settler colonial studies blog

Indigenous doctorates in settler colonialism: Emma Lea Allen, Settler Aggressions: Indigenous Doctoral Student Experiences With Settler Colonialism in Higher Education, PhD dissertation, University of Oklahoma, 2025

22Jul25

Abstract: Indigenous students pursuing doctoral education often navigate environments shaped by the historical and on-going settler colonial structure of the United States. This study aimed to examine the lived experiences of Indigenous doctoral students with microaggressions at NonNative Colleges and Universities (NNCUs), with attention to how these incidents are shaped by underlying settler colonial dynamics. Using an Indigenous methodological approach, with Settler Colonialism and TribalCrit as guiding frameworks, data were collected through in-depth interviews with 11 Indigenous doctoral students from both public and private universities. The term “settler aggression” emerged in this study as a way to describe microaggressions rooted in settler colonialism and directed at Indigenous individuals or communities. The findings uncovered four themes of settler aggressions: Settler Ignorance, which is categorized as a structural lack of awareness that benefits the setter; Settler Tokenization (and Indigenous Labor), which illustrates how settlers utilize Indigenous people, knowledge, culture, or spirituality to appear diverse without bringing about real change; Environmental Settler Aggressions in the Academy, which are the systemic settler aggressions embedding within academic structures; and Settler as Supreme Sovereign, which reflects how settlers assert their dominance through the centering of their own authority, knowledge, and culture while marginalizing Indigenous people. This research highlights the need for higher education institutions to move beyond symbolic gestures and implement actionable policies that support, protect, and empower Indigenous students.

Filed under: Uncategorized | Closed

Remote care is not stealing: Joseph Freeman, Thomas Stubbs, Verity Chadwick, Anita Pickard, Tuguy Esgin, Elizabeth J. Elliott, Alexandra Martiniuk, ‘Models of care for Indigenous children in rural and remote settings: A global scoping review’, PLOS, 2025

22Jul25

Abstract: Indigenous communities internationally have demonstrated remarkable strength despite significant challenges. Health disparities among Indigenous peoples persist due to historical injustices and ongoing racial discrimination, not inherent vulnerabilities. Disparities are rooted in a legacy of colonisation, systemic exclusion, and socio-economic inequities impacting access to healthcare, education, and employment. Preliminary searches show limited literature on models of care for remote living Indigenous children. This review aimed to identify internationally, effective models of care for Indigenous children in rural and remote areas. A scoping review was conducted, analysing literature on models of care for remote Indigenous children. This study followed the JBI’s Scoping Review Guidance and PRISMA Scoping Review guideline. Inclusion criteria were aged ≤18, rural or remote areas, majority Indigenous, reported health outcomes, described a model of care, in English, and published since 1990. Data were systematically extracted, quality appraised using the ‘Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Quality Appraisal Tool’ then analysed using descriptive-analytical methodology. This review included 16 papers: 8 case series, 3 qualitative studies, and 5 trials. Of these, 7 studies were in Australia, 7 in the USA and 2 in Canada. All studies primary aim was to improve quality of care. Models of care described in the included papers varied, being delivered in traditional healthcare settings, homes, and elsewhere in the community. This review provides insights into the design and implementation of models of care in remote communities with primarily Indigenous populations. The authors recommend 1) that future reviews privilege ‘realist evaluation’ when examining models of care, 2) designers consider whether a model of care will run for a fixed-period versus ongoing as they have different requirements for success and 3) a toolkit approach to model of care development like the Qungasvik toolkit which provides evidenced modules adaptable to local conditions, easing workload on local people developing programs.

Filed under: Uncategorized | Closed

Parallel oppressions, parallel resistances: Malika Belkharchouche, ‘The Land, Indigenous Identity, and Resistance in Native American and Palestinian Literatures: N. Scott Momaday’s House Made of Dawn and Susan Abulhawa’s Mornings in Jenin as Illustration’, Revue des Sciences Humaines, 36, 2, 2025, pp. 275-295

22Jul25

Abstract: The aim of this study is to explore the complex interaction between land and indigenous identity in the literatures of Native Americans and Palestinians and to provide insights into the experiences of the two peoples in their struggle against colonial oppression. Within a post/decolonial framework and adopting an interdisciplinary approach that combines the paradigms of culture, memory, nationhood and sovereignty, this study explores how place and relations to the land have been enacted in Scott Momaday’s House Made of Dawn and Susan Abulhawa’s Mornings in Jenin, and how this connection to the land represents a means of identity affirmation and a symbol of resistance that enables a way of existence in this world. Undertaking this comparative study, which reveals the implicit and explicit connections between two disparate literatures, contributes to understanding interconnected experiences of settler colonialism and the ways indigenous writers contribute with counter-narratives in the nationalist movements of resistance and decolonization.

