Valerie Legge

Position

Full Professor

Education

  • Ph.D (Memorial University of Newfoundland)
  • M.A. (Memorial University of Newfoundland)
  • B.Ed (Memorial University of Newfoundland)
  • B.A. (Memorial University of Newfoundland)

Contact Information

Research Interests

Canadian Literature, Women's Literature, Critical Theory, Aboriginal Studies, Travel Literature

Selected Publications

Books & Edited Volumes

  • Agnes C. Laut’s Lords of the North [1900], edited and introduction by Valerie E. Legge, Tecumseh Press, 2001.

Articles and Book Chapters

  • “Agnes C. Laut: High Ideals and Dreams of Unity.” Studies in Canadian Literature [Special Edition to coincide with Canada’s 150th Anniversary], vol. 42, no. 1, 2017, pp. 191-208.
  • “With High Hearts: Women Travellers to Newfoundland and Labrador”. Pathways of Creativity in Contemporary Newfoundland and Labrador, edited by María Jesús Hernáez Lerena’s, Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2015, pp. 51-73.
  • “Heralds of Empire: Liminal Heroes and Visionary Fugitives.” Nation-State Discourses of Cultural Identity in Canada, edited by Miroslawa Buchholtz and Eugenia Sojka, Kraków Universitas, 2010, pp. 211-227.
  • “Exotic Geographies: Early Twentieth-Century Constructions of Quebec and the American Southwest.” From the Foundations of Quebec City to Present-Day Canada (1608-2008) Retrospections, Paths of Change, Challenges, edited by Krzysztof Jarosz, Zuzanna Szatanik and Joanna WarmuziÅ„ska-Rogóż, University of Silesia, 2009, pp. 288-298.
  • “Elizabeth Bishop in Newfoundland: ‘Sad and Still and Foreign.” Newfoundland and Labrador Studies, vol. 22, no. 2, fall 2007, pp. 429-446.
  • “Why Go Abroad? Agnes Laut in Wonderland.” Literary Environments: Canada and the Old World, edited by Britta Olinder, Peter Lang, 2006, pp. 61-73.
  • “Worldly Women and the land of Frost and Fire.” Rediscovering Canadian Difference, edited by Gudrun Bjork Gudsteins, Nordic Association for Canadian Studies, 2001, pp. 107-129.
  • “Journey-Women in the Ark of the Wilderness.” Canada and the Nordic Countries in Times of Reorientation, edited by Jørn Carlsen, Aarhus University Press, 1998, pp. 119-140.
  • “Agnes C. Laut: What the New Nation to the North Thinks of the United States.” Informal Empire: Cultural relations between Canada, the United States and Europe in Peter Easingwood, edited by Konrad Groß and Hartmut Lutz, Verlag, 1998, pp. 103-122.
  • “Kristjana Gunnars’ Zero Hour: When Mourning Becomes Language.” Essays in Comparative Literature [Special Issue], edited by Suresh Chandra Verma, Anmol Publications, 1998, pp. 311-321.
  • “Agnes C. Laut’s Freebooters of the Wilderness: Borderlands and Visionary Fugitives.” Alternative Frontiers: Voices from the Mountain West, edited by Allen Saeger, Leonard Evenden, Roland Lorimer and Robin Mathews, Association of Canadian Studies, 1997, pp. 89-102.
  • “Heralds of Empire: Liminal Heroes and Visionary Fugitives.” International Journal of Canadian Studies, vol. 15, Spring 1997, pp. 135-150. Reprinted in 2010 in Nation-State Discourses of Cultural Identity in Canada.
  • “Lily Dougall’s The Madonna of a Day (1895): Spiritual Fortress Inviolate; or, Falling into [W]holiness.” Quilting a New Canon: Stitching Women’s Words, edited by Uma Parameswaran, Sister Vision Press, 1996, pp. 301-318.
  • “The Guerrillero: Albalucía Angel and the Politics of Terror.” Peace and Change: A Journal of Peace Research, vol. 21, no. 4, October 1996, pp. 409-423.
  • “Sheila Watson’s Antigone: Anguished Rituals and Acts of Public Disturbance.” Studies in Canadian Literature, vol. 17, no. 2, July 1993, pp. 28-46.
  • “Sheila Watson’s Antigone: Anguished Rituals and Acts of Public Disturbance.” Studies in Canadian Literature, vol. 17, no. 2, July 1993, pp. 28-46.
  • Republished in Short Story Criticism, vol. 128, Cengage/Gale Publishing, 2010.
  • “Foremothers, the New Nation, and Our Literary History,” Facsimile Newsletter: Canadiana on Microfiche Requested by Pamela Bjornson, National Library, Ottawa.

