Parkdale’s Mad History: Back Wards to Back Streets
Don't miss the final talk in this year’s History Matters series. It takes place Thursday, November 4 at the Parkdale Branch, 7 pm. Megan Davies and David Reville present “Locating Parkdale’s Mad History: Back Wards to Back Streets, 1980-2010,″ an exploration of the impact of deinstitutionalization in Parkdale.
Megan Davies is principal investigator for a Canadian Institutes for Health Research funded project on the history of deinstitutionalization in Canada, the U.S. and Britain. David Reville was Toronto city councillor (1980-1985) and an MPP (1985-1990). He teaches, among other things, “A History of Madness” and “Mad Peoples’ History” at Ryerson.
The previous talk, “Keeping the City Clean: Portuguese Women in Toronto’s Cleaning Industry” by Susana Miranda was a fascinating and at times moving look at the labour struggles of the Portuguese women who cleaned the skyscrapers that formed the city’s skyline in the 1970s and 1980s. Miranda’s talk—available on the Active History website—is based on research for her PhD dissertation, completed earlier this year. Read her essay, "Portuguese Women's Activism in Toronto's Building Cleaning Industry, 1975-1986,” in The Portuguese in Canada: Diasporic Challenges and Adjustment, available in several TPL branches.
The History Matters series is part of the library's Thought Exchange, a collection of eclectic lectures designed to spark discussion and debate. The History Matters talks are an opportunity for the public to connect with Toronto historians. These lively talks (with plenty of discussion showcase current research on Toronto’s past and allowing the public to discover some of the surprising ways history matters to everyone in this city.
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