There is a hunger for and urgent need to provide readable, attractive material on Canada’s rich history to newcomers and first-generation Canadians alike who currently rely on their own multilingual publications for much of their information.

The common threads of the civic, political and social development of this country, and the more recent changes wrought by waves of postwar immigration are simply not understood or shared by a growing majority of newer Canadians. This lack of a common historical vocabulary and knowledge severely weakens us as a nation and leads to a lack of civic participation and hinders the development of a common identity.

“This nationwide project has been especially designed with Canada’s newcomers in mind, to provide them with access to information about Canada — how our country developed, how it works — published in their newspapers of choice,” says Lori Abittan, President & CEO of Multimedia Nova Corporation, Canada’s largest diversity publisher and printer.

This civic literacy project is a unique, 52-week Canadian series intended for all Canadians.  Through the partner publisher network of Diversity Media Services (DMS) and Lingua Ads, multicultural marketing divisions of Multimedia Nova, the series is being made available free of charge to select partners of its Canadian multilingual newspaper and online publisher network.

“Our unique network which, in addition to our own, reaches a potential audience of over 5.8 million households,” adds Abittan, “which we describe as the New Mainstream™.  We hope The Canadian Experience series will make a major contribution to Canadian unity and to the education of Canada’s citizenry.”

The project’s themes, column titles, content and authors have been established by an Advisory Board and led by distinguished Editor, prominent historian J.L. Granatstein.