[4] In this same year, the CCA was established on June 1, 1979 during the Learned Societies Conference (now the Congress of the Humanities and Social Sciences) in Saskatoon, Canada.

[7] Part of the activities of the CCA in its early years was to address the combination of unique Canadian perspectives and the burgeoning theories on the nature and definition of communication.

Advancing the debate, especially at early CCA meetings and conferences were "pioneers of Canadian communication studies"[8] including: Earle Beattie, William Gilsdorf, Garth Jowett, Annie Mear, William Melody, Walter Romanow, Paul Rutherford, Liora Salter, Eugene Tate, James R. Taylor, Gaëtan Tremblay,[8] Gertrude Robinson[9] and others.

[10][11][12] In the early 1990s, news and discussion about the association was communicated by an electronic mailing list called CCANet.

[14] The executive governance structure for 2022-2024 is as follows: The conference is normally held during the Canadian Federation for the Humanities and Social Sciences Congress, a gathering of scholarly associations from across the country.