Matthew Evenden is a Professor of Geography who specializes in environmental history and historical geography, with a focus on water, rivers and energy. He completed his PhD at York University in 2000 under the supervision of Viv Nelles, for which he received the Governor General’s Gold Medal as well as the Rachel Carson Prize from the American Society of Environmental History for best dissertation of the year. He teaches in the areas of Canadian and comparative environmental history and historical geography. In 2011 he received a UBC Killam teaching prize.
Some of his major publications include Fish versus Power: An Environmental History of the Fraser River (Cambridge UP 2004), which received a Clio Prize from the Canadian Historical Association; The River Returns: An Environmental History of the Bow, co-authored with Christopher Armstrong and H.V. Nelles (McGill-Queen’s UP 2009); Urban Rivers: Re-making Cities, Rivers and Space in Europe and North America, co-edited with Stephane Castonguay (U Pittsburgh Press 2012); and Allied Power: Mobilizing Hydro-electricity during Canada’s Second World War (University of Toronto Press, 2015).
Recent research focuses on the environmental history of potable water and conflicts over hydro-electric development. Currently, Evenden is conducting new research on the global circulation and environmental impacts of ballast in the Age of Sail.
Evenden has served in several administrative roles. From 2019-2024, he was Associate Vice-President of Research & Innovation; from 2015-2019 he was Associate Dean (Research and Graduate Studies) in the Faculty of Arts and before that chair of Canadian Studies at UBC (2011-2015). He was also a founding executive member (2005-2015) of the Network in Canadian History and Environment/ Nouvelle initiative canadienne en histoire de l’environnement (NICHE) and co-director (2007-2015) with Stéphane Castonguay of the Canadian Water History Project/Projet sur l’histoire de l’eau au Canada.
Contact information:
Department of Geography, University of British Columbia, 1984 West Mall, Vancouver, BC CANADA V6T 1Z2
Phone: (Geography) 604.822.6407
Email: matthew evenden AT ubc ca (where AT=@, and space = .)