John Reid
John Reid Profile
Professor Emeritus
B.A. (Oxford), MA (Memorial), Ph.D. (U.N.B.)
john.reid@smu.ca
Phone: 902-420-5760
Gorsebrook Research Institute
5960 Inglis Street, Room 210,
John G. Reid holds degrees from Oxford University (BA), Memorial University (MA), and the University of New Brunswick (PhD). He has been a member of the History department at Saint Mary's University since 1985, and has held the rank of Professor since 1989. He is also a former Coordinator of Atlantic Canada Studies at Saint Mary’s, and is currently Senior Research Fellow at the Gorsebrook Research Institute. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, elected in 2004. Reid’s principal teaching and research interests include the history of early modern northeastern North America (focusing especially on imperial-Indigenous relations), the history of Atlantic Canada, the history of higher education, and the history of sport. He has published books and articles in these areas, as well as writing two historical novels for teenage readers and two plays for radio. Reid has served on the Council of the Canadian Historical Association and on the editorial board of the Canadian Historical Review. A current board member of three historical journals, in 2015 he completed a six-year term as Co-editor of Acadiensis: Journal of the History of the Atlantic Region. With Peter L. Twohig, he is also founding Co-editor of the University of Toronto Press monograph series on the History of Atlantic Canada. Among other international activities, in 2008 he held the Shastri Indo-Canadian Institute (SICI) Visiting Lectureship in India. Subsequently appointed as the Saint Mary’s representative to the Canadian Member Council of SICI, he became the organization’s Vice-President/President Elect in 2018.
Teaching
Courses currently and recently offered include:
ACST/HIST 2341- History of the Atlantic Provinces, to Confederation
ACST/HIST 2342 - History of the Atlantic Provinces, from Confederation
ACST/HIST 2471 - History of Football
ACST/HIST 2472 - History of Hockey
ACST/HIST 4527 - Biography and History
ACST/HIST 6661 - Reappraisals of Atlantic Canada’s Past
Recent Publications
“The Cricketers of Digby and Yarmouth Counties, Nova Scotia, 1871-1914: Social Roots of a Village and Small-Town Sport.” Histoire sociale/Social History, 51:103 (May 2018), 47-73.
“Scots, Settler Colonization, and Indigenous Displacement: Mi’kma’ki, 1770-1820, in Comparative Context.” Journal of Scottish Historical Studies, 38.1 (May 2018), 178–196.
Clio’s Lives: Biographies and Autobiographies of Historians. Co-edited with Doug Munro. Canberra: ANU Press, 2017.
“Imperial Women: Collective Biography, Gender, and Yale-trained Historians.” In Doug Munro and John G. Reid, eds., Clio’s Lives: Biographies and Autobiographies of Historians (Canberra: ANU Press, 2017), 273-99.
“Cricket, the Retired Feather Merchant, and Settler Colonialism: The Troubled Halifax Sojourn of A.H. Leighton, 1912.” Acadiensis, 46:1 (Winter/Spring 2017), 73-96.
“Colonies of Settlement and Settler Colonialism in Northeastern North America, 1450-1850.” In Edward Cavanagh and Lorenzo Veracini, eds., The Routledge Handbook of the History of Settler Colonialism (Abingdon: Routledge, 2017), 79-94. With Thomas Peace.
“A Conversation with Ann Moyal, Lord Beaverbrook’s Researcher.” Edited interview. Journal of New Brunswick Studies/Revue d’études sur le Nouveau-Brunswick, 7:2 (2016), 37-53.
“The Multiple Deindustrializations of Canada's Maritime Provinces and the Evaluation of Heritage-Related Urban Regeneration.” London Journal of Canadian Studies, 31:1 (October 2016), 89-112. With Jane H. Reid.
“Immigration to Atlantic Canada: Historical Reflections.” Royal Nova Scotia Historical Society Journal, 19 (2016), 38-53.
Hector Maclean: The Writings of a Loyalist-Era Military Settler in Nova Scotia. Co-edited with Jo Currie and Keith Mercer. Kentville, NS: Gaspereau Press, 2015.
“Diffusion and Discursive Stabilization: Sports Historiography and the Contrasting Fortunes of Cricket and Ice Hockey in Canada’s Maritime Provinces, 1869-1914.” Journal of Sport History, 42:1 (Spring 2015), 87-113. With Robert Reid.
“The Three Lives of Edward Cornwallis.” Royal Nova Scotia Historical Society Journal, 16 (2013), 19-45.
Britain’s Oceanic Empire: Atlantic and Indian Ocean Worlds, c.1550-1850. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012. Co-edited with H.V. Bowen and Elizabeth Mancke.
Revisiting 1759: The Conquest of Canada in Historical Perspective. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2012. Co-edited with Phillip Buckner.
Remembering 1759: The Conquest of Canada in Historical Memory. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2012. Co-edited with Phillip Buckner.
