This syllabus outlines a history course on modern Canada from 1867 to the present. The course will place Canadian history in a global context, focusing on Canada's relations with Europe, the United States, and other parts of the world. Students will learn about key political, economic, and social developments in Canada through primary and secondary sources as well as historical thinking concepts. The syllabus provides evaluation criteria, course expectations around attendance, participation, note-taking, and respect. The content will be divided into four units covering Canadian history from Confederation to World War I, the World Wars and Depression era, the postwar period up to 1979, and current events since then.

1. S2 History/Fall 2015/ Mr. Walsh (a.k.a., David, DW)
Syllabus, Agenda, Outline, Plan = ’What We Will do and Learn’
Theme: Conceiving Canada in the Modern World
Introduction
This course places the History of Modern Canada (since 1867) in a global yet predominantly Western, especially Atlantic,
European and North American, context. The course content features some of the best primary and secondary textual,
audio, and visual sources available, as well as ‘the Big 6 Historical Thinking Concepts’- an internationally respected
framework for the study of History at the High School level and beyond. While many parts of the world will be
mentioned as they relate to Canada, during the course, usually only Canada, the United States, and Europe will be
discussed in detail. In short, while focusing on Modern Canada this course surveys histories of other parts of the World
since knowledge of the wider world-particularly of the United States and Europe but also of other parts-is necessary for
thinking about Canada.
Tips and Guidelines
• The exams, in our class, are ‘realistically utopian’: challenging and ambitious, yet doable. Enjoy your exams in
the spirit of competition, challenge, and serious fun for learning’s sake. Don’t lose too much sleep over the exams; do
be prepared to work before and during the exams.
• Our day-to-day work routines will vary, usually consisting in readings, auditions, and discussions. Ultimately, our
most important activity as a class will be asking and answering questions: i.e., thinking, so be prepared to think (and
show how you think) in class. Students will be asked to write about History in their Writing class (since they have the
same teacher for History and Writing).
• Attendance is crucial. Therefore, poor attendance will be, to some extent, punished and frowned upon. While
not every reasonable person agrees on this policy, this is your teacher’s policy- so accept it. If you miss too many
classes, take responsibility and behave accountably, or else suffer the consequences.
• Try to find a balance between taking too many notes and never taking any notes at all, keeping in mind that,
ideally, you should always be taking notes about History and about the English language, in general, and that these
‘categories’ may or may not be separated. It should not be the teacher’s job to micromanage and organize students’
notebooks (any more than it should be his job to get students to school on time in the morning or to instruct students in
personal hygiene or life management).
• During the course your teacher will give you documents. Never lose them and please don’t throw them in the
garbage!
• The teacher expects your classroom to appear relatively clean and your desk to appear relatively organized
when he comes to teach your class. Your messiness could lead to his grumpiness.
• When the teacher asks you a question, show some respect by at least trying, sometimes, to formulate some kind
of an answer. We all have bad days but this is common public decency, not just in Canada but pretty much everywhere
in the world. Your answers don’t need to be fast or long; you have the right to pass, or to say ‘I don’t know’, but,
usually, you should try to say something (unless you have a good reason not to). Remember that you don’t need to be
certain when answering questions. To the contrary, a lot of human conversation consists in speculation, intuition, and
guesswork-not certitude. Anyway, try to participate because too much non-participation may negatively impact the
classroom environment. Accept that you are a part of a team and consider how your behavior positively or negatively
impacts others.
Evaluation
Exam + Assignments (Document Analysis) + Quiz + Participation = Grade

2. Brief Contents
Unit #1: Before Canada, the Conjuncture of Confederation, the fin de siècle
-Review of key concepts, events, and developments in Western History since about 1500 AD. (Since this material is not
covered in ‘Canada: Our Century, Our Story’- the information is provided to students in class in the form of notes and
documents).
-Canada & the World in 1900, the Progressive Era, the Guilded Age, La Belle Époque, Modernism, the Age of Nationalism
& Imperialism, ‘the Social Question’, the Age of Newspapers, Robber Barons, Economic Geography, the Staples Theory,
the experience of Canada’s first peoples
-Why and What is Canada in 1867?
Readings from ‘Canada: Our Century, Our Story’ Chapters 1 and 2
-Wilfrid Laurier and some of the challenges Canada faced in the early century; Everyday popular leisure at the turn of the
century; Women’s Suffrage; Immigration; Free-Trade
Unit # 2: The Age of Extremes: the Great Wars & the Great Depression
-the Jazz Age, Poetry & WWI, Prohibition, Broadway, the world comes to America, the Group of Seven & Emily Carr,
Anti-Semitism, Social Darwinism, Eugenics, Isolationism, The Russian Revolution, Labor unrest, The failures of the Treaty
of Versailles and of the League of Nations, FDR’s New Deal, The Great Powers Conferences (Tehran, Yalta, Casablanca,
Potsdam,) William Lyon McKenzie King-Canada’s greatest Prime Minister? Canada comes of age?
-Questions about War & (geo)Politics
Readings from ‘Canada: Our Century, Our Story’ Chapters 3-7
Unit #3: ‘Les trentes glorieuses’ & the Cold War
- Decolonization (especially in Africa), the Korean War, the American Civil Rights movement, the ‘Three Worlds’, the
Sino-Soviet split (and Western misunderstandings of China), the Rights Revolution (?), the IMF, the World Bank, the
European Union, troubles in the Middle East (the OPEC crisis), Vietnam quaqmire, Consumerism & Counterculture,
Pierre Trudeau & Trudeaumania, the Quiet Revolution, Rock n’ Roll, the expansion of the Universities, the Post-Industrial
age, the labor movement, the environmental movement, Canadian Social Policies in the 1960s, the growing role of
government, Toronto becomes Canada’s first city, Is official bilingualism successful?
-Readings from ‘Canada: Our Century, Our Story’ Chapters 8-13
Unit #4: Current History (since 1979)
-the Neoconservative (or neoliberal) movement, the multiculturalism debate, Canada & Quebec redux, the
(Technological) History of the Digital Age, ‘national vs. cosmopolitan history’, Canada in the OECD, What Canadians think
today, ‘Bowling Alone’, Is Canada fulfilling its obligations to the global poor? Is Canadian democracy working well? The
end of the Laurentian thesis