Throughout this week, we discussed the topic of “Canada and Modernity” in the turn of the twentieth century. Within this topic, we examined many aspects which included; industry, technology, and consumerism in different articles. In Donica Belisle’s article “Toward a Canadian Consumer History”, she focuses on the ideas of consumerism, consumption, consume, and being a consumer and how these terms evolved over the years. These ideas “in turn were related to state expansion, industrialization, urbanization, democratization, and immigration”[1]. Belisle starts by defining “consume”; in 1382 it “referred to destruction”, in 1460 it “described the acquisition, use, and destruction of material goods”, “in the late 17^th century, the link between ‘consume’ and objects became explicit, and political economists began to use the word ‘consumption’ to discuss the ‘utilization of the products of industry’”. However, “by the early 20^th century, ‘consume’ signified an entire sphere of economic activity”[2]. In addition to Belisle’s article, Miriam Wright’s article “Young Men and Technology: Government Attempts to Create a ‘Modern’ Fisheries Workforce in Newfoundland, 1949-1970”, enforces some of the main aspects being industry and technology. Wright uses the fisheries workforce in Newfoundland to show that industry and technology advanced throughout the turn of the twentieth century by expressing that “in the years following World War II, the Newfoundland fishing economy was transformed from a predominantly inshore, household-based… enterprise into an industrialized economy”[3]. In addition to this, “both federal and provincial governments generally promoted the idea of a centralized, industrialized and ‘modernized’ fishery”[4]. Both these articles have similarities to the review on the book A Small Price to Pay: Consumer Culture on the Canadian Home Front, 1939-45 written by Dan Malleck. Malleck’s review outlines consumption in the time of World War II as being refocused[5], and there being “a fine line between encouraging consumption and discouraging needless expenses”[6] in the turn of the twentieth century. To add to this, Malleck touches on industry and how this contributes to consumption, “the interaction of private industry and public control, of personal interest and civic duty, of saving and spending”[7].

All of these articles contribute to the main topic of “Canada and Modernity” in the turn of the twentieth century. Each article has their own outlook on the ideas of industry, technology, and consumerism which helps us to better understand the Canadian past in the turn of the century, as well as, contribute to the wider historiography on this broad topic of “Canada and Modernity”.

Footnotes:

[1] Donica Belisle, “Toward a Canadian Consumer History,” Labour/Le Travail, 52 (Fall 2003): 181.

[2] Ibid., 183.

[3] Miriam Wright, “Young Men and Technology: Government Attempts to Create a ‘Modern’ Fisheries Workforce in Newfoundland, 1949-1970,” Labour/Le Travail, 43 (Fall, 1998): 144.

[4] Ibid.

[5] Dan Malleck, Review on Graham Broad’s A Small Price to Pay: Consumer Culture on the Canadian Home Front, 1939-1945, University of Toronto Quarterly, 84, 3 (2015), 190.

[6] Ibid.

[7] Ibid., 191.

Bibliography:

Belisle, Donica. “Toward a Canadian Consumer History.” Labour/Le Travail, 52 (Fall 2003): 181-206.

Malleck, Dan. Review on Graham Broad’s A Small Price to Pay: Consumer Culture on the Canadian Home Front, 1939-45. University of Toronto Quarterly, 84, 3 (2015), p. 189-191.

Wright, Miriam. “Young Men and Technology: Government Attempts to Create a ‘Modern’ Fisheries Workforce in Newfoundland, 1949-1970.” Labour/Le Travail, 43 (Fall, 1998): 143-159.