World War I and Canadian Unity

Paper Summary:

This paper examines how World War I involved a shared experience capable of galvanizing a Canadian unified identity. The paper describes accounts of nurses, gunners and others, who served in Europe and explains that Canadian achievements abroad were a source of particular pride. Finally, the paper tells of Canadian veterans, who have remained a generation remembered in many Canadian family stories as well as in Europe, and describes Canada's pride in its reputation as a country of military knowledge.

Table of Contents:
Introduction
Canadian Participation
World War I as Remembered
Wars and Identity
Something to be Forgotten
Conclusion

From the Paper:

"Anthony Smith is a sociologist of the London School of Economics who is devoted to the study of nationalism and ethno-nationalism. He has long stressed the role of warfare and its experiences in forging cohesive identities. (1981) The experiences of war have a way of forging distinct groups whose self-images are made different from others, often in a cohesion not there before, or not in the same way. Jonathan Vance Reading commented on the lasting memory of the Great War that affected perhaps every Canadian family, and certainly, every community, an understanding of the horrors of the trenches of World War I part of national consciousness as much as awareness of what Canadians had achieved. (1997) If one is Canadian or feels a strong connection to Canadians or their sufferings in the World Wars, one may be surprised by one's reaction to signs of something Canadian that is not properly recognized. For instance, when preparing an assignment that addressed Major John McCrae MD (1872-1918) and his poem In Flanders Field, for a different university course, it was intriguing to discover a personal reaction of anger at a poem sometimes claimed by the British and Americans, a short reference made to 'a Canadian doctor'. His poem, now memorized by generations of Canadian school children and a strong symbol of the Canadians in World War II and the veterans of both World Wars 'feels' Canadian and he was not a mere doctor but a remarkable man."

Sample of Sources Used:

• Adams, Annmarie. "Borrowed Buildings - Canada's Temporary Hospitals during World War I." Canadian Bulletin of Medical History. 16. (1999): 25-48.
• Batten, Sonia. "Forgetting the First World War." Journal of the Centre for First World War Studies. 2. (2005): 44-65.
• Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. (2006). The First World War - Canada Remembers. CBC Archives retrieved from CBC.ca in March 2007.
• Carter, R. "John McCrae (1872-1918) - Doctor Soldier-Poet." Annals of Thoracic Surgery. 63. (1997): 264-268.
• Cook, Timothy. No Place to Run - the Canadian Corps and Gas Warfare in the First World War. Toronto and Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 1999.

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