“Imperial-Aboriginal Friendship in Eighteenth-century Mi’kma’ki/Wulstukwik.” In Jerry Bannister and Liam Riordan, eds., The Loyal Atlantic: Remaking the British Atlantic in the Revolutionary Era (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2012), pp. 75-102.
Shaping an Agenda for Atlantic Canada. Halifax and Winnipeg: Fernwood Publishing, 2011. Co-edited with Donald J. Savoie.
Nova Scotia: A Pocket History. Halifax: Fernwood Publishing, 2009.
“Empire, the Maritime Colonies, and the Supplanting of Mi’kma’ki/Wulstukwik, 1780-1820.” Acadiensis, 38:2 (Summer/Autumn 2009), 78-97.
“Scots in Mi’kma’ki, 1760-1820.” The Nashwaak Review, 22-23: 1 (Spring/Summer 2009), 527-57.
“Is There a ‘Canadian’ Atlantic World?” International Journal of Maritime History, 21:1 (June 2009), 263-95. Forum co-edited with H.V. Bowen and Elizabeth Mancke.
Selected Older Publications
The People and Josh Wilson. Halifax: Fernwood Publishing, 2008.
Essays on Northeastern North America, Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2008. With contributions by Emerson W. Baker. Recipient of Clio Award, Canadian Historical Association.
“From Global Processes to Continental Strategies: The Emergence of British North America to 1783.” In Phillip Buckner, ed., Canada and the British Empire (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008), 22-42. Oxford History of the British Empire, Companion Series. Co-authored with Elizabeth Mancke.
“Écrire l'Acadie en lien avec les mondes atlantique et autochtone.” In Martin Pâquet and Stéphane Savard, eds., Balises et références: Acadies, francophonies (Québec: Les Presses de l'Université Laval, 2007), 255-70.
New England and the Maritime Provinces: Connections and Comparisons. Montreal and Kingston: McGill-Queen's University Press, 2005. Co-edited with Stephen J. Hornsby.
Viola Florence Barnes, 1885-1979: A Historian's Biography. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2005.
The ‘Conquest' of Acadia, 1710: Imperial, Colonial, and Aboriginal Constructions. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2004. Co-authored with Maurice Basque, Elizabeth Mancke, Barry Moody, Geoffrey Plank, and William C. Wicken.
“Pax Britannica or Pax Indigena? Planter Nova Scotia (1760-1782) and Competing Strategies of Pacification.” Canadian Historical Review, 85 (2004), 669-92.
“Amerindian Power in the Early Modern Northeast: A Reappraisal.” William and Mary Quarterly , 3rd series, 61 (2004), 77-106. Co-authored with Emerson W. Baker. Recipient of Harryman Dorsey Award (Society of Colonial Wars in the District of Columbia).
“The Conquest of ‘Nova Scotia': Cartographic Imperialism and the Echoes of a Scottish Past.” In Ned C. Landsman, ed., Nation and Province in the First British Empire: Scotland and the Americas, 1600-1800 (Lewisburg: Bucknell University Press; London: Associated University Presses, 2001), 39-59.
“Sir William Phips and the De-Centring of Empire in Northeastern North America, 1690-1694.” With Emerson W. Baker. In Germaine Warkentin and Carolyn Podruchny, eds., Decentring the Renaissance: Canada and Europe in Multidisciplinary Perspective, 1500-1700 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2001), 287-302. Co-authored with Emerson W. Baker.
The New England Knight: Sir William Phips, 1651-1695. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1998. Co-authored with Emerson W. Baker. Recipient of Keith Matthews Prize (Canadian Nautical Research Society).
The Atlantic Region to Confederation: A History. Toronto and Fredericton: University of Toronto Press and Acadiensis Press, 1994. Co-edited with Phillip A. Buckner. Recipient of Regional History Certificate of Merit (Canadian Historical Association).
“New Evidence on New Scotland, 1629.” William and Mary Quarterly, 3rd series, 49 (1992), 492-508. Co-authored with N.E.S. Griffiths.
Youth, University, and Canadian Society: Essays in the Social History of Higher Education. Kingston and Montreal: McGill-Queen's University Press, 1989. Co-edited with Paul Axelrod. Recipient of Founder's Prize (Canadian History of Education Association).
Six Crucial Decades: Times of Change in the History of the Maritimes. Halifax: Nimbus Publishing, 1987.
Mount Allison University: A History. 2 vols. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1984.
Acadia, Maine, and New Scotland: Marginal Colonies in the Seventeenth Century. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1981. Recipient of Sainte-Marie Prize in History (Province of Ontario, Huronia Historical Parks) and Gilbert Chinard Prize (Institut Français de Washington and the Society for French Historical Studies).
Maine, Charles II, and Massachusetts: Governmental Relationships in Early Northern New England. Portland: Maine Historical Society, 1977.
Current Research
History of Cricket in Nova Scotia, to 1914.
See also: Dr. John Reid