rethinkingthecanadianarchipelago.docVIP

Rethinking the Canadian Archipelago: Research Trajectories in Region, Identity, and Diversity in Canada Dr. Andrew Nurse Department of History and Canadian Studies 63D York St. Mount Allison University Sackville, NBE4L 1G9 anurse@mta.ca Regionalism occupies a prominent position in both scholarship about and public discourse on Canadian diversity. It is a perennial Canadian concern, the focus of extensive political, historical, and political-economic analysis. Scholarship on regionalism in Canada has also changed markedly over the last generation. The historical focus on regions as relatively homogenous entities has been in part replaced by a more nuanced scholarship focusing on diversity within regions. The result is a dualistic approach to regionalist scholarship. A deep and rich scholarship on diversity and difference within regions has been created along side a similarly rich scholarship on diversity between regions within Canada. Intersections of identity within regions, their meanings, and implications, however, remain unclear and frequently unspecified. How have Canadian studies of regionalism addressed issues of diversity within regions? Do different identity “markers” intersect differently in different regions of Canada? Does region constitute an identity unto itself, sufficient for political or policy mobilization? How do regional cultures develop and change over time? What affect does immigration have on regionalism? The objective of this paper is to examine these questions with specific reference to current scholarship on regionalism in Canada. This paper examines the ways in which Canadian scholars have examined the intersections of identity on a regional level in Canada. It begins by first examining current analytic frameworks used to understand identities, including regionalism, in Canada. Next, it examines general frameworks of regional analysis in Canadian scholarship, paying particular attention to how Canadian scholars have co