The making of Canada

School №105

 

 

Report

«Canada»

 

 

 

 

      

student 11-b class

Оlxovaja Alice

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Kharkiv 2013

 

Content

Entry                                                     3

1. The making of Canada                    3

2. Land                                                  4

3. People of Canada                             6

4. Economy                                            6

5. Government                                      7

6. History                                               8

7. British North America                     9

8. Confederation and Nationhood       10

9. World War II to the Present           11

10. Toronto                                           13

10.1. CN Tower                         14

10.2. SkyDome                          14

10.3. Royal Ontario Museum  15

10.4. Niagara Falls                   15

Conclusion                                                         16

List of uses of Literature                                  16

Entry

Canada is one of the largest countries in the world and a popular English-speaking country for tourists. Every year millions of tourists visit it with different reasons. Some want to study English there, some to visit their friends or relatives, but the majority arrives to discover numerous Canadian attractions. The country is full of sights indeed. There are architectural, natural, cultural, historic and other types of sights. One of the most interesting places in Canada is its capital – Ottawa. The main sights of the city are the Parliament, where even ordinary people are welcome, the Tower of Peace with 53 bells, picturesque quarters around the Market Hall Bayvord, Rideau Canal, which turns into the longest ice-rink in the world in winter, Canadian Museum of Nature and numerous other sights. Toronto is another tourist attraction. It’s the largest Canadian city and also the main cultural and trade center of English-speaking part of the country. The city is a huge megalopolis with lots of skyscrapers and office buildings. At the same time Toronto is a quite green city, full of trees, bushes and flowers. The main sights of the city is the entertainment complex at the Ontario square, Hyde Park and Queen Elizabeth’s Park, Islands Park on Lake Ontario, golden tower of the Royal Bank Plaza, Roy Thomson Concert Hall, a symbol of the city – 553-meter “CN Tower”, the famous shopping mall Eaton Center and many others. Speaking about Canadian sights it’s important to mention the Agawa canyon area, and of course, the famous Niagara Falls.

1. The making of Canada

John Cabot, an Italian sea captain in the pay of the British, discovered Can-ada in 1497, five years after Columbus discovered America. He planted a huge cross on the shore and sailed home, with the news that he had reached north east China , the land of the Great Khan , and that the sea was full of fish.In 1534 , the French explorer, Jacques Cartier, sailed right down the St.Lawrence River until he could go no further. Among the great forests along the shore he met Indians who welcomed him, but in return he kidnapped some of their chiefs . He was the first European to treat the Indians with cruelty and treachery. It was almost another hundred years before French colonists settled on the banks of the St Lawrence and founded Quebec. They were sent there to give food and shelter to the French fur traders, who were carrying on a profitable trade with the Indians.

By the middle of the 18th century, the French in North America realized that they could not avoid a fight to the death with the British and their American colonists, but back in France the French king , Louis XV , was too busy with his wars with Prus-sia to bother much about what was going on in the ‘ Land of Ice and Snow’. So the French troops in Canada did not receive the supplies they needed so badly, and the few ships that did try to get through were usually captured by British warships.Yet this colonial war ended in a famous battle. The British surprised the French by climbing the cliffs at Quebec in the middle of the night. After their defeat , the French were forced to give up each inch of land in North America. But the British allowed the French colonists , all 60,000 of them , to stay on, and they did no try to change the French way of life or their religion. The French were all Catholics. But the British warned them that Louis XV of France was no longer their King. Their King, from now on, would be King George III of England.

At that time there were very few British colonists in Canada. The first British settlers in Canada were American refugees who refused to fight against the British army in the Revolutionary War , because they felt they were more British than Ameri-can. They called themselves Loyalists, but their fellow Americans accused them of being traitors and took away their possessions. 80,000 Loyalists helped the British to defend Canada against Americans during the Revolutionary War. During the first half of the nineteenth century one million immigrants, mostly British, settled in Canada, but there were hardly any French immigrants from France. However, the French Canadians‘ birth rate was high, so that in just over two centuries the French Canadian population increased from 60,000 to 6 million.

Canada spread from Atlantic right across the prairies and the Rocky Moun-tains to British Columbia; and northwards to the bare but beautiful Yukon and the ice-covered islands of the Arctic. The pioneer farmers found that the black earth of the prairie provinces could grow some of the finest grain in the world. The tracks of the Canadian Pacific Railway pushed to westwards through Indian lands. To protect their land the Indians made fierce attacks on the railway-builders and the farmers.

Canada moved slowly towards self-rule during the second half of the nine-teenth century. A federation of the provinces was formed from Nova Scotia on the At-lantic coast to British Columbia on the far side of the Rockies. In 1936 Canada be-came a Dominion (a self-governing nation) within the British Commonwealth and Em-pire. The Dominions of Canada, New Zealand and South Africa went to war alongside Britain in 1918 and again in 1939.

