Despite contemporary concerns regarding the state of Canadian children's health, historians in Canada have yet to fully explore how conventional medical experts and educators thought about, and safeguarded, children's health. This paper explores the interplay between two sources of information regarding the provision of healthy children between 1900 and the end of the Second World War in the English Canadian context: curricular messages regarding health and illness aimed at public school children and the oral histories and autobiographies of adults who grew up in this period. Rather than simply juxtapose official health curriculum and lived memory, I argue that the two co-mingled to produce differing kinds of embodied knowledge aimed at the production and reproduction of hegemonic social values in the English Canadian setting. These values co-existed both harmoniously and uncomfortably, depending very much upon the priorities of, and socially constructed limitations placed upon, particular families in particular contexts.
{"title":"Between education and memory: health and childhood in English-Canada, 1900-1950.","authors":"Mona Gleason","doi":"10.7202/800503ar","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.7202/800503ar","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Despite contemporary concerns regarding the state of Canadian children's health, historians in Canada have yet to fully explore how conventional medical experts and educators thought about, and safeguarded, children's health. This paper explores the interplay between two sources of information regarding the provision of healthy children between 1900 and the end of the Second World War in the English Canadian context: curricular messages regarding health and illness aimed at public school children and the oral histories and autobiographies of adults who grew up in this period. Rather than simply juxtapose official health curriculum and lived memory, I argue that the two co-mingled to produce differing kinds of embodied knowledge aimed at the production and reproduction of hegemonic social values in the English Canadian setting. These values co-existed both harmoniously and uncomfortably, depending very much upon the priorities of, and socially constructed limitations placed upon, particular families in particular contexts.</p>","PeriodicalId":82679,"journal":{"name":"Scientia canadensis","volume":"29 1","pages":"49-72"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2006-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.7202/800503ar","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"26429871","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
The Department of Biochemistry at McGill University was inaugurated close to a century after the Medical School was founded. The roots of the Department, however, can be found at the very beginning of the Medical School in 1829. Because several of the founding faculty members of the Medical School were educated in Edinburgh, McGill's early medical program bore the imprint of the Edinburgh school--particularly in the importance placed on instruction in chemistry and on basic research. This survey of the development of a university department is structured on the succession of department chairs, and describes how the Department's scientific, pedagogical, and administrative activities were influenced by the particular abilities and dispositions of the individuals who were at the helm. It explains how the growth of external research institutes influenced the Department's evolution, and cites some of the noteworthy contributions of its members.
{"title":"A sixty-year evolution of biochemistry at McGill University.","authors":"Rose Johnstone","doi":"","DOIUrl":"","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>The Department of Biochemistry at McGill University was inaugurated close to a century after the Medical School was founded. The roots of the Department, however, can be found at the very beginning of the Medical School in 1829. Because several of the founding faculty members of the Medical School were educated in Edinburgh, McGill's early medical program bore the imprint of the Edinburgh school--particularly in the importance placed on instruction in chemistry and on basic research. This survey of the development of a university department is structured on the succession of department chairs, and describes how the Department's scientific, pedagogical, and administrative activities were influenced by the particular abilities and dispositions of the individuals who were at the helm. It explains how the growth of external research institutes influenced the Department's evolution, and cites some of the noteworthy contributions of its members.</p>","PeriodicalId":82679,"journal":{"name":"Scientia canadensis","volume":"27 ","pages":"27-84"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2003-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"25261265","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
In 1987, historian Jacques Bernier estimated that despite the publication between 1876 and 1986 of a number of prominent papers, the history of medicine and health in French Canada was still in its infancy. Since then, this particular field of study has boomed. The present article examines published studies gathered according to the various themes which have been favored from 1987 to 2002 and concern the history of medicine and health in French Canada, so as to illustrate the gains of the past sixteen years. In our conclusion, we shall discuss the advancement of the history of medicine and health in French Canada in connection with the various elements suggested by historians Ludmilla Jordonova and Thomas Brown when considering the maturity of a given field of study. We shall identify a number of factors limiting its consolidation.
