Eetsii Tthak T'agwahii Getr'ootanahchàh
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How Indigenous Storytelling Shapes Residential School Testimony
Restorying Relationships and Performing Resurgence: How Indigenous Storytelling Shapes Residential School Testimony by Melanie Braith A Thesis submitted to the Faculty of Graduate Studies of The University of Manitoba in partial fulfilment of the requirements of the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY Department of English, Theatre, Film, and Media University of Manitoba Winnipeg Copyright © 2020 by Melanie Braith i Abstract This dissertation argues that an understanding of Indigenous storytelling can change how audiences engage with residential school survivors’ testimonies. From 2009 to 2015, Canada’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) recorded residential school survivors’ stories. The National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation published these recordings online to meet survivors’ desire for their stories to be a learning opportunity. Any audience’s learning process is, however, contingent on their understanding of testimony. The most prominent Western understandings of testimony come from the contexts of courtroom testimony and trauma theory. Their theoretical underpinnings, however, emerge from epistemologies that are often incommensurable with Indigenous epistemologies, which can lead to a misreading of residential school testimonies. Looking at residential school testimonies through the lens of Indigenous oral storytelling, an inherently relational practice that creates and takes care of relationships, is an ethical alternative that allows audiences to recognize how these testimonies are a future-oriented process and restore relationships and responsibilities. My main argument is that Indigenous literatures can teach us how to apply the principles of Indigenous storytelling to residential school testimony. Indigenous epistemologies understand theory as a way of explaining processes by enacting those processes. Based on this, I argue that residential school novels reflect on the process of telling residential school stories by way of telling them. -
Porcupines and China Dolls
Canadians will likely never visit their northern regions, but anyone with an interest in the Arctic would do well to read Ritter’s account. Although it has been three-quarters of a century since she visited Spitsbergen and wrote her story, many parts of the circumpolar “Arctic wilderness” are much the same today as when she witnessed it. However, in a few years, climate change, melting ice, international shipping lanes, resource exploration and development, increased settlement, and demand for wildlife will transform the Arctic forever. The publication of Ritter’s memories is an important contribution to our knowledge of what is still one of the last frontiers of our modern world. Perhaps the lessons that Ritter learned from the untouched Arctic can be imparted to others, and with a knowledge of the North and what is at stake, it is possible that people who care for wild lands will be able to influence the amount and type of development that takes place in this huge but fragile wilderness. Although the Arctic might seem to be, as many early explorers thought, a terra nullius or empty land of no importance, it is important to preserve this wilderness, not only for the species that inhabit the Far North but also because it is humbling for men and women to know that there are still places on earth where life is difficult and treacherous, and survival, at times, uncertain. Jonquil Covello, Department of English, University of Northern British Columbia Porcupines and China Dolls. By Robert Arthur Alexie. Toronto: Stoddart, 2002. 286 pp. At a time when many Native survivors of residential schools have finally found a voice and an audience, Robert Alexie’s novel Porcupines and China Dolls, first published in 2002, continues to stand out as one of the most powerful and graphic descriptions of residential school practices and the subsequent destruction that claimed entire Aboriginal communities. -
The Northwest Territories Reconstruction Project: Telling Our Stories
THE NORTHWEST TERRITORIES RECONSTRUCTION PROJECT: TELLING OUR STORIES by Elizabeth Jonquil Covello B.A., McMaster University, 1968 M.A., Carleton University, 1973 M.A., Simon Fraser University, 2004 A THESIS SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY in THE FACULTY OF GRADUATE STUDIES (English) THE UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA (Vancouver) September 2009 ©Elizabeth Jonquil Covello, 2009 Abstract Early travellers and adventurers in the Northwest Territories in their struggle to deal with the harshness of the land and the strangeness of the inhabitants were often unable to give a verbal shape to the landscape and the people beyond that of the familiar images of their European background. North became synonymous with alien, hostile, cold, barren, and mysterious and its people were identified alternatively as abject, heathen, filthy and sometimes dangerous savages or as paragons of noble manhood who served as examples for future imperializing ventures. I examine two travel narratives of the Northwest Territories and argue that a discourse of North, that was constructed from an imperialist, Eurocentric perspective failed to take into account the stories, the history and the culture of the indigenous people who lived there. I question the means by which such received history and knowledge becomes validated and empowering, while at the same time, other uncredentialed knowledge and stories which lack authority are lost. Warburton Pike wrote The Barren Ground ofNorthern Canada in 1892 and Agnes Deans Cameron wrote The New North in 1910. These works and others, while contributing to early knowledge of the indigenous people, were instrumental in framing an imaginary north that assumed hegemonic status over the geographical and cultural north that already existed. -
