VIDEO: University Indigenization & Studying Indigenous Residential Schools

I urge you not to miss viewing the May 5, 2023 YouTube webinar linked to below produced by History Reclaimed, “an independent group of scholars with a wide range of opinions on many subjects, but with the shared conviction that history requires careful interpretation of complex evidence, and should not be a vehicle for facile propaganda.“

Its mission statement states:

The abuse of history for political purposes is as old as history itself.  In recent years, we have seen campaigns to rewrite the history of several democratic nations in a way that undermines their solidarity as communities, their sense of achievement, even their very legitimacy.

These ‘culture wars’, pursued in the media, in public spaces, in museums, universities, schools, civil services, local government, business corporations and even churches, are particularly virulent in North America, Australasia and the United Kingdom.  Activists assert that ‘facing up’ to a past presented as overwhelmingly and permanently shameful and guilt-laden is the way to a better and fairer future.  We see no evidence that this is true.  On the contrary, tendentious and even blatantly false readings of history are creating or aggravating divisions, resentments, and even violence.  We do not take the view that our histories are uniformly praiseworthy—that would be absurd.  But we reject as equally absurd the claim that they are essentially shameful.

We agree that history consists of many opinions and many voices.  But this does not mean that all opinions are valid, and certainly none should be imposed as a new orthodoxy.  We intend to challenge distortions of history, and to provide context, explanation and balance in a debate in which dogmatism is too often preferred to analysis, and condemnation to understanding.

If “the Frances Widdowson affair,” as many are calling her firing in late 2021 from her tenured position at Mount Royal University in Calgary, Alberta, had preceded the writing of this mission statement, any impartial and thoughtful person reading it would have concluded that it was written with Widdowson in mind.

More information about the Frances Widdowson affair can be found here: https://duckduckgo.com/?q=frances+widdowson&t=newext&atb=v322-1&ia=web

Widdowson was interviewed by History Reclaimed Executive Editor, Lawrence Goldman, an emeritus fellow of St. Peter’s College, Oxford where taught British and American History in Oxford for three decades.

The following chart is an outline of her presentation.

To experience this terrific interview, simply jump over the paywall to become one of mu hundreds of paid subscribers.