NiCHE New Scholars 2018/2019

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Welcome to the beginning of a new and exciting year for the NiCHE New Scholars Committee! I am your incoming New Scholars representative and am thoroughly looking forward to leading us in some great discussions about all things environmental history.

I am a postdoctoral fellow with the L.R. Wilson Institute for Canadian History working on a project questioning whether the rise of an international trophy hunting industry in the Yukon influenced Yukon conservation and wildlife management regulations in the early 20th century. My doctoral dissertation examined the environmental impacts of gold mining in the Yukon from 1880 to 1940. As a born and bred Cape Bretoner, I grew up around resource industries, particularly mining and fishing, and surrounded by the toxic legacy of steel making – the Sydney Tar Ponds. This has greatly shaped my interest in the history of resource development and conflict and the varied and complex relationships humans have with the rest of the natural world. Aside from my Wilson project, I am also a 2018/2019 Fulbright Scholar, which means I will be spending some of the year in the U.S. and am excited to expand my knowledge on transnational elements of environmental history.

For those who are new to NiCHE New Scholars, we are a network of early career scholars (graduate students, recent grads, and postdoctoral fellows) who share an interest in environmental history as it connects to Canada in some capacity. Our goal is to facilitate interaction between early scholars who are otherwise separated by geographical, national, and institutional barriers. To accomplish this, we meet several times throughout the academic year via Google Hangouts to discuss many topics that are relevant to our shared field.

New Scholars is not limited to historians – if you are in a different discipline but have an interest in the topic you are welcome to participate. I encourage all those interested in environmental history who are in the early stages of their academic careers to join some of our conversations and take advantage of this great community.

As I begin a new project, I want to use our meetings to challenge myself and extend my knowledge of the field, so I hope to discuss some topics that are fairly new to me. Some of these include environmental/eco-tourism, animal history, and environmental history and health. While I have ideas on what topics may make for excellent discussions, but I am happy to take suggestions from you. If you would like to discuss a specific topic, a book or an article that has influenced your research, or would like to lead a discussion, feel free to connect with me!

Aside from discussions, I hope to use the New Scholars group this year as a way for us to support each other as a scholarly community, including sharing resources, exchanging writing for feedback, and arranging a meet up at ASEH.

I look forward to connecting with the amazing community of New Scholars this year! If you would like to be added to the New Scholars list, you can reach me at greenh1@mcmaster.ca.

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Heather Green

Heather Green is an assistant professor in the Department of History at Saint Mary's University. She is interested in the intersections of environmental and Indigenous histories, histories of Indigenous and Settler Relations, and mining history, particularly in the Canadian North. You can connect with her on twitter @heathergreen21.

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