Adult Education in Manitoba: Historical Aspects

Alexander D. Gregor is Director, Centre for Higher Education Research
and Development, University of Manitoba, and the co-editor of
Postsecondary Education in Canada: The Cultural Agenda.

This collection of 13 articles is intended to encourage the development
of a systematic body of historical scholarship in Manitoba adult
education. The editors, who are faculty members at the University of
Manitoba, note that the value of adult education history is still
largely unappreciated. The other contributors are students in or
graduates of the institution’s master’s program in adult education.
Although the individual submissions were undertaken separately, without
an attempt to relate them to a larger interpretive framework, they group
under four general categories: biography, ethnic group, and citizenship;
events; institutions; and organizations.

The editors note that the contributors are trained as historians and
that the task of historical analysis and interpretation will have to
await a later stage. Nevertheless, the editors are to be congratulated
for demonstrating the value of history in providing a fuller
understanding of professional practice, for bringing the thoughtful
scholarship of graduate practitioners to the attention of a wider
audience, and for laying a foundation for the systematic study of adult
education history at the provincial level.