Assignments must be primarily based on scholarly, peer-reviewed sources. Non-scholarly, non-peer reviewed sources (such as encyclopedias, textbooks, newspapers and most web pages) may be used only for general information and background. High-quality non-peer reviewed sources (such as websites of major museums, websites of major archives, and magazines like Canada’s History) may be cited. See the instructor for guidance.

Academic Journals

Find journal articles via journal databases. The major databases for research in history are America: History and Life (which covers the U.S. and Canada) and Historical Abstracts (which covers everything else). Note that JSTOR only covers certain journals and does not include any Canadian journals.

Your best bets are recent articles from major historical journals (major journals always have simple names like The Journal of American History) or from the following:

Journals in environmental and agricultural history:

Environmental History …………………………………….. the major journal in the field

Environment and History …………………………………. emphasis on Britain

Agricultural History …………………………………………. emphasis on North Americ

Journals in related fields or areas:

Journal of Historical Geography ………………………… major journal in this related field

Historical Geography ……………………………………….. emphasis on North America

Annals of the Association of American Geographers ….geography generally

The Canadian Geographer ……………………………….. geography of Canada

Prairie Forum ………………………………………………….. history of the Canadian Prairies

Food & Foodways …………………………………………….. the most historical of the food journals

Food, Culture, and Society ………………………………… multidisciplinary

Books

You will find many useful scholarly, peer-reviewed books in the university library on environmental, agricultural, rural and food history. For guidance, use the footnotes of assigned articles and books. Note as well the authors you are assigned to read – these are generally important scholars – and see what other published works they have that may be useful. The North Bay Public Library has a good collection of books on local history. You can also consult the catalogues of major university libraries (such as the University of Toronto Libraries); if you find material there that Nipissing does not have, you can order it through interlibrary loan.

Blogs and Other Online Sources

The Otter, the blog of the Network in Canadian History of the Environment, contains many short, informative articles that you can use to get a brief introduction to a subject, to get ideas, or to learn about new books. Active History‘s mission is to show the relevance of history to today’s issues; much of the content is Canadian. For early Canadian history see Borealis. Note that though much of the writing on these blogs is by scholars, these are not peer-reviewed sources.

The University of Calgary Press‘ Canadian History and Environment series is open-source; all the content is freely available as downloadable pdfs. The McGill-Queen’s Series on Rural, Wildland and Resources Studies is not open source but is a great place to learn about new books; the same is true of UBC Press’ Nature, History, Society series.