On the Cusp of Contact: Gender, Space and Race in the Colonization of British Columbia

“The ways in which we can redress the past are many and varied,” writes Jean Barman, “and it is up to each of us to act as best we can.” The seventeen essays collected here, originally published between 1996 and 2013, make a valuable contribution toward this laudable goal. With a wide range of source material, from archival and documentary sources to oral histories, Barman pieces together stories of individuals and groups disadvantaged in white settler society because of their gender, race and/or social class.

Working to recognize past actors that have been underrepresented in mainstream histories, Barman’s focus is BC on “the cusp of contact.” The essays in this collection include fascinating, though largely forgotten, life stories of the frontier—that space between contact and settlement, where, for a brief moment, anything seemed possible.

This volume, featuring over thirty archival photographs and illustrations, makes these important and very readable essays accessible to a broader audience for the first time.

“Reading a book by local historian Jean Barman is like looking at the negative of a well-loved picture. By reversing the light and the dark, she forces us to see the edges, the margins, the details pushed aside by the Technicolor myths of accepted history.”

“On the Cusp of Contact is robust and well produced, with excellent illustrations. It is ideal for courses across a range of disciplines (history, sociology, education), but in fact, because it so successfully enriches our common understanding, it deserves a place on everyone’s bookshelf.”