Christopher Dummitt

Office: Champlain College S401
Phone: (705) 748-1011 ext. 7224
Email: cdummitt@trentu.ca
Website: www.christopherdummitt.com 

On Sabbatical 2021-22

I am a professor of Canadian history and I specialize in Canadian political, cultural and intellectual history with a growing side interest in research methods and issues of academic freedom.  

Most recently I have become absorbed in the world of 19th century Canadian political history. I am the creator and host of a Canadian history podcast  1867 & All That. The podcast is a narrative account of Canada from the 1830s to the 1880s.  I teach three courses built around the different seasons of the podcast.  

I also write on 20th century Canadian political history, including in two recent books.  No Place for the State (2020)  is an edited collection on the criminal code changes made by the Pierre Trudeau government in 1969. My 2017 book Unbuttoned: A History of Mackenzie King’s Secret Life was a finalist for several national awards including the Shaughnessy Cohen Prize as best book on Canadian politics from the Writers’ Trust. I am currently preparing a biography of the final years of Mackenzie King’s life, from 1939 until 1950. 

I also continue to take an interest in cultural history and the shifting ideas of morality and what it has meant to be “good” or “evil.” You can find this work in my articles on the history of Canada’s least well-remembered most famous author Ralph Connor, and in my article in No Place for the State suggesting that the omnibus changes in the 1960s represented a new morality of the self. I teach two courses on these themes - a third year course called Everyday History and an honours seminar called The History of the Self. 

More recently I have begun research into issues of viewpoint diversity and academic freedom in Canada. I am a member of Heterodox Academy and with HxA funding I conducted a national survey of Canadian professors (and a sample of the general public) to determine their view on the role of academics in contemporary Canada. Along with Zachary Patterson I appeared before the Quebec government’s Cloutier Commission in 2021 to promote firm protections of academic freedom. I continue to write on this topic in various public venues including the National Post, The Hub and elsewhere. In 2021 I helped lead a campaign that called out the way the Canadian Historical Association was threatening academic freedom in this country with its statements on the history of genocide in Canada.  

And perhaps somewhat out of the blue - I recently wrote a booklet history of tennis in Peterborough Ontario to mark the 100th anniversary of the Quaker Park Tennis Club in 2022 (to be published with the Peterborough Historical Society). 

For more on my work see www.christopherdummitt.com 

Some recent academic publications: 

Books:  

with Christabelle Sethna eds., No Place for the State: The 1969 Omnibus Bill and the Bedrooms of the Nation (Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 2020). 

Unbuttoned: A History of Mackenzie King’s Secret Life (Montreal & Kingston: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2017). 

• Finalist for Canada Prize, Federation for the Humanities and Social Sciences 
• Finalist for the Shaughnessy Cohen Prize for best book on Canadian Politics, Writers Trust 
• Finalist for the J W Dafoe Book Prize 

with Michael Dawson eds, Contesting Clio’s Craft: New Directions and Debates in Canadian History (London: Institute for the Study of the Americas Press, 2009). 

The Manly Modern: Masculinity in the Postwar Years (Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 2007). 

Refereed articles: 

“Because it is 1969: The Omnibus Bill and a New Canadian Morality” in Christopher Dummitt and Christabelle Sethna eds, No Place for the State: The 1969 Omnibus Bill and the Bedrooms of the Nation (Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 2020). 

“Je me souviens too: Eugene Forsey and the Inclusiveness of 1950s British Canadianism,” Canadian Historical Review 100 (September 2019): 374–397. 

 ‘‘The ‘Taint of Self’: Reflections on Ralph Connor, his fans, and the problem of morality in recent Canadian historiography’ Histoire Sociale/ Social History Vol XLVI, No 91 (May 2013): 63-90. [shortlisted for best article of 2013 in journal]