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Genocide is the intentional destruction of a particular group through killing, serious physical or mental harm, preventing births and/or forcibly transferring children to another group. The Canadian government has formally recognized certain instances of genocide abroad, including the Armenian genocide, the Holodomor, the Holocaust, the Rwandan genocide, the ethnic cleansing in Bosnia, the Uyghur genocide and the Rohingya genocide. Within Canada, some historians, legal scholars and activists have claimed that the historical, intergenerational and present treatment of Indigenous peoples are acts of genocide.

Piracy is traditionally defined as the seizure and robbery of craft at sea or in the air. Though piracy had only a small role in Canada’s history, it has been the subject of legendary tales over the years. Pirates traversed the Atlantic coast of the country during the 17th and 18th centuries, plundering and causing mayhem wherever they went. Stories about pirates like Peter Easton and Bartholomew Roberts remain a part of local histories. While maritime piracy is no longer a significant threat in Canada, it remains so in parts of Asia, Africa, South America and Central America. The Canadian Armed Forces have assisted in anti-piracy missions in various parts of the world. In the modern age, piracy has taken on new forms, such as virtual crime and digital theft. Online piracy poses threats to the Canadian people, industries and economy.

Canadian Forces Base Gagetown (or CFB Gagetown) functions primarily as the combat-training centre for the Canadian Army and comprises 111,000 hectares between Fredericton and Saint John, New Brunswick, west of the Saint John River.

Indigenous archaeology is a set of approaches to archaeology with, by and for Indigenous peoples. In particular, Indigenous archaeology is practised in colonial nations such as Canada, the United States, Australia and New Zealand. Indigenous archaeology emerged out of Indigenous peoples voicing their concerns about non-Indigenous archaeologists studying Indigenous pasts without engaging with Indigenous peoples in the present. Indigenous archaeology brings together Indigenous peoples and archaeologists through partnerships and collaborations. Together, they work to understand the past in ways that consider multiple perspectives and integrate Indigenous knowledge into archaeological interpretation.

The Canadian Music Hall of Fame was established in 1978 by the Canadian Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences (CARAS). It honours individuals or groups that have made an outstanding contribution to the international recognition of Canadian artists and music. For many years, a sole inductee was presented annually at the Juno Awards. Since 2019, multiple inductees have also been presented annually at a separate ceremony at the National Music Centre in Calgary.

Based on geological history, Canada can be divided into six regions, each characterized by a distinctive landscape: the Canadian Shield, Interior Platform, Appalachian Orogen, Innuitian Orogen, Cordillera and Western Canada Sedimentary Basin, and the Eastern Continental Margin.

Humans wrestled first for survival and eventually for sport; in fact, drawings on cave walls portray a form of freestyle wrestling. Wall paintings in Egyptian tombs from about 2000 BC depict matches that show moves very similar to those practised today.

The North American Indigenous Games (NAIG) — in French Jeux Autochtones de l’Amerique du Nord (JAAN) — is both a multisport event and a cultural celebration involving young athletes from across the continent. The 10th games will be held in Nova Scotia. Nova Scotia is part of Mi’kma’ki, the traditional and ancestral territory of the Mi’kmaq people. They will take place at 21 venues in Halifax, Dartmouth and the Millbrook First Nation (see First Nations in Nova Scotia) from 15 to 23 July 2023. More than 5,000 athletes, coaches and team staff from over 755 Indigenous Nations (see Indigenous Peoples in Canada) are expected to attend, supported by 3,000 volunteers.

In 1970, the federal government undertook a program, known as Project Surname, to assign last names to Inuit in northern Canada. These surnames were to replace the personal disc numbers (see Inuit Disc Numbers) that Inuit had been given by the Canadian government in the 1940s. Some Inuit and non-Inuit viewed Project Surname as a more effective and politically correct system of identification. Others saw it as another instrument of paternalism.

The New Left was an international political movement of the 1960s, mainly of youth and students, which originated in the "Ban the Bomb" movement of the late 1950s. It expanded to include issues such as the Vietnam War, Third World liberation struggles, women's liberation, education, ecology, and popular culture. Critical of the Old Left (Social Democracy and Marxism-Leninism) and its alienating hierarchical, centralized and bureaucratic structures, the New Left proposed local control of the political process, accessibility to political and social institutions and participatory democracy.