Welcome to Our Readers
Newsletter of the Land and Water Boards of the Mackenzie Valley SEPTEMBER 2011 VOLUME I, ISSUE 1 Inside this Issue Welcome to Our Readers It is our pleasure to welcome you to the first issue of the Newsletter of the Land • New Websites Launched and Water Boards of the Mackenzie Valley. Our goal with this new and improved newsletter is to inform you about the collective work and achievements happen- • MVLWB Staff Member ing under the Full Board of the Mackenzie Valley Land and Water Board (which Receives Award includes the Gwich’in, Sahtu, Wek’èezhìi, and Mackenzie Valley Yellowknife Office • Perspectives on Regulatory Board operations). This is part of a broader initiative to provide integrated -ser Improvement in the vices, including communications, to our clients. Mackenzie Valley In this issue you will learn more about the efforts we are making in the commu- nications arena, including the launch of four new websites which provide up-to- • New Land and Water Board date information about all aspects of the Boards’ operations. The newsletter also Policies and Guidelines features articles about regulatory improvement and the recent release of new • Meet the Chairs and policies and guidelines that we believe will contribute greatly towards the Boards’ Directors efforts to improve the regulatory system in the Mackenzie Valley. We also intro- duce you to and tell you a little bit more about us and our senior staff. You will • Land Use Permits and also find information about the most recent permits and licence activities in the Water Licences Issued Mackenzie Valley. We hope you enjoy this first issue. -
Teetł'it Gwich'in Practices of Indigeneity: Connection T
“Nakhwanh Gwich’in Khehłok Iidilii - We Are Our Own People” Teetł’it Gwich’in Practices of Indigeneity: Connection to Land, Traditional Self- Governance, and Elements of Self Determination by Elaine Donna Alexie B.A., University of Victoria, 2011 A Thesis Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of MASTER OF ARTS in the Department of Political Science Elaine Donna Alexie, 2015 University of Victoria All rights reserved. This thesis may not be reproduced in whole or in part, by photocopy or other means, without the permission of the author. ii Supervisory Committee “Nakhwanh Gwich’in Khehłok Iidilii - We Are Our Own People” Teetł’it Gwich’in Practices of Indigeneity: Connection to Land, Traditional Self- Governance, and Elements of Self Determination by Elaine Donna Alexie B.A., University of Victoria, 2011 Supervisory Committee Dr. Heidi Kiiwetinepinesiik Stark (Department of Political Science) Supervisor Dr. James Tully (Department of Political Science) Departmental Member iii Abstract Supervisory Committee Dr. Heidi Kiiwetinepinesiik Stark (Department of Political Science) Supervisor Dr. James Tully (Department of Political Science) Departmental Member This thesis examines the practices of Indigeneity, acts of Indigenous social and cultural traditions stemming from Teetł’it Gwich’in land-based culture in the Northwest Territories. By emphasizing Teetł’it Gwich’in philosophy, this project illustrates how Teetł’it Gwich’in practices of Indigeneity are rooted in their social, physical, and cultural relationship with the land, which are central to Gwich’in self-determination. This thesis demonstrates traditional Teetł’it Gwich’in self-governance practices are driven by cultural and social norms rooted in traditional knowledge, as well as contemporary Gwich’in-Canada relations. -
322-2-Cultural Identity in North America
CS 322 Peoples and Cultures of the Circumpolar World II Module 2 Changes in Expressions of Cultural Identity in northern North America: Media, Art, Education, and Recreation Contents Course objectives 1 Introduction 2 Indigenous and non-indigenous northern identities 4 The impact of media on indigenous peoples 9 Expression of identity and self-determination through media 11 Expression of identity and self-determination through literary and visual arts 14 Family, education and recreation as social institutions for self-determination 17 - Indigenous families: cultural standards vs. government-imposed rules 18 - Education systems: indigenous concerns vs. educational practices 24 Recreation 31 Glossary of terms 32 Literature 32 Course objectives Whereas the impact of colonization and assimilation on the traditional livelihood of the indigenous peoples of the circumpolar world was the main topic of CS 321, this course sheds light on the changes in expressions of cultural self-determination of the indigenous peoples of northern North America, Greenland and Northern Europe, and the Russian Arctic. Complex issues in relation to culture, identity and self-determination were discussed in detail in the previous module, which serves as an introduction to explain the theoretical background which University of the Arctic – CS 322 1 CS 322 Peoples and Cultures of the Circumpolar World II subsequently will be applied in this, and the following modules where the case studies of the different regions will be addressed. In this module, you will be familiarized with the complex issues surrounding the revival of cultures and languages in northern North America. We will explain how culture, identity and self-determination apply to indigenous and non-indigenous people in the North.