Indigenous Studies
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500 Years of Indigenous Resistance
Gord Hill
The history of the colonization of the Americas by Europeans is often portrayed as a mutually beneficial process, in which ”civilization” was brought to the Natives, who in return shared their land and cultures. A more critical history might present it as a genocide in which Indigenous peoples were helpless victims, overwhelmed by European military power. In reality, neither of these views is correct. This book is more than a history of European colonization of the Americas. In this… (more information)
Aboriginal Fishing Rights
Laws, Courts, Politics
Parnesh Sharma
This book examines the nature of aboriginal fishing rights before and after the Sparrow decision from a perspective of whether disadvantaged groups are able to use the law to advance their causes of social progress and equality. It includes interviews with the key players in the fishing industry: the Musqueam Indian Band, the Department of Fisheries and Oceans and the commercial industry. It concludes that aboriginal fishing rights remain subject to arbitrary control and examines why and how… (more information)
Aboriginal Oral Traditions
Theory, Practice, Ethics
Edited by Renate Eigenbrod, Renée Hulan
Oral traditions are a distinct way of knowing and the means by which knowledge is reproduced, preserved and transferred from generation to generation. The conference from which these essays were selected created an opportunity for people to come together and exchange information and experiences over three days. The scholarship may be grouped into three broad areas: oral traditions and knowledge of the environment, economy, education and/or health of communities; oral traditions and continuance of… (more information)
Accounting for Genocide
Canada’s Bureaucratic Assault on Aboriginal People
Dean Neu, Richard Therrien
Accounting for Genocide is an original and controversial book that retells the history of the subjugation and ongoing economic marginalization of Canada’s Indigenous peoples. Its authors demonstrate the ways in which successive Canadian governments have combined accounting techniques and economic rationalizations with bureaucratic mechanisms—soft technologies—to deprive Native peoples of their land and natural resources and to control the minutiae of their daily economic and social… (more information)
Aski Awasis/Children of the Earth
First Peoples Speaking on Adoption
Edited by Jeannine Carrière
The adoption of Aboriginal children into non-Aboriginal families has a long and contentious history in Canada. Life stories told by First Nations people reveal that the adoption experience has been far from positive for these communities and has, in fact, been an integral aspect of colonization. In an effort to decolonize adoption practices, the Yellowhead Tribal Services Agency (YTSA) in Alberta has integrated customary First Peoples’ adoption practices with provincial adoption laws and regulations… (more information)
Bathtubs but No Water
A Tribute to the Mushuau Innu
Gerry Steele
In 1967, the Mushuau Innu — the Aboriginal people of Labrador — were resettled on Davis Inlet by the Canadian government. Originally a land-based people, this move to the coast created cultural, economic and spiritual upheaval, and Davis Inlet became synonymous with shocking substance abuse and suicide rates. In Bathtubs but No Water, Gerry Steele offers the reader a participant observer’s perspective on Davis Inlet. An employee of the federal government working with the Mushuau… (more information)
Beyond Blood
Rethinking Indigenous Identity
Pamela Palmater
“For hundreds of years, we have struggled to survive amid a patrilineal system of government. We will not continue to allow government policy to manage our affairs, decide who is Aboriginal or not based on blood quantum ....” – Chief Candice Paul, St. Mary’s First Nation Author Pamela Palmater argues that the Indian Act’s registration provisions (will lead to the extinguishment of First Nations as legal and constitutional entities. The current… (more information)
Circleworks
Transforming Eurocentric Conciousness
Fyre Jean Graveline
This book is intended to contribute to both the theoretical debate and classroom practice in the field of education. It explores the legitimacy of Aboriginal, holistic paradigms within some of the diverse frameworks available to educators: experiential learning, feminist and anti-racist pedagogies are emphasized. It documents an effort to interrupt current Aboriginal/European power relations by evolving an alternative Aboriginal teaching model and enacting it within university classrooms. This work… (more information)
Cree Narrative Memory
From Treaties to Contemporary Times
Neal McLeod
Neal McLeod examines the history of the nêhiyawak (Cree People) of western Canada from the massive upheavals of the 1870s and the reserve period to the vibrant cultural and political rebirth of contemporary times. Central to the text are the narratives of McLeod’s family, which give first hand examples of the tenacity and resiliency of the human spirit while providing a rubric for reinterpreting the history of Indigenous people, drawing on Cree worldviews and Cree narrative structures… (more information)
