A settler climate: Riley Olstead, Sutapa Chattopadhyay, ‘Circles and lines: indigenous ontologies and decolonising climate change education’, Settler Colonial Studies, 2023 | settler colonial studies blog

A settler climate: Riley Olstead, Sutapa Chattopadhyay, ‘Circles and lines: indigenous ontologies and decolonising climate change education’, Settler Colonial Studies, 2023

04Jul23

Abstract: In 2015, The Truth and Reconciliation Report (TRC) was released in Canada, outlining 94 Calls to Action which, include pushing Canadian post-secondary institutions to ethically engage Indigenous communities and knowledge systems.¹ This paper seeks to respond to the TRC by offering a spatial analysis of the differences, broadly conceived, between Indigenous and western ontological structures. We consider these differences in terms of ‘circles and lines’ through a novice, settler understanding of how Mi’kmaw concepts of etuaptmumk (two-eyed seeing), netukulimk (conservation laws) and m’sɨt No’kmaq (all our relations) can be brought to support decolonial teaching and learning about such important and urgent matters as climate change. A related goal in this paper is pedagogic: we hope our own ambivalent learning here can be used as an example to reflect deeply on how settlers like us might/should/can’t work with the ethical, political, and practical challenges of responding to the TRC in our research, involving, and considering Indigenous ways of knowing and being.

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