Liza Piper

Area of Study / Keywords

Environmental History ; Health ; Industrial Resource Economies; Colonialism

About

I am interested to understand how invisible, intangible, and abiotic elements of other-than-human nature—whether pathogens, rocks and minerals, energy, climate and ice—are powerful agents in our past. I explore these questions primarily in the context of the lands that are now northern and western Canada, which has led me to engage with histories of settler colonialism, industrialization, infrastructure, pollution, environmental activism, and resource politics. 

My current research is focused on industrial resource economies and decisions around protecting or exploiting the land in the Rockies and foothills of Western Canada. I am also interested in the value of field work and place-based methodologies to historical research. 

My previous research looked at the history of epidemics and health on the lands that are now the Yukon and Northwest Territories, in particular my book When Disease Came to This Country: Epidemics and Colonialism in Northern North America (CUP 2023). Prior to that, I published a book on the Industrial Transformation of Subarctic Canada (UBC 2009) as well as co-editing two collections, Environmental Activism on the Ground: Small Green and Indigenous Organizing with Jon Clapperton (2019) and Sustaining the West: Cultural Responses to Canadian Environments (2015) with Lisa Szabo-Jones.

I regularly teach courses on the history of disease, Canadian environmental history, as well as on Alberta resource politics and global ecologies of health.

HIST 359 - Canadian Environmental History

Brings the natural environment onto a shared stage with social, economic, political and cultural history in Canada from the last ice age to the present.

HIST 467 - Topics in Alberta History

Prerequisite: 3 units in HIST at the 300-level or consent of Department.

HIST 664 - Topics in Western Canadian History

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