Women Writers' Archives - Expanding Systems of Enunciability

An Introduction

Abstract

This inaugural issue of the journal, The Women Writers’ Archive, grew out of and was the culmination of a graduate course offered through the English Department at Simon Fraser University on the territories of the Coast Salish peoples, including the səl̓ilw̓ətaʔɬ (Tsleil-Waututh), kʷikʷəƛ̓əm (Kwikwetlem), Sḵwx̱wú7mesh Úxwumixw (Squamish), and xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam) Nations. The course, titled Books, Bodies, and Borders: Women Writers’ (Trans)national Archives & Practices, took place in the winter of 2022 and featured four female authors as the focus of study: Pauline Johnson (Kanyen'kehà:ka, 1913-1861), Emily Carr (1871-1945), Jane Rule (1931-2007), and Sheila Watson (1909-1998). Collectively, these essays show the fascinating elements to women’s publications—the impediments to finding publication, the crucial interactions that informed their publications, the socio-political contexts that shaped what they produced and why they did so. They demonstrate how meaningfully archives shape our understanding of women writers—their lives, their contexts, and their contributions to the field of literature in Canada.