Decolonizing Methodologies
2nd edition
Linda Tuhiwai Smith
To the colonized, the term ‘research’ is conflated with colonialism; academic research steeped in imperialism remains a painful reality. This essential volume explores intersections of imperialism and research–specifically, the ways in which imperialism is embedded in disciplines of knowledge and tradition as ‘regimes of truth.’ Concepts such as ‘discovery’ and ‘claiming’ are discussed and an argument presented that the decolonization of research… (more information)
Differing Visions
Administering Indian Residential Schooling in Prince Albert, 1867-1995
Noel Dyck
”This book tells the story of how residential schooling for Indian children has been administered in Prince Albert for more than a century. In some ways, our experience of residential schooling has been similar to that of other Aboriginal peoples throughout Canada and other countries. In other ways, however, our story is quite different. At a time when Indian residential schools were closing elsewhere in Canada, the people of the Prince Albert Grant Council saw a need to take over and completely… (more information)
Duty to Consult
New Relationships with Aboriginal Peoples
Brian K. Murphy, Dwight Newman
Canada’s Supreme Court has established a new legal framework requiring governments to consult with Aboriginal peoples when contemplating actions that may affect their rights. The nature of the duty is to be defined by negotiation, best practices, and future court decisions. According to Professor Newman, good consultations are about developing relationships and finding ways of living together in the encounter that history has thrust upon us. Professor Newman examines Supreme Court and lower… (more information)
Elusive Justice
Beyond the Marshall Inquiry
Edited by Joy Mannette
“The Marshall Commission Report does not deserve accolades. While it acknowledges errors, negligence and mismanagement, it did not make the connections necessary to begin the process of developing a dialogue about a justice system that Aboriginal people can respect, or which respects Aboriginal people.” - M.E. Turpel, Dalhousie Law School (more information)
Healing Wounded Hearts
Fyre Jean Graveline
Healing Wounded Hearts brings together stories, poems and artwork that illustrate the struggles and strengths that Fyre Jean has, as a Métis Woman, living everyday in intersecting, parallel, sometimes colliding, socio-cultural realities. Baring her Heart and Soul, she shares personal, painful, spiritual discoveries of how life and worlds work, through Stories that have grown her into who she is. Through a blend of original research, reflective journals and creative use of dialogue, people… (more information)
In Their Own Voices
Building Urban Aboriginal Communities
Parvin Ghorayshi, Peter Gorzen, Joan Hay, Cyril Keeper, Darlene Klyne, Michael MacKenzie, Jim Silver, Freeman Simard
In Their Own Voices is an examination of the urban Aboriginal experience, based on the voices of Aboriginal people. It is set in Winnipeg’s inner city, but has implications for urban Aboriginal people across Canada. While not glossing over the problems that confront urban Aboriginal people, the book focuses primarily on innovative community-based solutions being created and run by and for urban Aboriginal people. Separate chapters examine Aboriginal involvement in community development, adult… (more information)
Indigenous Diplomacy and the Rights of Peoples
Achieving UN Recognition
James (Sa’ke’j) Youngblood Henderson
Despite centuries of sustained attacks against their collective existence, Indigenous peoples represent over 5,000 languages and cultures in more than 70 nations on six continents. Most have retained social, cultural, economic, and political characteristics distinct from other segments of national populations. Yet recognition of their humanity and rights has been a struggle to achieve. Based on personal experience, James (Sa’ke’j) Youngblood Henderson documents the generation-long struggle… (more information)
Issumatuq
Learning from the Traditional Healing Wisdom of the Canadian Inuit
Kit Minor
Through the development of a culture-specific design the author shows us how Inuit people, in a working relationship with members of the dominant culture, can continue to define and decide on appropriate helping skills. (more information)
Journeying Forward
Dreaming First Nations’ Independence
Patricia Monture-Angus
Activist and scholar Patricia Monture-Angus examines her own intellectual and personal colonization as a way to share ideas about what she, as a Mohawk woman, sees as the next steps on the path to finding a solution to the continued oppression of First Nations people. She is dissatisfied with the circuitous progress with which Aboriginal claims and issues are being dealt with in both Canadian courts and Canadian politics. As well, because many current day First Nations political institutions are… (more information)
Kaandossiwin
How We Come to Know
Kathleen Absolon (Minogiizhigokwe)
