Webinar: Woven Together, New Iceland in Canada: 150th Anniversary Reflections

We are posting information about this webinar that is being hosted by the Icelandic Ambassador to Canada. 

In 1875, Canada established a reserve for Icelandic immigrants on the shores of Lake Winnipeg that the Icelanders called Nýja Ísland (New Iceland). As Parks Canada notes on a historic monument in Gimli, Manitoba, “New Iceland represents a distinctive episode in the early settlement of the Canadian West.” Timed to coincide with the 150th anniversary of the founding of New Iceland, this webinar offers fresh insights into Icelandic emigration to Canada in the 1870s. In addition to exploring the push and pull factors that led to the foundation of Nýja Ísland on the Western shores of Lake Winnipeg, the webinar also addresses the Icelandic emigrants’ relations with Indigenous peoples, an important area of new historical research.

This event is the latest in an ongoing series of webinars organized by the embassies of Canada in Reykjavík and Iceland in Ottawa. In addition to our main speakers, the webinar will also include remarks by Canada’s Ambassador to Iceland, Jenny Hill, and Iceland’s Ambassador to Canada, Hlynur Guðjónsson.

Agenda

11:30: Welcome

• Ambassador Hlynur Guðjónsson, Embassy of Iceland in Ottawa

11:30-12:05: The Icelandic Emigration and New Iceland

• The Icelandic Emigration to the Americas 1860-1914 From an International Perspective: Dr. Ólöf Garðarsdóttir, Professor in Social History, Dean of School, School of Humanities, University of Iceland

• New Iceland in Canada: 150th Anniversary Reflections: Dr. Ryan Eyford, Associate Professor, Department of History, The University of Winnipeg

12:05-12:30: Discussion and Q&A

12:30: Closing Remarks

• Ambassador Jenny Hill, Embassy of Canada in Iceland

Dr. Ólöf Garðarsdóttir is a Professor in Social History and the Dean of School of School of Humanities at the University of Iceland. Her main research focus has been in the field of demographics and family history. Dr. Garðarsdóttir is a widely published author on migration, fertility, the history of health and public health, with emphasis on infant health, but as well on childhood and the history of education.

Dr. Ryan Eyford is an associate professor in the Department of History at the University of Winnipeg. He is the author of White Settler Reserve: New Iceland and the Colonization of the Canadian West (UBC Press, 2016).