Marie-Hélène Brunet

Biography

I am Assistant Professor of social studies and history education at the Faculty of Education at the University of Ottawa since August 2018. Previously, I held a teaching position (LTA). My doctoral dissertation (University of Montreal) focused on the understanding of women's history by Quebec high school students. I also hold a master's degree in history through which I became interested in motherhood outside marriage at the time of the Quiet Revolution in Quebec. I am interested in history education as well as the history of education and the history of women and gender. My current research focuses on the understanding of historical agency by elementary and secondary school teachers and students, through various teaching tools (narratives, textbooks, historical films, video games, children's literature, etc.) as well as on the teaching of sensitive questions and power relations (language, race, class, gender, etc.) in history classrooms.

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SELECTED PUBLICATIONS

"When It Became Equal": How Historical Consciousness and Theories of Agency Can Explain Female Students' Conceptions of Feminism (2018)

Marie-Hélène Brunet & Scott Pollock

This paper describes the results of two research projects, which were focused upon female students' historical understanding of feminism. In both cases the researchers found that the student participants harbored ambivalent or negative attitudes towards feminism and saw little connection between the present and feminist struggles in the past. While this attitude could be attributed to a wide range of variables, the authors illustrate that a focus upon the students' form of historical consciousness and theories of agency can explain the tendency to see a "gap" between past and present. This paper concludes with a call for further research into the interaction between historical thinking, historical consciousness, and theories of agency.

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Les francophones (in)visibles: comparaison du curriculum ontarien en histoire, version française et anglaise (2020)

Marie-Hélène Brunet & Raphaël Gani

« Le texte de Marie-Hélène Brunet et Raphaël Gani développe une réflexion autour du concept de reconnaissance, qui leur permet de bâtir un pont entre l’éducation inclusive et les disciplines scolaires. La reconnaissance est ici pensée comme étant la valorisation de perspectives et d’expériences collectives au sein de divers textes sociétaux – les programmes-cadres disciplinaires à l’école en sont un exemple probant. » (Texte issu de l’introduction du numéro)

 

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SELECTED PRESENTATIONS/MEDIA

SECs in Distance Leadership Series: Episode 3 w/ Marie-Hélène Brunet

SEL in Action Podcast, August 21, 2020

 

In conversation with Dr. Marie-Hélène Brunet {Pandemic Pedagogy convo 21}

Imagining a New 'We', May 20, 2020