This is the second in a series of lecture-dialogues led by Gene Long on the history of the Labrador boundary dispute and the British Privy Council decision of 1927. The event is free but seating is limited. Please register in advance. Doors open at 1:15 pm, the presentation begins at 2pm.

An invitation to friends and neighbours and interested persons

Gene Long presents two upcoming lecture-dialogues on the history of the Labrador Boundary. These are intended to seed awareness and discussion ahead of the centenary in 2027 of the drawing of the boundary by the British Privy Council.

The two lectures will cover similar material but, of course, will not be the same! The first will be a bit more informal and the second will dive a bit deeper into the archive.

The first was Sunday afternoon, 15 November at the Alt Hotel.

The second is a week later, also in the afternoon, 22 November at The Rooms.

Approaches to Boundary: Research Notes Across Labrador’s Centennial Line

“Gene Long recently spent several years researching the history of the legal deliberations that determined the 1927 boundary in Labrador. Using research from The Rooms archives, Mr. Long places the 1927 decision in historical context, and shows how the case exemplified colonial powers attempting to impose authority on a vast geography historically home to Indigenous communities.” (The Rooms)

Lecture project and bio background

Gene Long is a researcher and writer who has studied the case of the Labrador Boundary as it was adjudicated at the British Privy Council in the 1920s. He now brings forward new information and a fresh analysis to add to our understanding of how the case was decided – against Canada’s claim on Quebec’s behalf and in Newfoundland’s favour.

Gene’s background research and close reading of the voluminous record(s) show the centrality of Indigenous occupation in the contested territory as a key feature of arguments presented in the dispute – one that was then removed as an evident historical aspect in both the final, arbitrated decision of the Privy Council and through the many decades following. Gene presents this as a sleight-of-hand dynamic of colonization, containing both recognition and denial in shaping the failure of colonial approaches to land title and inherent Indigenous rights, particularly those of Innu people who have always lived on all sides of the 1927 border. A century later, the boundary case resonates urgently in the present.

Gene Long’s prior research on Newfoundland and Labrador’s political and constitutional history in the twentieth century formed the basis of his Master’s thesis at Memorial University. This work was later published to commemorate the 50th anniversary in 1999 of the province joining the Canadian federation as Suspended State: Newfoundland Before Canada (Breakwater Books).

Gene was the first elected New Democrat in St. John’s, serving one term in the House of Assembly. He then spent more than two decades in Toronto working in the public sector as a senior policy advisor and communications manager. With 15 years’ experience in public health and health policy, he also worked as an ESL language instructor before returning to St. John’s where he has survived and more or less thrived amid the pandemic and other common challenges to mental, physical, and community health.

Sponsored by PCBS-If (Post Colonial Building Society – Ideas in formation)