Recommended Reading: Indigenous History Month

My Decade at Old Sun, My Lifetime of Hell by Arthur Bear Chief depicts the sexual and psychological abuse that Bear Chief suffered during his time at Old Sun Residential school in Gleichen on the Siksika Nation. In a series of chronological vignettes, Bear Chief recounts the punishment, cruelty, abuse, and injustice that he endured at Old Sun and then later relived in the traumatic process of retelling his story at an examination for discovery in connection with a lawsuit brought against the federal government.

Xwelíqwiya is the life story of Rena Point Bolton, a Stó:lō matriarch, artist, and craftswoman. After surviving residential school, Point Bolton saw the urgent need to forge a sense of cultural continuity among the younger members of her community. Over her life, Point Bolton visited many communities and worked with federal, provincial, and First Nations politicians to help break the intercultural silence by reviving knowledge of and interest in Indigenous art.

Living on the Land: Indigenous Women’s Understanding of Place edited by Nathalie Kermoal and Isabel Altamirano-Jiménez examines how patriarchy, gender, and colonialism have shaped the experiences of Indigenous women as both knowers and producers of knowledge. From a variety of methodological perspectives, contributors to the volume explore the nature and scope of Indigenous women’s knowledge, its rootedness in relationships both human and spiritual, and its inseparability from land and landscape.

Memory and Landscape: Indigenous Responses to a Changing North edited by Kenneth L. Pratt and Scott A. Heyes (forthcoming December 2020) explores the ways in which Indigenous peoples in the Arctic have adapted to challenging circumstances, including past cultural and environmental changes. In this beautifully illustrated volume, contributors document how Indigenous communities in Alaska, northern Canada, Greenland, and Siberia are seeking ways to maintain and strengthen their cultural identity while also embracing forces of disruption.

We Are Coming Home: Repatriation and the Restoration of Blackfoot Cultural Confidence edited by Gerald T. Conaty is the story of the highly complex process of repatriation as described by those intimately involved in the work, notably the Piikani, Siksika, and Kainai elders who provided essential oversight and guidance.

From Turtle Island to Gaza by David Groulx. In these brief, yet powerful poems, Groulx tackles some of the most complex histories and pressing political issues of our time. Touching on cultural appropriation, police prejudice, and the loss of Indigenous languages, Groulx examines the extensive impact of colonialism and its present-day effects in Canada and Palestine.

kiyâm by Naomi McIlwraith. Through poems that move between the two languages, McIlwraith explores the beauty of the intersection between nêhiyawêwin, the Plains Cree language, and English, âkayâsîmowin. Written to honour her father’s facility in nêhiyawêwin and her mother’s beauty and generosity as an inheritor of Cree, Ojibwe, Scottish, and English, kiyâm articulates a powerful yearning for family, history, peace, and love.