Margery Fee as McLean Chair in Canadian Studies 2015-2017

We are proud to congratulate our editor, Margery Fee, on becoming the 2015-2017 Brenda and David McLean Chair in Canadian Studies.

Fee is the second Canadian Literature editor to be appointed this distinguished position after W. H. New. As Chair, she will be teaching the Senior Seminar and giving the McLean Lectures in Canadian Studies, which will be compiled and published by UBC Press.

From the press release:

In the McLean Lectures, Professor Fee will outline the history of Indigenous texts in the Canadian northwest and model ways to read them. Since the 1990s, literary works by Indigenous writers have been brought into the curriculum. However, oral and written works from earlier periods are rarely included. Instructors are concerned about how to teach these works while respecting their difference. To teach oral stories requires knowledge of national cultural protocols, languages, histories, and worldviews. Prominent early Indigenous written genres—such as life stories, political commentary, and ethnography—require ways of reading that differ from those typically used to analyze the preferred European genres of poetry, fiction, and drama.

Margery Fee’s research in Canadian literary criticism and bibliography, Indigenous literatures and cultures, and Canadian English has provided valuable insights and unique perspectives to the study of literature and nationalism. Her work has been recognized by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC), the Canada Council, and many other awards and distinctions over the course of her career. On top of being a distinguished Canadianist, Fee is also an active UBC faculty member, having served as Associate Dean of Students (1999-2004), Director of Arts One (2005-2008), and Director of Canadian Studies (2005-2008). Since becoming the editor of Canadian Literature eight years ago, Fee has used her expertise to direct over twenty-two issues and counting, including the following special issues:

Once again, congratulations to our wonderful editor and we look forward to her work as the McLean Chair in Canadian Studies.