Diversity In Canada Research Articles

Bioethics and end-of-life care in multi-ethnic settings: Cultural diversity in Canada and the USA

This paper addresses cultural dimensions of end-of-life care in Canada and the USA. In both countries contemporary health care providers commonly encounter patients with quite variable understandings of what constitutes compassionate end-of-life care. Participation in particular ethnic and religious groups can have a significant effect upon how patients and their families communicate with health care providers, make decisions about treatment alternatives, engage in advance care planning, and frame moral deliberations. Much of the contemporary literature in the field of bioethics emphasizes the importance of truth telling, the principle of autonomy and the significance of patient choice, the value of advance care planning, and the right to have treatment withdrawn or withheld. However, a growing body of scholarship on the cultural dimensions of end-of-life care reveals a plurality of attitudes towards what constitutes appropriate forms of communication and decision making. While there are limits to the kind of social practices and moral claims that should be accommodated in liberal democracies, health care providers should take steps to ensure that they are providing culturally sensitive end-of-life care.

Canadian art: from its beginnings to 2000

In a country that can boast over 50,000 artists from its earliest pre-history to the present, it is a daunting challenge to try and capture the richness and diversity of Canada's complex artistic heritage. In Canadian Art: From Its Beginnings to 2000 art educator Anne Newlands gives us a long overdue and extraordinarily wide-ranging survey of more than 300 Canadian artists. Integrating Euro-Canadian artists from the past and present with those of Canada's First Peoples, the book reflects the range of artistic production across the country's vast geography. While many of Canada's most beloved and familiar artists are included, Canadian Art will introduce less familiar names as well. You will find traditional oil paintings and watercolors as well as sculpture, photography and installation work. Each artist is represented by a full-colour reproduction of their work, along with a short text that explores the work's context and offers some brief comments about the artist's life. Anne Newlands is an art educator at the National Gallery of Canada. A rich A-Z history of Canadian artists...introduces the oeuvre of each artist with a concisely written critique of one major work. Long overdue, comprehensive and wide-ranging survey of 320 artists.

Labor Union Response to Diversity in Canada and the United States

Canadian and American research finds that organized labor's engagement with race, ethnicity, gender, and sexual orientation until recently has been largely exclusionist. The Canadian labor movement emerges as having been somewhat more responsive to equity issues, particularly gender and sexual orientation, and at an earlier stage than its U.S. counterpart. The American movement, however, did create limited room for African‐American issues and unionization from early this century and now shows signs of broader engagement with diversity issues in general. The literature is strong in case studies pointing to exceptional situations involving minority militancy and union acceptance and in highlighting the role of activists inside and external to the labor movement. It suffers from a lack of large‐scale analysis and comparison.

RELIGIOUS PARTICULARISM AND CULTURAL PLURALISM: THE POSSIBLE CONTRIBUTION OF RELIGIOUS EDUCATION TO CANADIAN POLITICAL IDENTITY

Multiculturalism is official Canadian policy. In the context of postmodernism, pluralism has taken on a sharper meaning, particularly with regard to identity. What can possibly unify a diverse nation like Canada? Does the separation of religion from public life make sense when cultural identity includes religious expression? Political unity, religious diversity, and the common search for and establishment of justice could become the essential building blocks toward an integral political unity. In particular, the celebration of religious diversity in Canada's schools could become a primary means of political unity as well as an essential means of unifying society. Five convictions are developed which help secure a new relationship among religious education, religious diversity, and political and societal unity.

Finding Our Way: Rethinking Ethnocultural Relations in Canada

Many people think that ethnocultural politics in Canada are spiralling out of control, with ever more groups making ever greater demands. This book offers a more balanced and optimistic picture. It argues that we have learned many important lessons about how to accommodate ethnocultural diversity, lessons which can help us tackle the challenges still facing us. The first half of the book examines the situation of ethnic groups formed by immigration to Canada. It argues that the multicultural model of integration adopted by the Canadian government in 1971 has worked much better than many people realize, and can be adapted to meet today's new challenges. Accommodating these 'nations within' is difficult, but here too we have learned a great deal about what works, and what does not. Reflecting on these lessons can help put our conflicts back into perspective. The challenges of ethnocultural diversity in Canada are real, but not insurmoutable, and we can draw upon an impressive range of experiences and resources in addressing them.

The nature of support from adult sansei (third generation) children to older nisei (second generation) parents in Japanese Canadian families.

