Jennifer Bonnell
Associate Professor
Office: 2130 Vari Hal
Phone: 416 886 9329
Email: bonnellj@yorku.ca
Primary website: http://www.jenniferbonnell.com
Attached CV
Media Requests Welcome
Accepting New Graduate Students
Jennifer Bonnell is a historian of public memory and environmental change in nineteenth and twentieth-century Canada. She is the author or co-editor of four books, including Stewards of Splendour: A History of Wildlife and People in British Columbia, published in 2023 by the Royal BC Museum, and Reclaiming the Don: An Environmental History of Toronto’s Don River Valley, published by the University of Toronto Press in 2014 (second edition released in 2024). Her current book project, Foragers of a Modern Countryside: Honeybees, Environmental Change, and Beekeeper Advocacy in the Great Lakes Region, will be published by the University of Washington Press’s Weyerhaeuser Environmental Books series.
Bonnell’s articles and essays have appeared in The Canadian Historical Review, The Journal of Canadian Studies, Museum & Society, and several edited collections. She has contributed to a variety of public history projects, including documentary film and television projects for the Evergreen Brick Works and Metal Dog Films, and research and public engagement work for environment and heritage organizations in the Toronto area. Her current research explores the role of beekeepers in documenting and decrying environmental change in the agricultural regions of Ontario and New York State in the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries.
Degrees
Ph.D. History Education, University of TorontoM.A. Environmental Studies, University of Victoria
B.A. (Honours), English and Environmental Studies, University of Victoria
Professional Leadership
Series Editor, Rural, Wildlands, and Resource Studies, McGill-Queens University Press
Co-editor, Papers in Canadian History and Environment
Co-curator, Toronto Gone Wild: City Meets Nature exhibition at the Museum of Toronto, April-November 2024
Community Contributions
Bonnell has delivered numerous presentations on her research to historical societies, conservation and citizen advocacy groups, public schools, and local libraries in the Greater Toronto Area, the wider Great Lakes Region, and British Columbia. Since 2016, she has facilitated collaboration between The Village at Black Creek (formerly Black Creek Pioneer Village) and a team of YorkU-affiliated historians and students on a multi-year interactive project titled "Changing the Narrative: Connecting Indigenous and Settler Histories at Black Creek Pioneer Village." The project, guided by representatives from five southern Ontario First Nations, will result in a series of interactive historical and artistic displays, exhibits, and programming at the Village exploring the Indigenous history of the region and interactions with settler communities.
Research Interests
- Canadian Historical Association Clio Prize for British Columbia for Stewards of Splendour - 2024
- Lieutenant-Governor’s Medal for Historical Writing from the British Columbia Historical Federation for Stewards of Splendour - 2024
- Finalist for the Roderick Haig-Brown Regional Prize, BC & Yukon Book Awards for Stewards of Splendour - 2024
- Finalist for the Authored Book Prize and the Biography and History of Wildlife Management Book Prize from The Wildlife Society (US) for Stewards of Splendour - 2024
- Canadian Historical Association Clio Prize for Ontario for Reclaiming the Don - 2015
- Heritage Toronto Award of Excellence for best book on Toronto history for Reclaiming the Don - 2015
- Ontario Historical Society Fred Landon Award for best book on Ontario regional history for Reclaiming the Don - 2015
Current Research Projects
-
Summary:
“Changing the Narrative: Connecting Indigenous and Settler Histories at Black Creek Pioneer Village” is a two-year public history project between York University researchers, Jumblies Theatre, and Black Creek Pioneer Village (BCPV), a museum owned and operated by Toronto and Region Conservation Authority. The project’s overarching goal is to bring Indigenous content, perspectives, and voices to the interpretation of early non-Indigenous settlement of the region at BCPV.
-
Summary:
This transnational study explores the effects of agricultural modernization and the corresponding transformation of rural and suburban ecosystems upon honey bees and their keepers. My research to date has concentrated on the evolving relationship between fruit growers and beekeepers surrounding the advent of insecticide spraying legislation in Ontario in the early 1890s; and beekeeper and state responses to the emergence of American foulbrood, a bacterial disease that decimated apiaries from the 1880s to the 1940s.