Canada, independent nation (2001 pop. 30,007,094), 3,851,787 sq mi (9,976,128 sq km), N North America. Canada occupies all of North America N of the United States (and E of Alaska) except for Greenland and the French islands of St. Pierre and Miquelon. It is bounded on the E by the Atlantic Ocean, on the N by the Arctic Ocean, and on the W by the Pacific Ocean and Alaska. A transcontinental border, formed in part by the Great Lakes, divides Canada from the United States; Nares and Davis straits separate Canada from Greenland. The Arctic Archipelago extends far into the Arctic Ocean.

Canada is a federation of 10 provinces— Newfoundland and Labrador, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island, Quebec, Ontario, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta, and British Columbia —and three territories— Nunavut , the Northwest Territories, and the Yukon Territory. Canada’s capital is Ottawa and its largest city is Toronto. Other important cities include Montreal, Vancouver, Edmonton, Calgary, Winnipeg, Hamilton, and Quebec.

2. Land

Canada has a very long and irregular coastline; Hudson Bay and the Gulf of St. Lawrence indent the east coast and the Inside Passage extends along the west coast. The ice-clogged straits between the islands of N Canada form the Northwest Passage. During the Ice Age all of Canada was covered by a continental ice sheet that scoured and depressed the land surface, leaving a covering of glacial drift, depositional landforms, and innumerable lakes and rivers. Aside from the Great Lakes, which are only partly in the country, the largest lakes of North America—Great Bear, Great Slave, and Winnipeg—are entirely in Canada. The St. Lawrence is the chief river of E Canada. The Saskatchewan, Nelson, Churchill, and Mackenzie river systems drain central Canada, and the Columbia, Fraser, and Yukon rivers drain the western part of the country.

Canada has a bowl-shaped geologic structure rimmed by highlands, with Hudson Bay at the lowest point. The country has eight major physiographic regions—the Canadian Shield, the Hudson Bay Lowlands, the Western Cordillera, the Interior Lowlands, the Great Lakes-St. Lawrence Lowlands, the Appalachians, the Arctic Lowlands, and the Innuitians.

The exposed portions of the Canadian Shield cover more than half of Canada. This once-mountainous region, which contains the continent’s oldest rocks, has been worn low by erosion over the millennia. Its upturned eastern edge is indented by fjords. The Shield is rich in minerals, especially iron and nickel, and in potential sources of hydroelectric power. In the center of the Shield are the Hudson Bay Lowlands, encompassing Hudson Bay and the surrounding marshy land.

The Western Cordillera, a geologically young mountain system parallel to the Pacific coast, is composed of a series of north-south tending ranges and valleys that form the highest and most rugged section of the country; Mt. Logan (19,551 ft/5,959 m) is the highest point in Canada. Part of this region is made up of the Rocky Mts. and the Coast Mts., which are separated by plateaus and basins. The islands off W Canada are partially submerged portions of the Coast Mts. The Western Cordillera is also rich in minerals and timber and potential sources of hydroelectric power.

Between the Rocky Mts. and the Canadian Shield are the Interior Lowlands, a vast region filled with sediment from the flanking higher lands. The Lowlands are divided into the prairies, the plains, and the Mackenzie Lowlands. The prairies are Canada’s granary, while grazing is important on the plains.

The smallest and southernmost region is the Great Lakes-St. Lawrence Lowlands, Canada’s heartland. Dominated by the St. Lawrence River and the Great Lakes, the region provides a natural corridor into central Canada, and the St. Lawrence Seaway gives the interior cities access to the Atlantic. This section, which is composed of gently rolling surface on sedimentary rocks, is the location of extensive farmlands, large industrial centers, and most of Canada’s population. In SE Canada and on Newfoundland is the northern end of the Appalachian Mt. system, an old and geologically complex region with a generally low and rounded relief.

The Arctic Lowlands and the Innuitians are the most isolated areas of Canada and are barren and snow-covered for most of the year. The Arctic Lowlands comprise much of the Arctic Archipelago and contain sedimentary rocks that may have oil-bearing strata. In the extreme north, mainly on Ellesmere Island, is the Innuitian Mt. system, which rises to c.10,000 ft (3,050 m).

