Own the Podium, Unite the Nation

In an earlier post, I talked about divisions within Canada. There are tensions between English vs French, Natives vs Europeans, and central Canada vs pretty much everyone else. That's not surprising because Canada first became a country mainly out of economic interest. Then after 1867, the central government went about acquiring new provinces with as much pomp and ceremony as a corporation purchasing subsidiaries. Unlike our neighbors to the south, we didn't begin with a great deal of national pride or defining narrative.

Fast forward to the Winter Olympic Games in Vancouver, 2010. Something happened in between 1867 and 2010 that made us into a flag-waving nation of patriots. One writer puts it this way: "Over a long period of time, shared experiences and cooperative activity of many different kinds shape a common life" (Walzer 54). I have a hunch that two shared experiences dominate our collective memory. Sadly, one of them is war -- especially the First World War. The other is Olympics.

I say Olympics because I think it's the only widely viewed forum where Canada competes as a nation. We're a far cry from victory in FIFA, and the world championships of most other sports aren't widely publicized. Do you watch rowing outside of the Olympics? How about freestyle skiing? Me neither.

But at the Olympics, we all get behind our national athletes with pride. We all share Olympic memories where Canada shone above the rest. In the lead up to Sochi, we were suddenly flooded with videos showing Canada's highlights from Vancouver. Every single medal winner deserves mention, but the top of the list must be Sidney Crosby's gold medal goal in overtime against the United States -- cue mass rejoicing and pandemonium!

At the end of the day, just look at this medal table. We are winter!

Rank	Nation	Gold	Silver	Bronze	Total
1	Canada (CAN)*	14	7	5	26
2	Germany (GER)	10	13	7	30
3	United States (USA)	9	15	13	37
4	Norway (NOR)	9	8	6	23
5	South Korea (KOR)	6	6	2	14

More important than anything, the athletes of Team Canada represent the whole nation. Athletes from the West, the Prairies, Central Canada, the Maritimes, and the North all come together in the drive for excellence -- and together, they achieve it. By the way, did you know that 19 French Canadians contributed to those 26 medals?* I'm glad that we don't have war to unite us as a nation today, and I pray that we never will again. Instead we have Team Canada in the Olympic games, the heart of our unity beating every two years.

Sources:

Team Canada: http://toomanymenonthesite.com/2014/02/08/canada-womens-hock
Walzer, Michael. Just and Unjust Wars. New York: Basic Books, 2006.
Crosby: http://www.thestarphoenix.com/sports/Sidney+Crosby+captain+Canada+Olympics/9406979/story.html
Medal Table: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2010_Winter_Olympics_medal_table
The Dufour-Lapointe sisters: http://montreal.about.com/

Canada: Nation of 3.41 People Per km2

Normally, my ESL teaching has the usual focus of courses in reading, writing, and speaking. This semester, I have the privilege of teaching a class called “Canadian Context.” I’m especially excited about this course because it lets me see Canada through the eyes of a newcomer.

Our first unit was Canadian geography. Looking over maps again made me think about how they give information at the same time that they mislead. Look again at the above map. Of course its purpose is to show provinces and capitals. But one might see this and think that the Canadian people are spread out over their provinces evenly, like butter over bread. Ontario is covered by its mustard population, a Nova Scotia by raspberry jam, and Saskatchewan/Manitoba by wasabi.

Now look at the real picture.

This is where people actually live. Wikipedia tells me that our population density is 3.41 people per km². For two years I lived in a Toronto neighborhood called St. James Town, and we had more than 20,000 people in less than one km². (In fact, St. James Town is the most densely-populated neighborhood in all of Canada, and one of the higest in North America). I’m not convinced that population density communicates any real information beyond the geographer's ability to use a calculator.

History has more examples of vast, unpopulated land claims. Take New France in the 1750s, represented by all of the shades of blue below.

Looks impressive! But even more impressive is that all of the American heartland was held by roughly 300 French soldiers, garrisoned in the forts sprinkled around the Mississippi River, and by no more than 600 voyageurs (fur traders). Historian J.L. Finlay concludes “Overall, then, fewer than 1000 persons secured a pattern of alliances that made more than half of the continent apparently loyal to France” (69).

On the British side of things, Rupert’s Land gives another example. In the 1660s, New France placed restrictions on the fur trade; the Catholic church was growing uneasy about rough young men going off into the wilderness for months at a time, having liaisons with Native women, and peddling liquor for furs. Two frustrated voyageurs, Medard Des Groseilliers and Pierre-Esprit Radisson, defected to England in 1665. They proposed to circumvent the expanding French trade by basing operations in Hudson Bay.

In 1670, at the stroke of a pen, all of the land with rivers flowing into Hudson Bay was granted to the new Hudson Bay Company. The land was named in honor of Prince Rupert, cousin of King Charles II, and one of the principal investors.

The area pictured above covers 3.9 million square kilometres. If I were to guess, its European population density would register somewhere in the neighborhood of 0.00/km². Now that would be a fair statistic.

Sources

J.L. Finlay and D.N. Sprague, The Structure of Canadian History. Scarborough: Prentice-Hall Canada Inc., 2000.

Political map of Canada: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cities_in_Canada

Population density of Canada: http://www.yellowmaps.com/map/canada-thematic-map-679.htm

Map of New France: http://gallica.bnf.fr/dossiers/html/dossiers/FranceAmerique/fr/D3/T3-a.htm

Map of Rupert’s Land: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Ruperts_land.svg