour performed largely by women.

As a national network of roads and hostels spread across Canada, so did the practice of hitchhiking. Thumbing a Ride examines its rise and fall in the 1970s, drawing on records from the time. Many equated adventure travel with freedom and independence, but a counter-narrative emerged of girls gone missing and other dangers. Town councillors, community groups, and motorists demanded a clampdown on a transient youth movement they believed was spreading anti-establishment nomadism.

Too often Indigenous peoples have been portrayed as being without a future, destined either to disappear or assimilate into settler society. This book asserts quite the opposite: Indigenous peoples are not in any sense “out of time” in our contemporary world. Shaping the Future on Haida Gwaii shows how Indigenous peoples in Canada not only continue to have a future, but are at work building many different futures – for themselves and for their non-Indigenous neighbours.

What has it meant to be a man in Canada? Percy Nobbs, architect, fisherman, fencer; Andy Paull, residential school survivor and athlete; Yves Charbonneau, jazz musician and commune member; “James,” black and gay in postwar Windsor. Who were these men, and how did they identify as masculine? Populated with figures both well known and unknown, Making Men, Making History reveals the dissonance between ideals of manhood and masculinity and the everyday lives of Canadian men and boys.

What’s the right way to be a feminist? Reconsidering Radical Feminism is not only a clear, precise summary of late-twentieth-century feminist debates about the politics of heterosexuality. It’s also an examination of how we become invested in arguments that position us as particular kinds of feminists – and as gendered subjects. Through the lens of poststructuralism, queer theory, and affect theory, Jessica Joy Cameron investigates the legacy of the passionate dispute between radical feminism and sex-positive feminism.

The transfer of knowledge is a key issue in the North as Indigenous peoples meet the ongoing need to adapt to cultural and environmental change. In eight essays, experts survey critical issues surrounding the knowledge practices of the Inuit of northern Canada and Greenland and the Northern Sámi of Scandinavia, and the difficulties of transferring that knowledge from one generation to the next.

In 2013, a violent crime left Jane Harris seriously injured and tumbling down the social ladder toward homelessness -- for the second time in her life -- leading her to question the underlying conditions that could allow this to happen in a country like Canada. Finding Home in the Promised Land is the result of her harrowing journey through the wilderness of social exile. Her Scottish great-great-grandmother Barbara's portrait opens the door into pre-Confederation Canada; Harris's own story lights our journey through 21st-century Canada.

Being a feminist can mean different things to different people, but one thing it always includes is the belief in equality and human rights. Whether you are talking with one close friend or hanging out with a group of classmates, it matters what you say and how you say it. Not everyone is going to agree with your opinions, especially when you are talking about social justice issues. Can Your Conversations Change the World? provides insight into the origins and history of feminism, how it plays out on the global stage and what it means to be a young feminist and activist today.