Guest Editors’ Note

Guest Editors' Note This special issue consists of a selection of papers from the thirty-second annual conference of the Canadian Association for American Studies, "Trade Marks: Commerce, Culture, and Identity After NAFTA." It was held on 17-20 October 1996 in Toronto. The conference, which was organized by Robert Adolph and Leslie Saunders, attracted scholars and students in many disciplines from Canada, the United States, Mexico, and Europe as well as participants from outside the academy: poets, journalists, lawyers, and administrators. The purpose of the conference was to serve as a meeting place for those interested in how the cultures of North America have been affected by the sweeping economic changes of the nineties powered by large corporations and governments commonly referred to as "globalization'' and of which the most characteristic institution on this side of the Atlantic is the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). The explicit or underlying theme of most of the papers in the present volume is perhaps best summarized by David Hutchison: "Does access to the culture of the United States necessitate the weakening or destruction of the cultures of other less economically powerful nations, and if it does, is it a price worth paying?" On behalf of the Canadian Association for American Studies, the editor would like to thank the following for their generous support of the conference: The Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada; The United States Information Service; and the President, VicePresident Academic, Deans of Atkinson College and the Faculty of Arts, and the Chair, Division of Humanities, all of York University. This special issue is dedicated to the memory of Catherine Keachie, president for ten years of the Canadian Magazine Publishers' Association, and at the centre of the struggle for a strong national cultural policy described by many of the contributors in the following pages. I am deeply grateful to the external readers of the manuscripts, the encouragement of Christine Bold and Stephen Randall, and above all to our copy editor and editorial assistant Eileen Delman. Robert Adolph vii ...