The innovative work of four Trent University researchers recently received a $500,000 funding infusion, thanks to Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC).

Drs. James Conolly, Jennine Hurl-Eamon, Winnie Lem, and Lisa Janz were recently awarded grants for their individual research projects – ranging from investigations into the influence the environment has on the development of human diets, and a study into the role children and families have played historically in military planning, to understanding the immigrant experience in an age of mobility.

Dr. James Conolly, professor in the department of Anthropology, received a $196,644 Insight Grant for his research project, “Human-environmental relationships in late hunter-gather and early farming societies in the Kawartha Lakes, 4500 to 500 BP.” Professor Conolly’s project aims to further academic understanding of the relationship between hunter-fisher-forager and early farmer land use and structure in the Kawartha Lakes region. His research seeks to affect change in local social planning, regional archaeological protection policies, and increase the control First Nations communities have over the management of their buried heritage. This project will also offer opportunities for five Archaeology or Environmental Science graduate students and up to 60 undergraduates at Trent to gain hands-on experience in the field or laboratory.

Dr. Jennine Hurl-Eamon, a professor of History, will use her $44,974 Insight Grant to create a monograph on the interactions between children and the British army between 1756 and 1815. Professor Hurl-Eamon’s project, titled “Childhood in the Wars of the Long Eighteenth Century,” highlights the agency that children had during this period and the family undercurrents present in between the horrors of war. Her project will contribute to the history of parenthood and build an understanding of the role children played in shaping political and military events. The grant will also support plans to employ a student that would aid in the development of educational programming for Parks Canada’s historical military sites.

International Development Studies professor, Dr. Winnie Lem’s $205,726 Insight Grant supports her for her project “Migrants into Citizens: Formations of Belonging in an Age of Mobility.” Professor Lem’s research focuses on how East Asian and South American transnational migrants develop a sense of belonging in Europe as governing forces emphasis political reform and economic restructuring. By questioning the relationship between migrant livelihood practices and encounters with citizenship making agendas, Prof. Lem is inquiring into the characteristics of the norms and values that are invoked in the activities and programmes offered through supranational, national, and local organizations that intervene in the lives of migrants and the process of migration.

Finally, Dr. Lisa Janz, also of the Anthropology department, was awarded a $70,590 Insight Development Grant for her project, “Diet Breadth and Landscape Ecology in Arid Northeast Asia.” Through collaboration with leading Canadian, American, and Mongolian researchers, Professor Janz’ research will work to address three primary objectives: testing the hypothesis that specific environmental changes parallel the diet breadth expansion; furthering the establishment of strategies for large-scale surveying and excavation in the riverine-steppe environment; and pinpointing the earliest evidence for the practice of herding.