Indigenous methodologies have been silenced and obscured by the Western scientific means of knowledge production. In a challenge to this colonialist rejection of Indigenous knowledge, Anishinaabe researcher Kathleen Absolon examines the academic work of fourteen Indigenous scholars who utilize Indigenous worldviews in their search for knowing. Through an examination not only of their work but also of their experience in producing that work, Kaandossiwin describes how Indigenous researchers re-theorize… (more information)
Keeping the Land
Kitchenuhmaykoosib Inninuwug, Reconciliation and Canadian Law
Rachel Ariss
When the Kitchenuhmaykoosib Inninuwug’s traditional territory was threatened by mining explora- tion in 2006, they followed their traditional duty to protect the land and asked the mining exploration company, Platinex, to leave. Platinex left — and then sued the remote First Nation for $10 billion. The ensuing legal dispute lasted two years and eventually resulted in the jailing of community lead- ers. Ariss argues that though this jailing was extraordinarily punitive and is indicative… (more information)
L’sitkuk
The Story of the Bear River Mi’kmaw Community
Darlene A. Ricker
“We have endured slavery, starvation, genocide and wars, but the spirit of our people has survived. We have one battle left to fight — ourselves.” — L’sitkuk Chief Frank Meuse Jr L’sitkuk (pronounced elsetkook) is the original name for the Bear River Mi’kmaw community, which is part of the Mi’kmaw First Nation. Nestled close to the Bear River watershed, this tiny native community is regaining its culture, language and identity after hundreds of years… (more information)
Language of this Land Mi’kma’ki
Edited by Bernie Francis, Trudy Sable
The ancient landscapes of Eastern North America are reflected in the language and cultural expressions – the legends, songs and dances – of its Indigenous peoples, the Mi’kmaq. The rhythms, sounds and patterns of their language are inextricably bound with the seasonal cycles of the animals, plants, winds, skies, waterways and trade routes. Language has sustained the Mi’kmaq to the present day, a product of a lineage of Elders who spoke it, who danced the dances… (more information)
Making a Living
Food, Place, and Economy in an Inuit Community
Nicole Gombay
Although food is vital to our daily lives, we tend to be unaware of the particulars of where it came from and how it was produced. We simply go to the market and buy what we need in neatly packaged containers. But what was required to get that food there in the first place? In some societies obtaining food is not merely a matter of going to market. Instead it involves the active participation of community members in its harvesting, distributing, and sharing so that ideally no one goes without. Such… (more information)
Making Space for Indigenous Feminism
Edited by Joyce Green
The majority of scholarly and activist opinion by and about Aboriginal women claims that feminism is irrelevant for them. Yet, there is also an articulate, theoretically informed and activist constituency that identifies as feminist. By and about Aboriginal feminists, this book provides a powerful and original intellectual and political contribution demonstrating that feminism has much to offer Aboriginal women in their struggles against oppression. The contributors are from Canada, the USA, Sami… (more information)
Names, Numbers and Northern Policy
Inuit, Project Surname, and the Politics of Identity
Valerie Alia
Names are the cornerstones of cultures. They identify individuals, represent life, express and embody power. When power is unequal and people are colonized at one level or another, naming is manipulated form the outside. In the Canadian North, the most blatant example of this manipulation is the long history of interference by visitors with the ways to Inuit named themselves and their land. This book is a concise history of government-sponsored interference with Inuit identity. (more information)
Negotiating the Numbered Treaties
An Intellectual and Political Biography of Alexander Morris
Robert Talbot
Alexander Morris, the main negotiatior of many of the numbered treaties on the prairies, has often been portrayed as a parsimonious agent of the government, bent on taking advantage of First Nations chiefs and councillors. Author Robert J. Talbot takes a different view. He sees Morris as a man deeply sympathetic to the challenges faced by Canada’s Indigenous peoples as they sought to secure their future in the face of encroaching settlement and the disappearance of the buffalo. In Talbot&rsquo… (more information)
No Nonsense Guide to Indigenous Peoples
2nd edition
Lotte Hughes
Since the first edition of the No-Nonsense Guide to Indigenous Peoples was published in 2003, much has changed. The United Nations General Assembly has adopted the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. Indigenous rights have become an increasingly important subject in international law, with Bolivia’s first indigenous president, Evo Morales, arguing on the international stage from an indigenous perspective, and introducing policies benefiting indigenous communities through… (more information)
