On October 14th, 2025, friends, faculty, students, and alumni of the Canadian Studies program gathered to commemorate fifty years of leading critical scholarship on the study of Canada at the 2025 Mel Watkins Lecture.
“In the first five decades when our program began here at U of T, Canadian Studies has played an essential role in helping all of us to try to understand — and to question — the very idea of Canada,” said program director Dimitry Anastakis during the evening’s introductory remarks. “Colleagues who founded and launched the program were all tremendously active and engaged scholars who put U of T at the heart of conversations about Canada as a nation-state, and in its historical, material, political, and cultural contexts.”
The 50th anniversary lecture was named after Professor Mel Watkins, one of the founders of the Canadian Studies program in 1975.
Watkins was one of Canada’s foremost progressive public intellectuals. He was a proponent of Canadian economic sovereignty and co-author of the famous 1968 Watkins Report. He also worked as a financial advisor to the Dene Nation (formerly the Indian Brotherhood of the North West Territories) as part of the Mackenzie Valley Pipeline Inquiry led by Justice Thomas R. Berger, which began a life of activism in support of Indigenous self-determination.
“Mel was a formidable figure, not just in academia, but in Canadian society. He thought it was a scandal that U of T didn’t have a Canadian Studies program for undergraduates,” recounted Rick Salutin, a Canadian writer and critic who has taught in the program since its inception.
“He asked me to lunch and said they were starting this program — an introductory course in two halves. He was going to teach the first half on history and economics and they wanted a second half on culture — and they would like to have someone with actual experience who was working in the field, and not just an academic.”
“I thought it would be like anything else,” said Salutin, “maybe a year, maybe two years, and it’s been almost fifty.”
Fifty years later, the Canadian Studies program continues to flourish, with over 950 students enrolled in its courses last year. Class sizes remain small, to allow for constructive dialogue with peers. Applying learned knowledge and making community connections beyond the classroom has remained a cornerstone of the program, as diverse guest speakers are often invited to share their expertise in class. Program students are also able to participate in the Canadian Studies Student Union (CANSSU) and have the opportunity to present and publish their research in the ImagiNATIONS undergraduate journal and at an annual undergraduate conference.
The program is recognized for its interdisciplinary approach, diverse methodologies and innovative curriculum. It was the first in Canada to house an Asian Canadian Studies program, which has since been spearheaded by the Richard Charles Lee Chair in Chinese Canadian Studies. This was followed by the launch of a Certificate in Black Canadian Studies in 2021.
The Mel Watkins 50th Anniversary Lecture was delivered by celebrated poet-scholar Rita Wong, whose work addresses questions of ecology, climate justice and decolonization.
At the reception following the lecture, stories and reflections of Canadian Studies program alumni were on display, highlighting the program’s collective legacy.
“The fact that the program was so interdisciplinary had an amazing positive impact on my life,” wrote a former Canadian Studies student who is now an associate professor in geography and planning. “It allowed me to learn about the same place from a variety of perspectives such as wilderness to urban areas, from how free trade was shaping the economy to the cultural and historical discourses that shaped Canadian identity. That type of perspective has been extremely valuable, whether thinking about Canada, in specific, or how societies function in general.”
Other students attended the program to help contextualize their experiences and transition to a new life in Canada.
“As a newcomer, this program was also my pathway to better integrate into Canadian society,” a former student wrote, “Canadian Studies has helped me become more thoughtful and intentional about how we, as individuals and as a society, can contribute to building a better Canada every day.”
Canadian Studies has helped me become more thoughtful and intentional about how we, as individuals and as a society, can contribute to building a better Canada every day.
Indeed, many of the guests in attendance spent their careers contributing to improving Canadian life, such as former Canadian Senator and U of T chancellor Vivienne Poy and the Right Honourable Adrienne Clarkson, the former Governor General of Canada. Celebrated Canadian writer and philosopher John Ralston Saul was also in attendance, alongside Dene Nation leader and former Premiere of the North West Territories Stephen Kakfwi.