Recently the Department of Indigenous Studies at the University of Lethbridge received a semi-anonymous donation box of approximately 35 older textbooks and writings about Indigenous Peoples in Canada. A community group had received book sale donations, and the donor had removed these books because the donor felt they had a “colonial slant/outright mis-telling of Cdn history + general misunderstanding (+ disrespect, often) of indigenous peoples”. These books and the stories in them represent an opportunity for re-imaging the relationship between Euro-Western Canadians and Indigenous Peoples in Canada.
Specifically, this new research project will start with developing a workshop based on the process used to call these works to account (reckonings) and then to transform these books into visual and literary stories that empower Indigenous voice and experience (imaging otherwise) by grounding them in lived experience with land and territories. Generally, this on-going research project is focused on developing ways to creatively engage with these literary works in order to decolonize them and collectively re-create stories based on Indigenous ways of knowing.
(If you donated these books to the Department of Indigenous Studies, please contact Assistant Professor Tara Million at tara.million@uleth.ca)
Most Recent Conference Presentation:
Million, T. & Million, J. (2023, May 31-June 2). “Transforming ‘colonial truth’ into ‘our stories’” [Workshop presentation]. Indigenous Literary Studies Association conference as part of the Congress of the Humanities and Social Sciences, York University, Ontario.
