Associate Professor
BA University of New Brunswick
MA Dalhousie University
PhD University of New Brunswick
902-457-5975
martha.walls@msvu.ca
Martha Walls holds a BA and PhD from the University of New Brunswick and an MA from Dalhousie University. Her research areas include Indigenous-State relations in eastern Canda (the unceded territories of the Mi’kmaq and Wolastoqiyik ) and her book, “no need of a chief for this band”: The Maritime Mi’kmaq and Federal Electoral Legislation, 1899-1951, was published by UBC Press in 2010. Her work has also appeared in Acadiensis, the Canadian Journal of Native Studies, and the Journal of the Canadian Historical Association.
Martha is currently finishing a SSHRC-funded study of the Micmac Community Development Program and has recently turned her research attention to the history of disability in a medical context.
At MSVU Martha teaches courses in women’s, Indigenous, educational and disability history in Canada and Atlantic Canada.
Books
“no need of a chief for this band”: The Maritime Mi’kmaq and Federal Electoral Legislation, 1899-1951. Vancouver: UBC Press, 2010.
Select Articles
With Cornelia Schneider, “Uninformed comments on autism are resonant of dangerous ideas about eugenics.” The Conversation, 27 May 2025, https://theconversation.com/uninformed-comments-on-autism-are-resonant-of-dangerous-ideas-about-eugenics-256762
“Prenatal Testing, Genetic Advocacy and the ‘Burden of Down Syndrome’ in 1970s Nova Scotia.” The Acadiensis Blog, March 19, 2025, https://acadiensis.wordpress.com/2025/03/19/prenatal-testing-genetic-advocacy-and-the-burden-of-down-syndrome-in-1970s-nova-scotia/
“Physicians, Public Discourse, and Passive Euthanasia of Infants with Down Syndrome in the Late-Twentieth Century.” Canadian Journal of Health History. 41, 1 (April 2024): 100-128.
“The TRC, Reconciliation, and the Shubenacadie Residential School.” Acadiensis. 50, 2 (Autumn 2021): 72-84.
“The Complex Truth: Intersections between Day Schools and the Shubenacadie Residential Scholl,” ActiveHistory.ca, 14 November 2019, http://activehistory.ca/2019/11/the-complex-truth-intersections-between-day-schools-and-the-shubenacadie-residential-school/. Reprinted in Nova Scotia Advocate, https://nsadvocate.org/2019/11/19/the-complex-truth-intersections-between-day-schools-and-the-shubenacadie-residential-school/.
With Clingon Debogorksi, Magdalena Milosz, and Karen Bridget Murray, “Education ‘After’ Residential Schools,” ActiveHistory.ca, 24 October 2019.
“Mi’kmaw Politicism and the Origins of the Micmac Community Development Program, 1900-1957.” Journal of the Royal Nova Scotia Historical Society. Vol. 20 (2017): 1-17.
“Confederation and Maritime First Nations.” Acadiensis. 46, 2 (Summer/Autumn 2017): 155-176.
“The Disposition of the Ladies: Mi’kmaw women and the Removal of the King’s Road Reserve, Sydney, Nova Scotia.” Journal of Canadian Studies. 50, 3, (Fall 2017): 538-65.
“Mi’kmaw Women and St. Francis Xavier University’s Micmac Community Development Program, 1958-1970.” Acadiensis. 44, 2 (Summer/Autumn 2015): 51-74.
“‘[t]he teacher that cannot understand their language should not be allowed’: Colonialism, Resistance, and Female Mi’kmaw Teachers in New Brunswick Day Schools, 1900-1923.” Journal of the Canadian Historical Association. 22, 1 (2011): 35-68.
“‘part of that whole system’: Maritime Day and Residential Schooling and Federal Culpability.” Canadian Journal of Native Studies. 30, 2 (Winter 2010): 361-385.
“Countering the ‘Kingsclear Blunder’: Maliseet Resistance to the Kingsclear Relocation Plan, 1945 1949.” Acadiensis. 37, 1 (Winter/Spring 2008): 3-30.