Current Courses
| Term | Course Number | Section | Title | Type |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Fall/Winter 2024 | AP/HIST4840 6.0 | A | Public History | SEMR |
Jennifer Bonnell is a historian of public memory and environmental change in nineteenth and twentieth-century Canada. She is the author or co-editor of four books, including Stewards of Splendour: A History of Wildlife and People in British Columbia, published in 2023 by the Royal BC Museum, and Reclaiming the Don: An Environmental History of Toronto’s Don River Valley, published by the University of Toronto Press in 2014 (second edition released in 2024). Her current book project, Foragers of a Modern Countryside: Honeybees, Environmental Change, and Beekeeper Advocacy in the Great Lakes Region, will be published by the University of Washington Press’s Weyerhaeuser Environmental Books series.
Bonnell’s articles and essays have appeared in The Canadian Historical Review, The Journal of Canadian Studies, Museum & Society, and several edited collections. She has contributed to a variety of public history projects, including documentary film and television projects for the Evergreen Brick Works and Metal Dog Films, and research and public engagement work for environment and heritage organizations in the Toronto area. Her current research explores the role of beekeepers in documenting and decrying environmental change in the agricultural regions of Ontario and New York State in the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries.
Degrees
Ph.D. History Education, University of TorontoM.A. Environmental Studies, University of Victoria
B.A. (Honours), English and Environmental Studies, University of Victoria
Professional Leadership
Series Editor, Rural, Wildlands, and Resource Studies, McGill-Queens University Press
Co-editor, Papers in Canadian History and Environment
Co-curator, Toronto Gone Wild: City Meets Nature exhibition at the Museum of Toronto, April-November 2024
Community Contributions
Bonnell has delivered numerous presentations on her research to historical societies, conservation and citizen advocacy groups, public schools, and local libraries in the Greater Toronto Area, the wider Great Lakes Region, and British Columbia. Since 2016, she has facilitated collaboration between The Village at Black Creek (formerly Black Creek Pioneer Village) and a team of YorkU-affiliated historians and students on a multi-year interactive project titled "Changing the Narrative: Connecting Indigenous and Settler Histories at Black Creek Pioneer Village." The project, guided by representatives from five southern Ontario First Nations, will result in a series of interactive historical and artistic displays, exhibits, and programming at the Village exploring the Indigenous history of the region and interactions with settler communities.
Research Interests
Awards
- Canadian Historical Association Clio Prize for British Columbia for Stewards of Splendour - 2024
- Lieutenant-Governor’s Medal for Historical Writing from the British Columbia Historical Federation for Stewards of Splendour - 2024
- Finalist for the Roderick Haig-Brown Regional Prize, BC & Yukon Book Awards for Stewards of Splendour - 2024
- Finalist for the Authored Book Prize and the Biography and History of Wildlife Management Book Prize from The Wildlife Society (US) for Stewards of Splendour - 2024
- Canadian Historical Association Clio Prize for Ontario for Reclaiming the Don - 2015
- Heritage Toronto Award of Excellence for best book on Toronto history for Reclaiming the Don - 2015
- Ontario Historical Society Fred Landon Award for best book on Ontario regional history for Reclaiming the Don - 2015
Current Research Projects
-
Summary:
“Changing the Narrative: Connecting Indigenous and Settler Histories at Black Creek Pioneer Village” is a two-year public history project between York University researchers, Jumblies Theatre, and Black Creek Pioneer Village (BCPV), a museum owned and operated by Toronto and Region Conservation Authority. The project’s overarching goal is to bring Indigenous content, perspectives, and voices to the interpretation of early non-Indigenous settlement of the region at BCPV.
Project Type: Funded-
Summary:
This transnational study explores the effects of agricultural modernization and the corresponding transformation of rural and suburban ecosystems upon honey bees and their keepers. My research to date has concentrated on the evolving relationship between fruit growers and beekeepers surrounding the advent of insecticide spraying legislation in Ontario in the early 1890s; and beekeeper and state responses to the emergence of American foulbrood, a bacterial disease that decimated apiaries from the 1880s to the 1940s.
All Publications
Current Courses
| Term | Course Number | Section | Title | Type |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Fall/Winter 2024 | AP/HIST4840 6.0 | A | Public History | SEMR |
