Geoffrey Reaume, professor in York’s graduate critical disability studies program, is hosting a talk on Nov. 10 by historian Nicholas Clarke.
The talk, which takes place from 11:30am to 12:30pm in Vari Hall 1156, is open to all of the York community and is free of charge.
Clarke is an assistant historian at the Canadian War Museum and will speak the day before Remembrance Day on his new book Unwanted Warriors : The Rejected Volunteers of the Canadian Expeditionary Force. (UBC Press, 2015)
Unwanted Warriors uncovers the history of Canada’s first casualties of the Great War – men who tried to enlist but were deemed ‘unfit for service.’ What impact did military exclusion have on these men? Clarke looks for answers in the service files of 3,400 rejected volunteers and explores the mechanics of the medical examination, the physical and psychological qualities that the authorities believed made a fighting man, and how evaluations changed as the war dragged on. In the process, he exposes the deleterious effects that socially constructed norms about health and fitness had on individual men and Canadian society during the First World War.
For more on this event, visit www.yorku.ca/yuevents/index.asp?Event=37382.