Conference Presentations

  • “‘Exotic Geographies’: Early 20th-Century Constructions of Quebec and the American Southwest.” Polish Association for Canadian Studies, 9-11 October 2008, Ustro, Poland.
  • “Agnes C Laut and the Early Conservation Movement in the United States.” Taking a Stand Conference, June 2007, Ottawa, Canada.
  • “‘Exotic Geographies’: Early 20th-Century Constructions of Quebec and the American Southwest.” Polish Association for Canadian Studies. 9-11 October 2008, Ustro, Poland.
  • “Agnes C Laut and the Early Conservation Movement in the United States.” Taking a Stand Conference, June 2007, Ottawa, Canada.
  • “The Grace R. Hebard and Agnes C. Laut Correspondence: American Historian Meets Canadian Roughneck.” The Association for Canadian Studies in the United States 18th Biennial Conference, 16-20 November 2005, St Louis, USA.
  • “Agnes Laut: Romancing the American West.” Canadian Studies Conference, November 2003, Portland, USA.
  • “‘Why Go Abroad?’: Agnes Laut and the Politics of Travelling at Home and Abroad.” 7th Triennial Conference, 8-11 August 2002, Stockholm, Sweden.
  • “Worldly Women and the Land of Frost and Fire.” 6th Triennial Conference of the Nordic Association for Canadian Studies. Reykjavík, Iceland. August 5-8, 1999.
  • "Last of the Beothuks; or, The Blizzard Moans Her Name." Popular Culture Conference, 8-11 April 1998, Orlando, USA.
  • "Agnes C. Laut's The New Dawn (1913): 'It's Life that Matters and the Key is Love'." Western Social Science Association Conference, 15-18 April 1998, Denver, USA. .
  • "The Strangest Journeys Made by Women: Opium Dreamers, Planet Pilgrims and Mountain Women." Western Social Science Association Conference, 23-27 April 1997, Albuquerque, USA.
  • "Bernice Morgan's Random Passage (1992) and Waiting for Time (1994): Women, Writing and Marginalia." Popular Culture Conference, 26-29 March 1997, San Antonio, USA.
  • "Journey-Women in the Ark of the Wilderness." Presented at the 5th Triennial Conference of the Nordic Association for Canadian Studies, 15-18 August 1996, Aarhus, Denmark.
  • "Albalucía Angel's "The Guerrillero": Writer as Watch-Woman or Night-Light of the World." Popular Culture Conference, March 1996, Las Vegas, USA.
  • "Kristjana Gunnars' Zero Hour: 'When Mourning Becomes Language'". Western Social Science Association Conference, April 1996, Reno, USA.
  • "Agnes C. Laut: What the New Nation to the North Thinks about the United States." Viking Connection Conference, May 1996, Greifswald, Germany. Funded fully by Ernst-Moritz-Arndt-Universitat Greifswald, Institut fur Anglistik/ Amerikanistik.
  • "Agnes C. Laut and Canadian-American Relations." Western Social Science Association Conference, 25-29 April 1995, Oakland, USA.
  • "Dream of a Nation." Round-Table Paper Presentation on Quebec Succession. Western Social Science Association Conference, 25-29 April 1995, Oakland, USA.
  • "Canadian Women: Agnes C. Laut, Women and Westerns." Popular Culture Conference, 15-20 April 1995, Philadelphia, USA.
  • "Agnes C. Laut's Freebooters of the Wilderness: Borderlands and Bitterwaters." Mountain West Canadian Studies Conference, 16-20 February 1994, Vancouver, Canada.
  • " Lords of the North (1900) and Heralds of Empire (1902): Agnes C. Laut's Northern Fictions about High Carnival and Romancing the land." NACS/ANEC Fourth Triennial Conference, 14-18 August 1993, Turku, Finland.
  • "Lily Dougall's The Madonna of a Day (1895): The Female Body as Spiritual Fortress." Women-Focused Research Conference, 25-27 September 1992, University of Winnipeg, Manitoba.

Invited Talks

  • “The Teaching Professor Conference: Educate, Engage, Inspire.” Cambridge, Massachusetts. May 21-23, 2010. Funded by the President’s Distinguished Teaching Award.

Current Research Projects

  • Agnes C. Laut: Roughneck Woman of the West. A critical biography based on the life and works of Agnes C. Laut (1871-1936). This 550 page manuscript was submitted to the University of Alberta Press. Revisions are now in process.
  • Wayfaring Woman: Agnes C. Laut’s Collected Letters. From more than 50 archives throughout Canada, the United States and Britain, I have collected hundreds of professional and personal letters that Laut wrote between 1898 and 1936. Most of the correspondence documents her extensive involvement with the publishing industry in the United States, her activities in the American conservation and National Parks movement, her international travels and her social work activities involving child labour in the United States and Mexico. University of Alberta Press is interested in publishing it.

Awards

  • 2016 CNIE-RCIE Award for Merit (for Excellence and Innovation in the Integration of Technologies in Instructional Design) for English 2160: North American Aboriginal Literature
  • 2008-2009 President’s Award for Distinguished Teaching

Regularly Taught Courses

Undergraduate

  • English 1193: Ways of Reading
  • English 2150: Modern Canadian Fiction
  • English 2160: North American Aboriginal Literature
  • English 3830: Women Writers
  • English 4851: Canadian Exploration Literature

Graduate

  • English 7003: Contemporary Critical Theory
  • English 7066: ‘Turning from the Tower’: Women, Writing and Wilderness
  • English 7067: Early Canadian Women Writers
  • English 7086: Women’s Travel Literature
  • English 7069: Canadian Criticism from 1970 to Present
  • English 7063: The Vietnam War and American Trauma
  • English 6062: The ‘Sorrows of War’ in a Postmodern World