McGill in History

"This is a history that responds to the expanded, decentralized nature of the twenty-first-century university. McGill is seen through the eyes of members of its multifaceted and diverse community; the traditional comprehensive, synthetic, and inevitably conformist institutional history is replaced by many snapshots, each bringing a different hue to the university experience over time. Marshalling a particularly impressive array of talented scholars across various disciplines, McGill in History opens a new and many-paned window on McGill's past." - Duncan L. McDowall, Queen's University

"McGill in History shows how the genre of university history can be recast. It presents timely understandings of McGill's intersections with African enslavement; with the use of funds deriving from Indigenous lands and supposedly held in trust; with the complex roles of wealthy benefactors; with the impingement of social tensions on contests of ideas and disciplines; with the external and internal implications of societal debates over the wartime exile of Japanese-Canadians or the Quiet Revolution; with gay organizations' insistence on inclusivity; and ultimately with matters of current global concern. This book shares with the best histories of higher education the goal of placing the university into its always-complicated societal context rather than depicting it in a kind of gloriously idealized detachment. The crucial achievement of this volume is that it has found so many thoroughly innovative ways of fulfilling that purpose." - John Reid, Saint Mary's University