No Place for Violence
Canadian Aboriginal Alternatives
Edited by Sharon Perrault, Jocelyn Proulx
Family violence has become an issue of significant concern within the Aboriginal community. One of the unique aspects of family violence within this community is its link to the history of colonization. This volume presents a number of studies on the effects of colonization, the need for programming specific to and by Aboriginal people and the efforts made by the Aboriginal community to meet that need. The success and respect that these projects have elicited from the community will build confidence… (more information)
Out of the Depths (New Extended Edition)
The Experiences of Mi’kmaw Childrn at the Indian Residential School at Shubenacadie, Nova Scotia
Isabelle Knockwood
“The Residential School experience had serious negative consequences for many of our people who have suffered in silence for too long. It is time to take the first step and let others know they are not alone in their suffering. No matter how painful, the stories of our people must be told and heard. Through sharing our past, we can begin to heal ourselves, our communities, our people as we look to a better tomorrow.” —Phil Fontaine, Grand Chief, Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs, former… (more information)
Politics of Indigeneity
Dialogues and Reflections on Indigenous Activism
Edited by Emma Hughes, Sita Venkateswar
Provocative and original, The Politics of Indigeneity explores the concept of indigeneity across the world–from the Americas to New Zealand, Africa to Asia–and the ways in which it intersects with local, national and international social and political realities. Taking on the role of critical interlocutors, the authors engage in extended dialogue with indigenous spokespersons and activists, as well as between each other. In doing so, they explore the possibilities of a ‘second-… (more information)
Postcolonial Sovereignty
The Nisga’a Final Agreement
Tracy Lea Scott
In 1999 the Nisga’a First Nation in Northwestern British Columbia signed a landmark agreement which not only settled their land claim but outlined significant powers that could be exercised by its government. This book analyzes the impact the agreement has on federal/provincial/First Nations relations, but also in a concise manner examines the major terms of the agreement. The author summarizes the settlement and, more importantly, the powers over land, resources, education, and cultural policy… (more information)
Protecting Indigenous Knowledge and Heritage
A Global Challenge
Marie Battiste, James (Sa’ke’j) Youngblood Henderson
Whether the approximately 500 million Indigenous Peoples in the world live in Canada, the United States, Australia, India, Peru, or Russia, they have faced a similar fate at the hands of colonizing powers. That has included assaults on their language and culture, commercialization of their art, and use of their plant knowledge in the development of medicine, all without consent, acknowledgement, or benefit to them. The authors paint a passionate picture of the devastation these assaults have… (more information)
Racialized Policing
Aboriginal People’s Encounters With the Police
Elizabeth Comack
Policing is a controversial subject, generating considerable debate. One issue of concern has been “racial profiling” by police, that is, the alleged practice of targeting individuals and groups on the basis of “race.” Racialized Policing argues that the debate has been limited by its individualized frame. As well, the concen- tration on police relations with people of colour means that Aboriginal people’s encounters with police receive far less scrutiny. Going beyond… (more information)
Realizing the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples
Triumph, Hope, and Action
Edited by Jackie Hartley, Paul Joffe, Jennifer Preston
Adopted by the UN General Assembly on 13 September 2007, the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples affirms the “minimum standards for the survival, dignity and well-being of the indigenous peoples of the world.” The Declaration responds to past and ongoing injustices suffered by Indigenous peoples worldwide. It provides a strong foundation for improved relationships with states, and for the full recognition of the inherent rights of Indigenous peoples. Despite… (more information)
Research Is Ceremony
Indigenous Research Methods
Shawn Wilson
Indigenous researchers are knowledge seekers who work to progress Indigenous ways of being, knowing and doing in a modern and constantly evolving context. This book describes a research paradigm shared by Indigenous scholars in Canada and Australia, and demonstrates how this paradigm can be put into practice. Relationships don’t just shape Indigenous reality, they are our reality. Indigenous researchers develop relationships with ideas in order to achieve enlightenment in the ceremony that… (more information)
Seeking Mino-Pimatisiwin
An Aboriginal Approach to Helping
Michael Hart