{"title":"[Medicine and health in French Canada: a historiography (1987-2000)].","authors":"Guy Grenier, Marie-Josee Fleury","doi":"","DOIUrl":"","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>In 1987, historian Jacques Bernier estimated that despite the publication between 1876 and 1986 of a number of prominent papers, the history of medicine and health in French Canada was still in its infancy. Since then, this particular field of study has boomed. The present article examines published studies gathered according to the various themes which have been favored from 1987 to 2002 and concern the history of medicine and health in French Canada, so as to illustrate the gains of the past sixteen years. In our conclusion, we shall discuss the advancement of the history of medicine and health in French Canada in connection with the various elements suggested by historians Ludmilla Jordonova and Thomas Brown when considering the maturity of a given field of study. We shall identify a number of factors limiting its consolidation.</p>","PeriodicalId":82679,"journal":{"name":"Scientia canadensis","volume":"26 ","pages":"29-58"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2002-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"40845126","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Modern armies of the industrialized world operate in accordance with a doctrine, that is to say a philosophy linked to a series of procedures themselves determined by the tactical and strategic environment. These same armies, however, answer to civilian governments that do not limit their demands or instructions to the types of operations an army might list in its doctrine. For Canada's armed services, such seems to have been the case in regards to humanitarian operations which, even if they were not part of these services' operational philosophies, have nonetheless been of no little importance in the history of the air force, the navy, and the army since the end of the Second World War. This study will explore humanitarian operations from the second half of the 1940s to the formation and first missions of a unit specializing in such work in the 1990s. It will focus mainly on medical practice during these missions and attempt to determine whether medical practitioners had to change their basic approach to accomplish their tasks, or whether it sufficed to adapt procedures in accordance with the operational situation.
{"title":"No task fit for a soldier? Canadian forces medical personnel and humanitarian relief missions since the Second World War.","authors":"Bill Rawling","doi":"10.7202/800444ar","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.7202/800444ar","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Modern armies of the industrialized world operate in accordance with a doctrine, that is to say a philosophy linked to a series of procedures themselves determined by the tactical and strategic environment. These same armies, however, answer to civilian governments that do not limit their demands or instructions to the types of operations an army might list in its doctrine. For Canada's armed services, such seems to have been the case in regards to humanitarian operations which, even if they were not part of these services' operational philosophies, have nonetheless been of no little importance in the history of the air force, the navy, and the army since the end of the Second World War. This study will explore humanitarian operations from the second half of the 1940s to the formation and first missions of a unit specializing in such work in the 1990s. It will focus mainly on medical practice during these missions and attempt to determine whether medical practitioners had to change their basic approach to accomplish their tasks, or whether it sufficed to adapt procedures in accordance with the operational situation.</p>","PeriodicalId":82679,"journal":{"name":"Scientia canadensis","volume":"26 ","pages":"79-102"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2002-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.7202/800444ar","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"40845128","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
These are halcyon days for health care history in Canada. One routinely sees articles pertaining to health in leading Canadian and international history journals. The Canadian Bulletin of Medical History is a vibrant and important vehicle and there are a growing number of monographs. This essay reviews several of the maturing content areas that now characterize the writing of health history in Canada, including hospital history, nursing history, the history of mental health, and health and medicine in aboriginal settings. This essay seeks to highlight the accomplishments of the field, while reviewing some of the gaps.
{"title":"Recent writing on health care history in Canada.","authors":"Peter L Twohig","doi":"10.7202/800441ar","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.7202/800441ar","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>These are halcyon days for health care history in Canada. One routinely sees articles pertaining to health in leading Canadian and international history journals. The Canadian Bulletin of Medical History is a vibrant and important vehicle and there are a growing number of monographs. This essay reviews several of the maturing content areas that now characterize the writing of health history in Canada, including hospital history, nursing history, the history of mental health, and health and medicine in aboriginal settings. This essay seeks to highlight the accomplishments of the field, while reviewing some of the gaps.</p>","PeriodicalId":82679,"journal":{"name":"Scientia canadensis","volume":"26 ","pages":"7-28"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2002-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.7202/800441ar","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"40845124","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
The final decades of the 19th century have become known as a period of important transition in the medical world. New discoveries revolutionized the way diseases were seen and fought. Germs, not miasmas, caused disease and sanitary measures of prevention not miracle treatments controlled them. The articles in l'Union médicale du Canada, from 1872 to 1900 concerning typhoid fever reveal that doctors rapidly accepted some important innovations. However, when it came to innovations refuting their former theories or risking to jeopardize their popularity with the public, certain doctors hesitated to adopt the new theories. This study presents the coexistance of new ideas with the older ideas, which continued to be presented, sometimes years after important discoveries. This paper looks at how they were finally won over to the newer ideas.
