A Short History of Canada

by MORTON, DESMOND

• ISBN13: 9780771064807
• ISBN10: 0771064802
• Edition: 6th
• Format: Trade Paper
• Copyright: 2006-06-20
• Publisher: McClelland & Stewart

Summary

Most of us know bits and pieces of our history but would like to be more sure of how it all fits together. The trick is to find a history that is so absorbing you will want to read it from beginning to end. With this book, Desmond Morton, one of Canada's most noted and highly respected historians, shows how the choices we can make at the dawn of the 21st century have been shaped by history. Morton is keenly aware of the links connecting our present, our past, and our future, and in one compact and engrossing volume he pulls off the remarkable feat of bringing it all together from the First Nations before the arrival of the Europeans to the failure of the Charlottetown accord and Jean Chretien's third term as prime minister. His acute observations on the Diefenbaker era, the effects of the post-war influx of immigrants, the flag debate, the baby boom, the Trudeau years and the constitutional crisis, the Quebec referendum, and the rise of the Canadian Alliance all provide an invaluable background to understanding the way Canada works today. From the Trade Paperback edition.

Author Biography

A professor emeritus of history from the University of Toronto, Desmond Morton was also founding director of McGill’s Institute for the Study of Canada. He is the author of forty books on Canadian history, a lecturer at the Canadian Forces Staff College, and a frequent media commentator. He lives in Montreal.

Table of Contents

Preface	v
PART I DIFFERENT HISTORIES
1. New Nation	2	(10)
2. First Nations	12	(5)
3. Cartier's Quebec	17	(16)
4. English Canadians	33	(14)
5. United Canadas	47	(15)
6. Lower Provinces	62	(12)
7. The Great Northwest	74	(14)
PART II A MARI USQUE AD MARE
1. Confederation	88	(11)
2. Nation-building	99	(15)
3. National Policy	114	(13)
4. Political Revolution	127	(17)
PART III "THE CENTURY OF CANADA"
1. Flourishing	144	(15)
2. Questioning	159	(16)
3. National Crisis	175	(16)
4. Dead Ends	191	(18)
5. The Depression	209	(19)
PART IV MIDDLE AGE, MIDDLE POWER
1. Mr. King's War	228	(18)
2. Prosperity	246	(20)
3. Recession	266	(16)
4. Confusion	282	(16)
PART V A COUNTRY SHARED
1. Liberation	298	(19)
2. Affirmation	317	(17)
3. Individualism	334	(12)
4. Paying the Price	346	(24)
5. New Choices	370	(20)
Index	390