Extractive settler colonialism (they still need the land): Merle Davis Matthews, Producing Mineral Futures: Mineral Exploration, SettlerCapitalism, and the Search for Potential in Ontario, PhD dissertation, University of Minnesota, 2026 | settler colonial studies blog

Extractive settler colonialism (they still need the land): Merle Davis Matthews, Producing Mineral Futures: Mineral Exploration, SettlerCapitalism, and the Search for Potential in Ontario, PhD dissertation, University of Minnesota, 2026

06Aug26

Abstract: This dissertation investigates processes ‘upstream’ of mineral extraction in Ontario, Canada- a key jurisdiction in the global mining industry. Critical analyses of mining have largely focused on operating mines. I examine the processes of discovering and delineating mineral deposits, understudied despite their significance for where, how, and with what social and environmental consequences mining occurs. My research looks upstream of mining in order to understand the knowledge practices, financial instruments, policies, and social relations that undergird extraction and its effects, building on this geographic tradition and extending it through asking, how are extractive futures re/produced? In looking upstream of extraction, I speak to a strand of radical geography scholarship that illuminates potential futures. Through examining how potential is produced by and through mineral exploration, my work interrogates the ways in which potential is used to reproduce capitalist and settler-colonial relationships. I ask what an understanding of how extractive capital and colonial governance structures absorb crises and use them as an opportunity to extend their reach, can teach scholars about the work of scaffolding alternatives.

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