The Kanesatake Resistance, also known as the Oka Crisis or the Mohawk Resistance at Kanesatake, was a 78-day standoff (11 July–26 September 1990) between Kanyen'kehà:ka (Mohawk) protesters, Quebec police, the RCMP and the Canadian Army. It took place in the community of Kanesatake, near the Town of Oka, on the north shore of Montreal. Related protests and violence occurred in the Kahnawake reserve, to the south of Montreal. The crisis was sparked by the proposed expansion of a golf course and the development of townhouses on disputed land in Kanesatake that included a Kanyen'kehà:ka burial ground. Tensions were high, particularly after the death of Corporal Marcel Lemay, a Sûreté du Québec police officer. Eventually, the army was called in and the protest ended. The golf course expansion was cancelled, and the land was purchased by the federal government. However, it did not establish the land as a reserve, and there has since been no organized transfer of the land to the Mohawks of Kanesatake.

This is the full-length entry about Kanesatake Resistance (Oka Crisis). For a plain-language summary, please see Kanesatake Resistance (Oka Crisis)(Plain-Language Summary).

The Charlottetown Conference set Confederation in motion. It was held from 1–9 September 1864 in Charlottetown, with additional meetings the following week in Halifax, Saint John and Fredericton. The conference was organized by delegates from New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island to discuss the union of their three provinces. They were persuaded by a contingent from the Province of Canada, who were not originally on the guest list, to work toward the union of all the British North American colonies. The Charlottetown Conference was followed by the Quebec Conference (10–27 October 1864) and the London Conference (December 1866–March 1867). They culminated in Confederation on 1 July 1867.

The Canadian Rangers are a unique organization within the Armed Forces, created to provide a paramilitary presence in the North and in other remote areas made up of mainly local Indigenous populations. The current number of Canadian Rangers in 2021 is roughly 5,000.

For many centuries, a legend has persisted that gunpowder was invented in China. Until recently, however, there was no real proof to support the story. In 1986, a team of researchers headed by Dr. Joseph Neeham at Cambridge University published the necessary evidence.

Bannock is a form of bread that served as a staple in the diets of early settlers and fur traders. Most Indigenous nations in North America have some version of bannock. Inuit call it palauga, Mi’kmaq luskinikn, and Ojibwe ba‘wezhiganag. The word derives from the Gaelic bannach, meaning morsel, which in turn likely came from the Latin panis, which means bread. Bannock is usually unleavened, oval-shaped and flat. The version that we know today came from Scotland. In its most rudimentary form, it is made of flour, water, and fat or lard. Milk, salt, and sugar are often added, depending on the recipe. It is traditionally cooked by mixing the ingredients into a large, round biscuit and baked in a frying pan. Today, most often, bannock is baked in the oven, making it heavy and dense; or it is pan-fried, light and fluffy; or it is deep-fried.

The Northern Star Award (formerly the Lou Marsh Trophy) is presented annually to Canada’s best athlete. It is decided by a committee of Canadian sports journalists convened by the Toronto Star. First awarded in 1936, the prize was originally named after sports journalist Lou Marsh. Calls to change the name of the award — due to Marsh’s long, documented history of racism and discrimination — led to it being renamed the Northern Star Award in November 2022. The trophy is made of black marble and stands about 75 cm high. It is kept on exhibit at Canada’s Sports Hall of Fame. The most recent winner is hockey player Marie-Philip Poulin.

In 1858, around 30,000 gold seekers flooded the banks of the Fraser River from Hope to just north of Lillooet in British Columbia’s first significant gold rush. Although it dissipated by the mid-1860s, the Fraser River Gold Rush had a significant impact on the area’s Indigenous peoples and resulted in the Fraser Canyon War. Fears that the massive influx of American miners would lead the United States to annex the non-sovereign British territory known as New Caledonia also resulted in the founding of British Columbia as a colony on 2 August 1858 (see The Fraser River Gold Rush and the Founding of British Columbia). By the mid-1860s, the Fraser Rush collapsed, and British Columbia sank into a recession.

In 1982, Canada fully broke from its colonial past and “patriated” its Constitution. It transferred the country’s highest law, the British North America Act (which was renamed the Constitution Act, 1867), from the authority of the British Parliament to Canada’s federal and provincial legislatures. The Constitution was also updated with a new amending formula and a Charter of Rights and Freedoms. These changes occurred after a fierce, 18-month political and legal struggle that dominated headlines and the agendas of every government in the country.

In the early 20th Century, the Ross rifle, a Canadian-made infantry rifle, was produced as an alternative to the British-made Lee-Enfield rifle. The Ross rifle was used during the First World War, where it gained a reputation as an unreliable weapon among Canadian soldiers. By 1916, the Ross had been mostly replaced by the Lee-Enfield.