Public Lecture: American Civil Wars: Canadian Dimensions

The UMass / Five College Graduate Program in History 2025 Distinguished Annual Lecture

Source: UMass Department of History

Alan Taylor, History Writer in Residence at UMass Amherst, will present this year’s, UMass/Five College Graduate Program in History’s 2025 Distinguished Annual Lecture on Tuesday April 8, at 6:00 p.m. in the UMass Amherst Commonwealth Honors College Events Hall, 157 Commonwealth Avenue. The event is free and open to all.

The lecture, entitled American Civil Wars: Canadian Dimensions, explores the role of the American Civil War in the emergence of the Canadian nation. During the 1860s, the American Civil War rebuilt the United States, but it also accelerated the creation of Canada as another transcontinental nation in North America. American reconstruction and the Canadian emergence were closely related. For it was the fear of the growing military power and political ambitions of a triumphant United States that pushed Canadians to seek security through their own, new confederation. But to achieve that, Canadians had to overcome the invasion of Irish radicals and internal tensions between French and English speakers.

A Q&A will follow the public lecture. Books will be available to purchase, courtesy of Amherst Books.

About Alan Taylor
Alan Taylor is Professor Emeritus at the University of Virginia, where he was the Thomas Jefferson Professor of History. Taylor has published eleven books and is a two-time recipient of the Pulitzer Prize for History. Taylor is the 2025 History Writer In Residence at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. Read more

About the Writer-in-Residence Program
The Writer-In-Residence Program, is organized by the UMass/Five College Graduate Program in History. Each year, the history department brings a writer of national prominence to campus for a week-long residency. The Writer-In-Residence Program facilitates sustained conversation with widely-read authors whose historical work engages broad public audiences. Writers in Residence visit courses and seminars, meet with students and faculty over coffee, lunches, and dinners, and deliver a public lecture

About The Distinguished Annual Lecture
The Department of History’s Distinguished Annual Lecture celebrates the 1996 establishment of the UMass/Five College Graduate Program in History, and has featured addresses by the nation’s most preeminent historians. It is presented by the UMass/Five College Graduate Program in History with support from the UMass Amherst History Department and Five Colleges, Inc.