UC Programs - Canadian Studies

Welcome to the Canadian Studies Program at the University College at the University of Toronto St. George!

Canadian Studies program offers opportunities to study contemporary Canada in an interdisciplinary manner to explore cultural, social, economical and political developments in this complex and diverse country. Students are encouraged to consider additional courses in Indigenous Studies in completing the Program requirements. 

The Minor in Asian Canadian Studies focuses on community-engaged learning that explores how to understand the historical, social, cultural, economic, and political forces that affect people of Asian heritage in Canada. Our interdisciplinary courses connect students with local communities, and every course provides opportunities for students to pursue a choice of research interests. Together we critically investigate and add to knowledge about Asian Canadians. A new special topics course, CDN305S Chinese Canadian Communities and Oral Histories will give students the opportunity to receive training in oral history theory, methods and practice, community-based research, archival preservation and digitization, as well as collections and exhibitions methods and practice, engaging with Chinese Canadian communities.  

The Certificate in Black Canadian Studies will provide students with an opportunity to study and research the social construction of race in Canada, with a focus on Black Canada and Black Canadians, past and present. This will include attending to structural and systemic discrimination in areas including politics, judicial systems, and the arts, as well as considering counter-narratives and forms of resistance and empowerment enacted by Black Canadian communities. This certificate also offers a specialization that considers the historical roots and contemporary implications of anti-Black racism, as well as movements that are building towards social equity, and future imaginings. While this certificate addresses local and national contexts, it also situates diasporic and transnational frameworks for understanding Blackness in Canada. As a result, the certificate also examines a comparative approach to meaning-making and belonging in solidarity with other forms of racism and oppression.