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Showing posts from June, 2014

World Refugee Day and The Ugandan Asian Archive

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Hello blog world! My apologies for the delay in posting on these two amazing events that happened on June 20th in Ottawa. The first was World Refugee Day that was celebrated at Ottawa City Hall with a wonderful mix of speeches, presentations, poetry, and live performances. Mr. De Angelis delivering the opening remarks at the flag raising ceremony Some of the distinguished guests included Furio De Angelis  (the head of UNHCR in Canada),  Senator Mubina Jaffer (a Ugandan Asian refugee), Senator Thanh Hai Ngo (a Vietnamese Refugee), Jim Watson (Mayor of Ottawa), and Chris Alexander (Citizenship and Immigration Minister). To be entirely honest the commemoration embodied both the hope and despair of refugee life in the 21st century. As Mr. De Angelis remarked in his opening address, the world currently has more refugees than it has ever had since the Second World War. That means there are more than 51.2 million refugees  worldwide. As the world has become increasingly v

Another Day Another Publication

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Hello blog world! A huge thank you to William J. Turkel and Mary Beth Start who I collaborated with in my latest publication. This one is a bit of a twist from what I usually work on and I am very proud of it. It is published in the IEEE Annals of the History of Computing and looks at grounding digital history within the history of computing. It is a short one, so have a quick read, and as always send me comments or questions.  http://www.computer.org/csdl/mags/an/2014/02/man2014020072.pdf

Adventures from the Archives Part II

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Hello blog world! Sorry for the delay on sending this one out but I have finally gotten around to uploading part II :) Today's latest treasure from the archives is a draft of a public statement made by Prime Minister Trudeau. Page 1 of the draft (click on the image to zoom) Who: Prime Minister Pierre Elliot Trudeau What: Submission to the Cabinet of a draft statement to be made on August 24th 1972 (The draft is very similar to the final version) When: August 22nd, 1972 Where: Ottawa Why: This would officially mark the formal launch of the resettlement initiative by the Canadian government. As you read through the statement you will notice some very interesting details. The first is that the Prime Minister explains Canada's involvement is based on humanitarian grounds. The second reason is that the Canadian government sought to aid the British. Prime Minister Trudeau also outlines that Canada is willing to accept Ugandan Asians on an emergency basis. Wha