Filed under: Uncategorized | Closed

In the heart of settler colonialism: Margret McCue-Enser, Indigenous Activism in the Midwest: Refusal, Resurgence, and Resisting Settler Colonialism, Michigan State University Press, 2025

22Jul25

Description: In Indigenous Activism in the Midwest: Refusal, Resurgence, and Resisting Settler Colonialism, Margret McCue-Enser examines how Minnesota Indigenous activists use public memory sites to interrupt and challenge the dominant narrative of place. She explores how Indigenous activism reveals and disrupts material, discursive, and performative rhetorics of settler colonialism. This work cultivates the ground between rhetorical studies of place and space and Indigenous studies in which place is central to Indigeneity and activism. Using largely in situ analysis and drawing on Indigenous and rhetorical scholarship as well as Indigenous and mainstream press, the analysis focuses on sites such as an outdoor art installation, a historic settlers’ village, centennial and sesquicentennial farms, and a celebrated military fort.

Filed under: Uncategorized | Closed

The writing on the bark: Clare Wright, Naku Dharuk The Bark Petitions: How the People of Yirrkala Changed the Course of Australian Democracy, Text Publishing, 2024

21Jul25

Description: In 1963—a year of agitation for civil rights worldwide—the Yolŋu of northeast Arnhem Land created the Yirrkala Bark Petitions: Naku Dharuk. ‘The land grew a tongue’ and the land-rights movement was born. Naku Dharuk is the story of a founding document in Australian democracy and the trailblazers who made it. It is also a pulsating picture of the ancient and enduring culture of Australia’s first peoples. And it is a masterful, groundbreaking history.

Filed under: Uncategorized | Closed

Thoughts, prayers AND apologies: Katherine Morton Richards, ‘Thoughts and Prayers: Comparing Public Apologies for Residential Schools in Canada’, American Indian Culture and Research Journal , 48, 2, 2025, pp. 93-113

21Jul25

Excerpt: The Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC), established by the Canadian federal government in 2007, was tasked with investigating Indigenous peoples’ experiences with the Indian residential school system. Residential schools, run by the state and churches, removed Indigenous children from their homes and communities with the aim of assimilating Indigenous peoples into Canadian society. The TRC and its resulting final report reflect a significant milestone in the work done by survivors, families, and Indigenous nations to bring attention to the realities of the residential school program, extending to broader processes of reconciliation and restorative justice.1 Through the sheer volume of information collected and reported alone, the TRC made a substantial contribution to our knowledge about residential schools, particularly among settler Canadians, who too often deny or are ignorant of the intensity of genocidal colonial violence. Public inquires, such as the TRC, as well as state apologies—the subject of this article—engage in a similar politics of redress, something that is significant within contemporary responses to settler colonialism. Understanding the TRC as a significant event in settler colonial Canada, in this article I compare two public apologies for residential schools, one made before and one made after this restorative justice process.

Filed under: Uncategorized | Closed

Not incommensurable incommensurability: Michalinos Zembylas, ‘Tensions between decolonisation and social justice in education: seeking pathways beyond incommensurability’, Oxford Review of Education, 2025

21Jul25

Abstract: This conceptual paper examines the tensions that emerge in debates about decolonisation in education, particularly those that position decolonisation as incommensurable with social justice projects. Scholars have identified pitfalls in the incommensurability thesis, including the risk of reifying colonial binaries – such as the settler-Indigenous dichotomy – and fragmenting alliances between decolonisation, anti-racism, and other justice-oriented movements. The paper argues that these pitfalls can obscure the efforts to challenge the interconnected colonial logics of dispossession, exploitation, and racialisation that shape educational structures and experiences. Drawing on examples where Indigenous, Black, and racialised migrant settler subjectivities are brought into dialogue, the paper proposes a synergistic approach that bridges these projects and theoretical frameworks. By advocating for relationalities between decolonial and social justice politics in education, the paper highlights the potential of solidarity across differences, emphasising the need for intersectional and coalitional approaches that resist fragmentation.

