Settler regrowth: Elliott Michael Reichardt, The second growth: Indigenous resurgence, settler adaptation, and the possibility of repair in the forests of the Canadian North, PhD dissertation, Stanford University, 2026 | settler colonial studies blog

Settler regrowth: Elliott Michael Reichardt, The second growth: Indigenous resurgence, settler adaptation, and the possibility of repair in the forests of the Canadian North, PhD dissertation, Stanford University, 2026

07Sep26

Abstract: The Second Growth examines the future of forests, authority, and life in the Nak’albun/Fort St. James region of northern British Columbia, Canada. Drawing on archival research, oral histories, and sixteen months of ethnographic fieldwork, I develop the concept of “second growth” to describe emergent non-colonial relations among regenerating forested landscapes, Indigenous peoples, and non-Indigenous peoples. Borrowed from forestry, the term names renewal after disturbance without implying restoration to an untouched past. I demonstrate that Indigenous resurgence has ruptured the settler colonial status quo of northern Canada, creating new forms of social relations. This resurgence has enabled Indigenous Peoples to exert authority within shared landscapes, which in turn allows non-Indigenous peoples to reimagine their futures and lives within, or supported by, Indigenous sovereignty. It is this capacious and transformative dimension of Indigenous resurgence that I describe as the second growth. Across five substantive chapters encompassing four ethnographic cases, I develop a theoretical approach to studying such “middle grounds”: the unstable spaces where colonial relations are challenged, partially reworked, or unevenly reproduced. I show that Indigenous resurgence can create conditions for repair, but that such repair remains vulnerable to ecological crisis, extractive capitalism, settler backlash, and resurgent Canadian nationalism. Ultimately, the dissertation argues that the future of life in the forests of the North will depart from settler colonialism, taking shape through Indigenous authority, negotiated coexistence, dependency, and renewal within the North’s industrial landscapes.

Filed under: Uncategorized | Closed