Given the growing ethnocultural diversity of Canada's aging population and the increased research focus on the role of the family in the social support of older persons, it is important to explore the ways in which adult ethnic minority children provide assistance to older parents within the context of the family. The current study contributes to research on intergenerational support systems in later life in Japanese Canadian families by examining the factors, particularly the cultural value of oya koh koh (filial obligation), affecting the nature of support from adult children to older parents. Using data gathered from interviews with 100 older nisei (second generation) parents and 100 adult sansei (third generation) children in British Columbia, the study focuses on the frequency, quality and provision of three types of support: emotional, service, and financial. Results of logistic regression analyses indicate that oya koh koh has a significant effect on children's provision of emotional support, but no effect on financial or service support. Parent's health and socioeconomic status are found to have significant effects on children's provision of financial and service support. Child's availability is also a major determinant of financial support. Further, ordinary least squares (OLS) regression analyses results suggest that oya koh koh has a significant effect on the quality of emotional support provided by children to their parents. Findings are discussed in terms of the North American Asian "ideal" family myth and directions for future research.

Abstracts, The Canadian Phytopathological Society, annual meeting, Montreacute;al, Quebec, 1999

Abstracts, The Canadian Phytopathological Society, annual meeting, Montreacute;al, Quebec, 1999

The Impact of Climate Change on Mammal Diversity in Canada

Current large-scale mammalian diversity patterns in Canada can be accurately explained using various measurements of heat energy. Unfortunately, climatic change is predicted to alter the fundamental climatic basis for contemporary diversity gradients, with the expected consequence that much of the Canadian biota will need to migrate in order to remain within climatically suitable regions. We make predictions regarding future mammal diversity patterns in Canada, and therefore provide a preliminary indication of where management intervention should be directed in order to conserve mammal diversity as climate changes. We also examine the current distributions of individual mammal species in Canada in order to determine which taxa cannot migrate farther north because of the Arctic Ocean barrier. Of the 25 species that fall into this category, we examine the predicted loss of habitat in one keystone species – Dicrostonyx groenlandicus, the collared lemming – and find that this taxon is likely to lose approximately 60% of its habitat with unpredictable but likely detrimental consequences for the arctic biota. We discuss the implications of our findings briefly.

Self-Ingroup Relationships

The individualist and collectivist value orientations of 40 English (EC), 40 French (FC), and 36 Italian (IC) Canadian children, aged 10 to 12, were investigated relative to three themes: ideal self, self-esteem, and peer relations. The study intended to determine whether the individualist value orientations displayed in an earlier study by younger EC children were now shared by those of other ethnic groups. Although most children expressed comparable conceptions of self-esteem and self-centered projections of an ideal self, significant differences persisted, and others emerged with respect to self-ingroup relationships across ethnic and gender groups. As expected, ECs were the most individualist, ICs the most peer oriented, and FCs the most family oriented. Accentuation of gender differences was encountered, but not consistently for the three ethnic groups. Although the North American individualist value orientations of the ECs appeared to reflect egalitarian child-rearing values, the different values toward significant others of the FC and IC male and female preteenagers suggest different parental modes of gender role socialization. Results are discussed within cross-cultural perspectives on self-ingroup relationships, and the implications of the results are discussed with regard to cultural diversity in Canada.

Revision of Silesian sphenophyll biostratigraphy of Canada

Revision of the Westphalian/Stephanian (Cantabrian) sphenophylls from the Sydney Coalfield, Nova Scotia leads to the following conclusions. (1) Sphenophyll diversity in Canada is low and limited to five species, possibly nine if the doubtfully determined specimens of S. trichomatosum, S. myriophyllum, S. majus, and S. tenerrimum are counted: S. cuneifolium, S. costae emend., S. emarginatum, S. oblongifolium, and S. zwickaviense emend. (2) As illustrated by description of variability in tooth form of leaflets on the same axis of S. costae, work with fragmentary sphenophyll material is difficult and new taxa of such material are taxonomically questionable. (3) Sphenophyllum is more heterogeneous than has formerly been recognized. (4) S. costae emend. and S. zwickaviense emend. are more widely distributed than formerly presumed, adding their occurrences from the U.S.A. to the list of geographic distribution. (5) A distinct floral change-over of sphenophylls provides a potential basis for indexing the Westphalian/Stephanian boundary, or if non-homotaxial for a subdivision within the lower Stephanian or even Permian.

Demographic change and pluralism

The author presents an overview of ethnic diversity in Canada its impact on public life and prospects for the future. This paper addresses the implications of demographic change for pluralism in Canada. It will outline the dimensions and directions of diversity and the impact on public life. It includes identification of areas which require research in order to prepare Canada for the next century. (SUMMARY IN FRE) (EXCERPT)