Filed under: Uncategorized | Closed

Environmentalist settler colonialism? J. M. Bacon, Kirsten Vinyeta, Graham Ward, Ella Widmann, ‘Mapping the web of solidarity: a social network analysis of shifting Tribal engagement among the Big 10 environmental organizations in the United States’, Environmental Sociology, 2025

21Jul25

Abstract: In the last decade, Big 10 environmental movement organization (EMO) rhetoric in the U.S. has noticeably shifted to include topics pertaining to social justice. For Indigenous studies scholars, Indigenous peoples, and Tribal governments and organizations, this raises questions about how Big 10 organizations grapple with Tribal sovereignty and with ongoing legacies of settler colonialism. As organizations largely led by non-Natives, EMO failures to acknowledge Tribal sovereignty reflect settler colonial legacies of Indigenous erasure. Nevertheless, EMOs have made progress toward improving relationships with Tribes in recent years. Our research employs social network analysis and qualitative methods to explore the collaborations the ‘Big 10’ have built since 2010. Our findings affirm the importance of two large-scale, land-based conflicts – the Dakota Access Pipeline and the Bears Ears National Monument – as catalysts for strengthened ties between EMOs and Tribes. As EMOs interacted closely with Tribal partners, their rhetorical frames shifted from environmental and cultural frames to political frames centering Tribal treaty rights and sovereignty. We also found EMO involvement in direct action supporting Indigenous peoples fluctuated throughout the dataset depending on the presence or absence of high-profile environmental conflicts affecting Indigenous peoples.

Filed under: Uncategorized | Closed

Anti-Indigenous racism is different: Darell Howard, Adele N. Norris, Juan M. Tauri, ‘Rewriting a violent settler-colonial history: why anti-Māori racism must be distinguished from other forms of racism in Aotearoa New Zealand’, Ethnic and Racial Studies, 2025

21Jul25

Abstract: Driven by a United Nations 2017 recommendation to assess New Zealand’s progress to eliminate racial discrimination and the 2019 terrorist attack on Christchurch mosques, the Ministry of Justice along with National Iwi (Indigenous) Chairs forum (NICF) launched the National Action Plan Against Racism (NAPAR) Joint Steering Committee in April 2022. In April 2024, the NICF walked away from NAPAR. Their departure occurred after the newly entered right-wing government advised the official document to limit its focus on colonial racism, institutional racism and specific references to anti-Māori/Indigenous racism. This paper interrogates the embedded egalitarian myth and extensive legislation imposed overtime to distinguish racism, as a broad category, from strategic assaults on Māori/Indigenous sovereignty. We conclude by contextualizing current attempts to diminish focus on the historical specificity of anti-Māori racial oppression demonstrate deliberate state efforts to target Māori upon which Pākehā/white sovereignty is asserted and maintained.

Filed under: Uncategorized | Closed

Acceptance and reparations: Andreea Ioana Zota, Ismehen Melouka, Jo-Anne Wemmers, ‘Settler-colonialism, social acceptance, and support for reparations in Canada’, International Review of Victimology, 2025

21Jul25

Abstract: In contexts of collective victimization such as settler colonialism in Canada, recognizing both
historical and ongoing victimization, as well as supporting reparations measures, is crucial for healing
the relationship between Indigenous and non-Indigenous peoples and for propelling reconciliation
efforts forward. While most non-Indigenous Canadians recognize the historical victimization of
Indigenous peoples, fewer acknowledge ongoing victimization of Indigenous communities and
support measures promoting their right to self-determination. The recognition of ongoing
inequality can evoke feelings of guilt and pose a threat to the privileges of the advantaged groups,
which may lead to minimizing and disregarding experiences of victimization of the disadvantaged
group. While recognition of ongoing victimization can be uncomfortable, it is not impossible.
According to the needs-based model, members of the advantaged group may be more willing
to acknowledge the ongoing structural victimization and consider relinquishing their privileges if
they receive social acceptance from members of the disadvantaged group. Using data (n=313)
collected from an original survey, this paper examines if social acceptance by Indigenous peoples
influences: (a) acknowledgment of ongoing victimization, (b) support for justice measures, and (c)
recognition of Indigenous autonomy among non-Indigenous Canadians. The findings suggest that
there is a positive relationship between social acceptance and both recognition of victimization
and support for justice measures. However, no significant association was found between social
acceptance and support for autonomy. These findings partially support the needs-based model,
suggesting that social acceptance plays a limited role in promoting reconciliation.

Filed under: Uncategorized | Closed

what’s new

contribute