Author: Janis Thiessen

Manitoba Food History Project

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My latest SSHRC-funded research project is the Manitoba Food History Project. I’m honoured that the Oral History Centre‘s Kimberley Moore and Kent Davies are collaborators on this research. The project’s two key research questions are:

“How has food been produced, sold, and consumed in Manitoba?”

and

“How has this changed over time?”

Interested in learning more? Check out the project’s website, manitobafoodhistory.ca, where you’ll find the Food History Truck, upcoming events, and “The Pantry” (which holds Story Maps and the project’s podcast series, Preserves).

Manitoba Food History Truck.jpg
The Manitoba Food History Truck. (Photo by Kimberley Moore)

Kim’s Convenience: A Conversation with Ins Choi at the University of Winnipeg

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If you love comedy and Canadian immigrant stories, you’ve probably been watching Kim’s Convenience. This great CBC series is based on the award-winning play of the same name by Ins Choi. The play’s script was published by House of Anansi Press; reading it doesn’t do justice to the play, though, as it really comes alive through the interpretation of actor Paul Sun-Hyung Lee, who dramatizes the lead character of Mr. Kim (aka Appa) in the play and now in the TV series.

Kim's Convenience: New episodes Tuesdays
SOURCE: CBC Television.

In March 2014, when the play was being performed at Winnipeg’s Royal Manitoba Theatre Centre, Ins Choi spoke about his experience to a small audience at the University of Winnipeg.

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Interviewees wanted: Descendants of the Winnipeg General Strike

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Do you have a grandparent or other relative who was involved in the 1919 Winnipeg General Strike?

Did that person share stories with you about their experiences?

1919 Strike troops
Troops on Main Street, Winnipeg, 21 June 1919. University of Manitoba Libraries, Winnipeg Tribune Photo Collection, PC 18/7188/18-6233a-010.

Consider commemorating their participation by sharing those stories in a recorded oral history interview.

Interviews so conducted will used in teaching and research, including publications. For further details (including potential benefits and risks), contact Janis Thiessen, History Department, University of Winnipeg, ja.thiessen@uwinnipeg.ca, 204-786-9947.

1919 Strike streetcar
Winnipeg General Strike, 21 June 1919. Archives of Manitoba, Still Images Section, Foote Collection, Item no. 1696, Negative 2762.

 

 

Scarborough Fare 2016

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Scarborough Fare Logo
Conference logo by Carmen Yung.

#foodstudies2016

“Scarborough Fare: Global Foodways and Local Foods in a Transnational City” was the first joint conference of 3 major food studies organizations: the Association for the Study of Food and Society; the Agriculture, Food, and Human Values Society; the Canadian Association for Food Studies; and the Society for the Anthropology of Food and Nutrition.

The conference was held at the University of Toronto Scarborough, a fitting venue, given the presence of Culinaria on that campus. (I’ve been in awe of their “Mapping Scarborough Chinatown” digital project for some time now.)

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Necessary Idealism: A History of Westgate Mennonite Collegiate

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Mural inside Westgate’s front entrance. Photo copyright Janis Thiessen.

Manitoba Mennonites’ ethno-religious identity was transformed in the last half of the 20th century. As a school situated in the heart of the city, Westgate Mennonite Collegiate‘s history offers a unique means of exploring generational and class differences within the Mennonite community. Westgate has been a significant site of contested power and social integration: authorities (government officials, church leaders, and school administrators) struggled with others (parents, students, faculty and staff, church members, neighbourhood residents, and non-Mennonites) to (re)define Mennonitism for the post-Second World War generations.

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Not Talking Union book launch

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Hot off the press! Please join me for the launch of Not Talking Union: An Oral History of North American Mennonites and Labour.

NTU cover

The launch will take place at Winnipeg’s McNally Robinson on Wednesday, 18 May 2016 at 7 pm.

The book examines why the majority of North American Mennonites rejected labour unions in the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries.

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Not Talking Union: An Oral History of North American Mennonites and Labour

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WPA mural depicting a ’30s era lunch counter, Coit Tower, San Francisco. Photo copyright Janis Thiessen.

Not Talking Union: An Oral History of North American Mennonites and Labour is the title of my forthcoming book from McGill-Queen’s University Press.

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