(L-r) Dopp, Jackson and Gaston are pumped for this month’s conference on the scholarship of hockey.
By Patty Pitts
Hockey may be Canada’s definitive game and arguably part of the country’s collective psyche but for many academics and writers, our national sport is also the focus of their research and writing. From April 19–21, men and women from around the world will gather at Victoria’s Grand Pacific Hotel for “Canada and the League of Hockey Nations,” a UVic-organized international conference examining the game from a variety of perspectives.
Conference organizer Jamie Dopp of the University of Victoria’s English department got the idea for the Victoria event after attending a similar gathering in Boston. “I thought, ‘Why not do something like that here?’ We’ve had a tremendous response that cuts across many disciplines—English, kinesiology, history, sport management—and it will be an opportunity for people to get together, share new knowledge about the game and talk hockey.”
Several UVic researchers will be among the presenters. Writing professor Bill Gaston (who, like Dopp, plays hockey) will discuss his latest book Midnight Hockey. Colleague Lorna Jackson (who does not play hockey) will participate on a panel on the challenges of writing about the game. English professor Misao Dean will chair a panel on hockey and gender identity, and her colleague Doug Beardsley will chair a panel on hockey and history. Panel participant and filmmaker Brett Kashmere will show Valery’s Ankle, his multimedia presentation about the 1972 Summit Series between Team Canada and Team USSR, with a focus on Bobby Clarke’s slash on the late Valery Kharlamov’s ankle that injured the Soviet star at a pivotal point in the series.
Keynote speakers include: Harley Hotchkiss, part owner of the Calgary Flames and chairman of the NHL board of governors; University of Alberta political scientist David Whitson, who is the co-editor of Artificial Ice: Hockey, Culture and Commerce; and Stephen Hardy, kinesiology professor and coordinator of the sports studies program at the University of New Hampshire, who’s a former editor of Sport Marketing Quarterly and has written extensively about early hockey in America.
Presentations will examine the introduction of body checking in atom level hockey, how hockey culture reacts to sport-related concussions, the history of women’s hockey, race and hockey, and a dissection of the controversial trade that sent Olympian Chris Pronger from Edmonton to the Anaheim Mighty Ducks last year.
Registration is still being accepted for the conference. Visit
www.confmanager.com/main.cfm?cid=668 for program details and registration information or contact Dopp at 721-7251 or jdopp@uvic.ca.
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