The Cultural Anthropology of Canada:
As Viewed Through the Lens of Ice Hockey
9:30 a.m., Thursday, Sept. 3, 2009
Corley Auditorium in Webster Hall
Admission: free

Question: What does the most famous speech in Canadian history, the largest quick service restaurant chain in Canada, the only event resembling a race riot in Canada during the second half of the 20th century, and the song sent to a soldier in Afghanistan on Canada Day to make him know he was not forgotten by those at home have in common?

Answer: Ice Hockey.

Although the role of ice hockey in Canadian society and culture is usually dismissed by social scientists as just a stereotype, and a superficial stereotype at that, Craig Palmer suggests that viewing Canada through the lens of ice hockey provides insights into many important (and trivial) aspects of Canadian culture and society.

Craig T. Palmer is an associate professor of cultural anthropology and director of graduate studies in the Department of Anthropology at the University of Missouri-Columbia. He earned his Ph.D. in anthropology from Arizona State University in 1988. His research focuses on kinship, religion, ritual, cooperation, migration, sports and the ecological adaptations of fishing communities to their environment. His experience working in the commercial lobster fishery of Maine for five years during the 1980s led to his anthropological fieldwork in fishing communities on the Northern Peninsula of Newfoundland, Canada. This research started in 1990 and initially focused on the social consequences of the collapse of the cod stocks that had been the primary economic resource in the area for centuries. More recently his research has followed the residents of Newfoundland as the collapse of the fishery has caused them to have to migrate to western Canada in order to find jobs in the oil industry of northern Alberta. His current research focuses on how these individuals maintain many of their Newfoundland traditions and use these to create networks of social relationships with other Newfoundlanders to help meet the many challenges faced in the new environment of western Canada.