{"title":"[Miasmas, germs and doctors: the diffusion of ancient and new ideas in the Union médicale du Canada: the case of typhoid fever (1872-1900)].","authors":"John MacFarlane","doi":"","DOIUrl":"","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>The final decades of the 19th century have become known as a period of important transition in the medical world. New discoveries revolutionized the way diseases were seen and fought. Germs, not miasmas, caused disease and sanitary measures of prevention not miracle treatments controlled them. The articles in l'Union médicale du Canada, from 1872 to 1900 concerning typhoid fever reveal that doctors rapidly accepted some important innovations. However, when it came to innovations refuting their former theories or risking to jeopardize their popularity with the public, certain doctors hesitated to adopt the new theories. This study presents the coexistance of new ideas with the older ideas, which continued to be presented, sometimes years after important discoveries. This paper looks at how they were finally won over to the newer ideas.</p>","PeriodicalId":82679,"journal":{"name":"Scientia canadensis","volume":"26 ","pages":"59-78"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2002-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"40845127","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
As insecticides were adopted by Canadian farmers and fruit-growers after 1871, the resources conferred on economic entomology by the Dominion and Ontario governments grew. In 1886, with the establishment of the Experimental Farms system, James Fletcher, the Dominion entomologist and botanist, and his colleagues inherited the task of promoting insecticides to orchardists and others. In 1898-1900, in response to the arrival in Ontario of the San Jose scale, Canada and Ontario adopted laws mandating the use of insecticides, as sprays and fumigants, in orchards and at plant quarantine stations. To meet the resulting demand for trained technicians and scientifically-minded farmers, the institutions of applied entomology federally and at the Ontario Agricultural College were further developed. In 1910, after a decade of rapid diffusion of insecticides, Parliament adopted the Destructive Insects and Pest Act, thus creating a national system of horticultural hygiene.
{"title":"\"Spray, Spray, Spray!\": insecticides and the making of applied entomology in Canada, 1871-1914.","authors":"G. Cook","doi":"10.7202/800406AR","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.7202/800406AR","url":null,"abstract":"As insecticides were adopted by Canadian farmers and fruit-growers after 1871, the resources conferred on economic entomology by the Dominion and Ontario governments grew. In 1886, with the establishment of the Experimental Farms system, James Fletcher, the Dominion entomologist and botanist, and his colleagues inherited the task of promoting insecticides to orchardists and others. In 1898-1900, in response to the arrival in Ontario of the San Jose scale, Canada and Ontario adopted laws mandating the use of insecticides, as sprays and fumigants, in orchards and at plant quarantine stations. To meet the resulting demand for trained technicians and scientifically-minded farmers, the institutions of applied entomology federally and at the Ontario Agricultural College were further developed. In 1910, after a decade of rapid diffusion of insecticides, Parliament adopted the Destructive Insects and Pest Act, thus creating a national system of horticultural hygiene.","PeriodicalId":82679,"journal":{"name":"Scientia canadensis","volume":"16 1","pages":"7-50"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1998-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"75852289","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
At the turn of the twentieth century, water pollution was the primary vector spreading waterborne disease and a public health issue. In the Great Lakes basin, unprecedentedly high mortality from typhoid fever prompted a conference of federal and provincial public health officials in 1910. Three related initiatives resulted: the provincial government amended the Public Health Act in 1912; federal legislators attempted to develop national pollution control legislation between 1912 and 1915; the International Joint Commission investigated cross boundary pollution in 1912 and recommended a convention to control it. Of the three initiatives, only the provincial Public Health Act amendments were carried to fruition. By 1915, the almost universal adoption of chlorine treatment for municipal water supplies effectively controlled waterborne disease and there was no longer a perceived need for further action.
