The CanLit Guides 2018 Collection: Chapter Spotlight — Discovering Implicit Motivations in Canadian Literature Scholarship

“Trust Tonto” by Herb Wyile. Issue 161/162 of Canadian LiteratureCanadian Literature.

Discovering Implicit Motivations in Canadian Literature Scholarship is an essential skill for scholars in the field. In this chapter by Sarah Banting, hone your skills through hands-on practice and relevant case studies:

When your instructors guide class discussion toward particular topics, or set assignment questions that encourage you to think about particular issues, they are implicitly teaching you what is of current interest in this field. As they guide your reading and thinking, they are inviting you to join the scholarly community in its ongoing conversation about pressing topics in Canadian literature studies. This chapter similarly invites you to further understand and participate in this scholarly community by highlighting some of the most frequently recurring and characteristic motivations that inspire professional scholars to make their arguments in this field. It explores how these motivations shape the development of articles in the field. And it will invite you to consider adopting these motivations in your own essays, or to see how you may have already started adopting them—perhaps even without realizing it.

Read “Discovering Implicit Motivations in Canadian Literature Scholarship”


CanLit Guides, created and maintained by Canadian Literature, is a open-access collection of learning materials on different topics in the field of Canadian literature. The CanLit Guides 2018 Collection is the result of collaboration between experts in the field and our editorial team. The chapters here cover a range of topics, time periods, and genres, and show the dynamic ways scholars are engaging with literatures in Canada today.