Canada’s climate is influenced by latitude and topography. The Interior Lowlands make it possible for polar air masses to move south and for subtropical air masses to move north into Canada. Hudson Bay and the Great Lakes act to modify the climate locally. The Western Cordillera serves as a climatic barrier that prevents polar air masses from reaching the Pacific coast and blocks the moist Pacific winds from reaching into the interior. The Cordillera has a typical highland climate that varies with altitude; the western slopes receive abundant rainfall, and the whole region is forested. The Interior Lowlands are in the rain shadow of the Cordillera; the southern portion has a steppe climate in which grasses predominate. S Canada has a temperate climate, with snow in the winter (especially in the east) and cool summers. Farther to the north, extending to the timberline, is the humid subarctic climate characterized by short summers and a snow cover for about half the year. The huge boreal forest, the largest surviving remnant of the extensive forests that once covered much of North America, predominates in this region. On the Arctic Archipelago and the northern mainland is the tundra, with its mosses and lichen, permafrost, near-year-round snow cover, and ice fields. A noted phenomenon off the coast of E Canada is the persistence of dense fog, which is formed when the warm air over the Gulf Stream passes over the cold Labrador Current as the two currents meet off Newfoundland.

3. People of Canada

Canada is a good example of the way peoples of different ways of life and dif-ferent languages can live side by side under one government. The population of Canada has risen from 11,5 million in 1941 to 25 million in 1980. Most of the new-comers are from Europe, Asia and the USA, so that today less than 44% of Can-ada’s population is of British origin. Quebec Province is still 90% French. There are some groups of French Canadiands in Ontario and Manitoba, but the numbers are quite small.

There are many Indians, Pacistanis and Chinese, and also blacks from the USA, among the immigrants who are pouring into Canada now. Some Canadians are afraid that before long Canada will have coloured citizens that white. Other Canadians are disturbed by the growing racism in their country. Canada, like so many countries, has only just begun to treat her own non-white citizens, Eskimos (or Inuit) and the Indians, as generously as they deserve. The Indian and Eskimo populations have grown quite a lot in the last few years. The government is at last realizing that it has a duty towards this people that it has neglected for so long.

All Canadian children have to learn both French and English at school, but Francophones and Anglophones do not enjoy learning each other’s language. Still, most Quebecois middle class families, living in Montreal are bilingual - they speak English and French equally well.

Until the Second World War, every Canadian province except Quebec was overwhelmingly British. Some Canadians were more patriotic than the British them-selves and were really angry if anyone walked out of a cinema while ‘God Save the King’ was being played. Now Canadians think of themselves as a people in their own right, not tied to either Britain or the USA. The USA has not been a threat to Canada for almost two hundred years. In fact, the 6,416 km US-Canadian frontier is the long-est continuous frontier in the world, has no wire fence, no soldiers, no guns on either side. It is called ‘The Border’.

About 40% of the Canadian population are of British descent, while 27% are of French origin. Another 20% are of other European background, about 10% are of E or SE Asian origin, and some 3% are of aboriginal or Metis (mixed aboriginal and European) background. In the late 1990s, Canada had the highest immigration rate of any country in the world, with more than half the total coming from Asia. Over 75% of the total population live in cities. Canada has complete religious liberty, though its growing multiculturalism has at times caused tensions among ethnic and religious groups. About 45% of the people are Roman Catholics, while some 40% are Protestant (the largest groups being the United Church of Canada, Anglicans, and Presbyterians). English and French are the official languages, and federal documents are published in both languages. In 1991, about 61% of Canadians cited English as their mother tongue, while 24% cited French.

4. Economy

Since World War II the development of Canada’s manufacturing, mining, and service sectors has led to the creation of an affluent society. Services now account for 66% of the GDP, while industry accounts for 31%. Tourism and financial services represent some of Canada’s most important industries within the service sector. However, manufacturing is Canada’s single most important economic activity. The leading products are transportation equipment, pulp and paper, processed foods, chemicals, primary and fabricated metals, petroleum, electrical and electronic products, wood products, printed materials, machinery, clothing, and nonmetallic minerals. Industries are centered in Ontario, Quebec, and, to a lesser extent, British Columbia and Alberta. Canada’s industries depend on the country’s rich energy resources, which include hydroelectric power, petroleum, natural gas, coal, and uranium.

Canada is a leading mineral producer, although much of its mineral resources are difficult to reach due to permafrost. It is the world’s largest source of nickel, zinc, and uranium, and a major source of lead, asbestos, gypsum, potash, tantalum, and cobalt. Other important mineral resources are petroleum, natural gas, copper, gold, iron ore, coal, silver, diamonds, molybdenum, and sulfur. The mineral wealth is located in many areas; some of the most productive regions are Sudbury, Ont. (copper and nickel); Timmins, Ont. (lead, zinc, and silver); and Kimberley, British Columbia (lead, zinc, and silver). Petroleum and natural gas are found in Alberta and Saskatchewan.

