Learning to question and wonder about the world around you.
Historians have always engaged with the question, "What is history?" If you ask different scholars, you'll get different answers. Some grapple with the question from a philosophical perspective, while others focus on its applicational value in the field.
Is history a time? An event? A theory?
While you can fall down a rabbit hole of trying to create your own definition of 'history,' what I've found myself questioning most isn't what is history, but where is history. Where can I find history in my life? Where can I see it impacting my present? Where is it active, influential, and buried?
From the brickwork on a building to the bones of its structure— from the curve of a street corner that hasn't changed in a century to the trees that have witnessed generations go by—history is everywhere.
If you were to stand right in the middle of Toronto's Yonge-Dundas intersection— right on the street— sure, the skyscrapers are new, we've repaved the roads, and the city only built Sankofa Square (formerly Yonge-Dundas Square) in 2002. But if you stand on that road and look towards Queen St, you're standing on Canada's longest street, running for 56km, where horse-drawn carriages were once pulled. You're standing where the first cars were driven in the city. You're standing where the first streetcars and public buses ran. To your right is the entrance to Canada's first subway line, the Yonge Line. You're on the border of what used to be St. John's Ward, an arrival immigrant community that used to be located between Queen, University, College, and Yonge streets from the mid-1800s until the early 1900s.
History doesn't just linger in our street corners, the roads, our buildings, and communities. It's a force that shapes our cities like Toronto. But if we continue to be passive toward our history, who will remember it? If we don't question where history is, will we ever notice it? History is not just a passive observer; it's a transformative agent in our lives.
Over the next twelve months, this site will publish short articles written by our newest generation of female historians. They will not just make you question what you know about history; they will help reshape it. They will make you think about where history belongs in our modern conversations. The articles will cover various topics, geographical locations, and time periods. They will engage with history as it relates to our present, questioning things like movies, AI, museum ethics, and material culture. Hopefully, as you follow along every month, the next time you stop to look around yourself, watch the news, or see a movie, you'll question where you can find the history behind everything. Because once you start to look closely enough, you'll never stop seeing how history shapes our everyday lives.
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