Matter Of Course: Trump, Trudeau, Trees, Trade and Other Stuff
History course takes students behind current headlines
HIST-3170H: Trump, Trudeau, Trees, Trade and Other Stuff: Contemporary Canada and the United States
Dr. Dimitry Anastakis
As a Canadian historian who believes history is “centrally important to our understanding of current events,” one Trent history professor is viewing his mission to improve students’ historical literacy as more important than ever.
“We will be susceptible to the worst types of misinformation and manipulation if we don’t know our history,” warns Dr. Dimitry Anastakis, whose course Trump, Trudeau, Trees, Trade and Other Stuff: Contemporary Canada and the United States helps students “wade through the data fog” to understand the broader meaning behind dizzying, and often complicated, current events affecting the two countries.
“This is not just a course on Trump or Trudeau or current issues. It is a way to talk about some broader themes in Canadian history, U.S. history and our shared history,” Professor Anastakis explains. “What we are doing is trying to get behind the headlines so we can understand how and why these issues emerged over time and how history can help us better understand the truly confusing, confounding and interesting events we now face.”
Prof. Anastakis, an author whose research interests include 20th century Canadian and U.S. economic and political history, says his course emerged from students’ interest in events on both sides of the border. In November 2016, joined by several fourth year students, he watched the televised U.S. presidential election results at a pub.
“They and I were shocked by the result, and how the system seemed so contradictory with his (Trump’s) massive popular vote loss,” recalls Prof. Anastakis. “The students couldn’t really understand how this happened and what it all meant. Similarly, students asked about Justin Trudeau, who seems to have a special bond with younger people, and how his journey to power happened. The issues that these two men represented, in terms of matters related to trade, pipelines, culture and a host of other things, really got me thinking about how to develop a course that allowed students to understand how these things came to be.”