Historically, social work and psychology professions have pressured and coerced Aboriginal peoples to follow the euro-centric ways of society. The needs of Aboriginal peoples have not been successfully addressed by helping professioan due to a limited attempt to incorporate Aboriginal perspectives and practices of helping. Michael Hart briefly discusses colonization from an Aboriginal perspective, ontological imperialism, social work’s role in colonial oppression, and the dynamic of resistance… (more information)
Songlines to Satellites
Indigenous Communication in Australia, the South Pacific and Canada
Michael Meadows, Helen Molnar
Songlines to Satellites explores the developmental history and policy environments of the Indigenous media sectors in Australia, New Zealand, the South Pacific Island countries and Canada. Helen Molnar and Michael Meadows detail how communication technologies have been pioneered by Indigenous communities and used as cultural, social and political resources. Songlines to Satellites is based on interviews with hundreds of Indigenous people in Australia, the South Pacific and Canada, over a thirteen… (more information)
The Fourth World
An Indigenous Perspective on Feminism and Aboriginal Women’s Activism
Grace Ouellette
This book is not about feminism. Rather, feminism is the basis of the discussion, an example of how understanding oppression must consider a number of barriers. Euro-Canadian feminists rarely address the circumstances that are unique to First Nations’ women, instead working with the assumption that all women are a part of a similar struggle. Ouellette attempts to confront these barriers. Throughout interviews with a number of women, she highlights the following four questions. To what extent… (more information)
The Mi’kmaw Concordat
James (Sekej) Youngblood Henderson
This important work, written primarily as a Native Studies text, fills a large gap in the history of Native peoples in the Americas. It is a fascinating multidisciplinary journey covering intellectual history, law, political science, religious studies, and Mi’kmaw legends, oral history and perceptions from the arrival in America by Columbus and other Europeans in the fifteenth century to the Mi’kmaw Concordat in the early seventeenth century. There is virtually nothing else in print… (more information)
The Tragedy of Progress
Marxism, Modernity and the Aboriginal Question
David Bedford, Danielle Irving-Stephens
The Left in Canada has had an uneasy relationship with the Aboriginal struggle for justice. There is a natural sympathy and alliance between the working class and its political representatives who are struggling against the exploitation of labour and Aboriginal peoples and nations who are resisting the dispossession of their lands and the loss of their culture. Yet the co-incidence of interests has very rarely led to any support by labour and the Left for Aboriginal resistance. In fact, rather than… (more information)
Thunder in my Soul
A Mohawk Woman Speaks
Patricia Monture-Angus
This book contains the reflections of one Mohawk woman and her struggles to find a good place to be in Canadian society. The essays, written in enjoyable and accessible language, document the struggles against oppression that Aboriginal people face, as well as the success and change that have come to Aboriginal communities. It speaks to both the mind and the heart. (more information)
Walking This Path Together
Anti-Racist and Anti-Oppressive Child Welfare Practice
Edited by Jeannine Carrière, Susan Strega
This book offers students and experienced practitioners alike the opportunity to explore a range of visions, strategies and concrete skills for anti-racist and anti-oppressive child welfare practice. Significant topics and emerging practice approaches are addressed by contributors who share a passionate commitment to the transformation of child welfare through socially just practices. The book challenges the current Anglo-American child welfare paradigm by centring Indigenous perspectives and voices… (more information)
We Were Not the Savages (3rd Edition) First Nations History
Collision between European and Native American Civilizations
Daniel N. Paul
As a person of First Nation ancestry I cannot help but wonder if the failure of Caucasian Americans and Canadians to reveal and teach about the horrors their ancestors carried out against North American First Nation Peoples is a deliberate cover-up, or an indication they hold within their minds a notion the life of a First Nation person is valueless—not worthy of human considerations. The latter is probably the more plausible, because it is an unchallengeable fact that the crimes against humanity… (more information)
Wícihitowin
Aboriginal Social Work in Canada
Gord Bruyere, Michael Anthony Hart, Raven Sinclair
Wícihitowin is the first Canadian social work book written by First Nations, Inuit and Métis authors who are educators at schools of social work across Canada. The book begins by presenting foundational theoretical perspectives that develop an understanding of the history of colonization and theories of decolonization and Indigenist social work. It goes on to explore issues and aspects of social work practice with Indigenous people to assist educators, researchers, students and practitioners… (more information)