{"title":"'A sort of destiny': the multi-jurisdictional response to sewage pollution in the Great Lakes, 1900-1930.","authors":"J. Read","doi":"10.7202/800408AR","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.7202/800408AR","url":null,"abstract":"At the turn of the twentieth century, water pollution was the primary vector spreading waterborne disease and a public health issue. In the Great Lakes basin, unprecedentedly high mortality from typhoid fever prompted a conference of federal and provincial public health officials in 1910. Three related initiatives resulted: the provincial government amended the Public Health Act in 1912; federal legislators attempted to develop national pollution control legislation between 1912 and 1915; the International Joint Commission investigated cross boundary pollution in 1912 and recommended a convention to control it. Of the three initiatives, only the provincial Public Health Act amendments were carried to fruition. By 1915, the almost universal adoption of chlorine treatment for municipal water supplies effectively controlled waterborne disease and there was no longer a perceived need for further action.","PeriodicalId":82679,"journal":{"name":"Scientia canadensis","volume":"68 1","pages":"103-29"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1998-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"81356796","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This paper is a history of the Science Academy of the Royal Society of Canada, from its foundation in 1882 until the early 1990s. The RSC has always had an honorific role, but it has sought a more substantive one in scientific publication (a role that it has largely lost to the National Research Council and to other scientific societies and journals), in educating the public, in reperesenting Canada internationally, and in undertaking scientific inquiries of public import, for example in assessing the risks associated with nuclear winter, or in the Canadian Global Change Program. Often, Fellows of the RSC have individually achieved more in science than the Society has achieved institutionally but as this narrative shows, the dynamic between science, government, the RSC, and the Canadian public, has been important in Canadian science and in Canadian history.
{"title":"The most select and the most democratic: a century of science in the Royal Society of Canada.","authors":"T. Levere","doi":"10.7202/800397AR","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.7202/800397AR","url":null,"abstract":"This paper is a history of the Science Academy of the Royal Society of Canada, from its foundation in 1882 until the early 1990s. The RSC has always had an honorific role, but it has sought a more substantive one in scientific publication (a role that it has largely lost to the National Research Council and to other scientific societies and journals), in educating the public, in reperesenting Canada internationally, and in undertaking scientific inquiries of public import, for example in assessing the risks associated with nuclear winter, or in the Canadian Global Change Program. Often, Fellows of the RSC have individually achieved more in science than the Society has achieved institutionally but as this narrative shows, the dynamic between science, government, the RSC, and the Canadian public, has been important in Canadian science and in Canadian history.","PeriodicalId":82679,"journal":{"name":"Scientia canadensis","volume":"17 1","pages":"3-99"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1996-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"84418609","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
As a number of recent studies have emphasized, it is relevant to examine official statistics not just merely to assess the accuracy of historical data, but also in their own right, as political-cognitive devices which, by providing a standard to measure things, allow for an agreement regarding their objective existence and, therefore, the possibility to act upon them. In this paper, we focus on the different manners according to which, prior to the modern census era, ages of respondence were classified. Four different models emerge from this analysis, which in each case can be related to a specific political and social context.
{"title":"Models for recording age in 1692-1851 Canada: the political-cognitive functions of census statistics.","authors":"J. Beaud, J. Prévost","doi":"10.7202/800383AR","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.7202/800383AR","url":null,"abstract":"As a number of recent studies have emphasized, it is relevant to examine official statistics not just merely to assess the accuracy of historical data, but also in their own right, as political-cognitive devices which, by providing a standard to measure things, allow for an agreement regarding their objective existence and, therefore, the possibility to act upon them. In this paper, we focus on the different manners according to which, prior to the modern census era, ages of respondence were classified. Four different models emerge from this analysis, which in each case can be related to a specific political and social context.","PeriodicalId":82679,"journal":{"name":"Scientia canadensis","volume":"118 1","pages":"136-51"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1995-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"77869372","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}