British Columbia, the Pacific Province: Geographical Essays

J.H. Galloway is a professor of geography at the University of Toronto.

The editor and nearly all of the contributors are faculty members at the
University of Victoria in Victoria, B.C, and the collection is published
by the Western Geographical Press, also of the Department of Geography,
the University of Victoria. With this locus of writing and production,
the reader might reasonably have expected to find here a distinctive
view of the province as seen from the provincial capital. But
unfortunately this interpretation of the geography of British Columbia
lacks local flavor.

There are 19 essays in all. Each author deals conventionally with his
or her topic, with the expected maps, diagrams, and tables accompanying
rather lacklustre prose. None of them seems to have been moved by the
beauty of the province to have raised language and insight above the
ordinary. There is the usual introduction to collections such as this,
then surprisingly a chapter on the history of the mapping of the
province that I found disappointingly brief and inadequately
illustrated. The necessary chapters on physical geography follow. There
is then a long and useful chapter that turns on the politics of the
territorial formation of British Columbia, on the politics of joining
Canada, and on the politics of hydroelectric power. The editor has
included the expected chapters on the exploitation of the various
natural resources and on tourism and the great outdoors, but the
discussion is always dry and statistical. Downhill skiing, mentioned in
the chapter on “Land Recreation,” is apparently a “young
person’s activity” with 75 percent of the skiers in B.C. under the
age of 35. I wonder how that compares with Europe. Could the author not
have found the words to convey why Whistler has become such a major ski
resort (it’s been picked to host the 2010 Winter Olympics), or why
people pay a fortune to helicopter into the back country to ski down
powder-covered slopes? After the ski statistics, the author goes on to
tell us the elderly play golf. A review of “Marine Conservation”
marks the end of the book: there is no conclusion.

Much is left out. Cultural geography is limited to two chapters: a long
and welcome one on the Chinese and an all-too-brief review of the
treaties with First Nations. The cities of the province are completely
ignored. Is there not an urban geographer at the university? The book, I
presume, is aimed at senior high school and first-year university
students. It is not a sufficient introduction to the geography of B.C.
The students should read more widely.