Agriculture employs about 3% of the population and contributes a similar percentage of the GDP. The sources of the greatest farm income are livestock and dairy products. Among the biggest income-earning crops are wheat, oats, barley, corn, and canola. Canada is one of the world’s leading agricultural exporters, especially of wheat. Manitoba, Saskatchewan, and Alberta are the great grain-growing provinces, and, with Ontario, are also the leading sources of beef cattle. The main fruit-growing regions are found in Ontario, British Columbia, Quebec, and Nova Scotia. Apples and peaches are the principal fruits grown in Canada. More than half of the total land area is forest, and Canadian timber production ranks among the highest in the world.

Fishing is an important economic activity in Canada. Cod and lobster from the Atlantic and salmon from the Pacific have been the principal catches, but the cod industry was halted in the mid-1990s due to overfishing. About 75% of the take is exported. The fur industry, once vitally important but no longer dominant in the nation’s economy, is centered in Quebec and Ontario.

A major problem for Canada is that large segments of its economy—notably in manufacturing, petroleum, and mining—are controlled by foreign, especially U.S. interests. This deprives the nation of much of the profits of its industries and makes the economy vulnerable to developments outside Canada. This situation is mitigated somewhat by the fact that Canada itself is a large foreign investor. Since the free trade agreement with the United States (effective 1989), Canadian investment in U.S. border cities, such as Buffalo, N.Y., has increased dramatically.

The United States is by far Canada’s leading trade partner, followed by Japan and Great Britain. Manufactured goods comprise the bulk of imports; crude petroleum and motor vehicles and parts rank high among both the nation’s largest imports and exports. Other important exports are newsprint, lumber, wood pulp, wheat, machinery, aluminum, natural gas, hydroelectric power, and telecommunications equipment.

5. Government

Canada is an independent constitutional monarchy and a member of the Commonwealth of Nations. The monarch of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is also the monarch of Canada and is represented in the country by the office of governor-general. The basic constitutional document is the Canada Act of 1982, which replaced the British North America Act of 1867 and gave Canada the right to amend its own constitution. The Canada Act, passed by Great Britain, made possible the Constitution Act, 1982, which was passed in Canada. The document includes a Charter of Rights and Freedoms, which guarantees the rights of women and native peoples and protects other civil liberties.

The Canadian federal government has authority in all matters not specifically reserved to the provincial governments. The provincial governments have power in the fields of property, civil rights, education, and local government. They may levy only direct taxes. The federal government may veto any provincial law. Power on the federal level is exercised by the Canadian Parliament and the cabinet of ministers, headed by the prime minister. (See the table entitled Canadian Prime Ministers since Confederation for a list of Canada’s prime ministers.) Canada has an independent judiciary; the highest court is the Supreme Court, with nine members.

The Parliament has two houses: the Senate and the House of Commons. There are generally 104 senators, apportioned among the provinces and appointed by the governor-general upon the advice of the prime minister. Senators may serve until age 75; prior to 1965 they served for life. The 301 members of the House of Commons are elected, largely from single-member constituencies. Elections must be held at least every five years. The Commons may be dissolved and new elections held at the request of the prime minister. There are four main political parties: the Liberal party, the Conservative party (formed in 2003 by the merger of the Canadian Alliance and the Progressive Conservative party), the Bloc Quebecois (aligned with the Parti Quebecois of Quebec), and the New Democratic party.

6. History

Early History and French-British Rivalry

Prior to the arrival of Europeans in Canada, the area was inhabited by various peoples who came from Asia via the Bering Strait more than 10,000 years ago. The Vikings landed in Canada c.AD 1000. Their arrival is described in Icelandic sagas and confirmed by archaeological discoveries in Newfoundland. John Cabot , sailing under English auspices, touched the east coast in 1497. In 1534, the Frenchman Jacques Cartier planted a cross on the Gaspe Peninsula. These and many other voyages to the Canadian coast were in search of a northwest passage to Asia. Subsequently, French-English rivalry dominated Canadian history until 1763.

The first permanent European settlement in Canada was founded in 1605 by the sieur de Monts and Samuel de Champlain at Port Royal (now Annapolis Royal , N.S.) in Acadia . A trading post was established in Quebec in 1608. Meanwhile the English, moving to support their claims under Cabot’s discoveries, attacked Port Royal (1614) and captured Quebec (1629). However, the French regained Quebec (1632), and through the Company of New France (Company of One Hundred Associates), began to exploit the fur trade and establish new settlements. The French were primarily interested in fur trading. Between 1608 and 1640, fewer than 300 settlers arrived. The sparse French settlements sharply contrasted with the relatively dense English settlements along the Atlantic coast to the south. Under a policy initiated by Champlain, the French supported the Huron in their warfare against the Iroquois; later in the 17th cent., when the Iroquois crushed the Huron, the French colony came near extinction. Exploration, however, continued.