settler colonial studies blog

On the meaning of Old World politics in the new one: Katherine L. Hull, ‘Concerns at Home, Concerns Abroad: Irish and English Political Ephemera in Southern Ontario’, International Journal of Historical Archaeology, 2016

12Oct16

Abdtract: Four unusual artifacts reflecting an unambiguous connection with a particular politician or political movement have recently been recovered from archaeological sites in Southern Ontario. These items reflect socio-political issues from the homelands of immigrant families. Politically charged items carry meaning for the user and also serve to forge bonds and create divisions within the community. Recently discovered artifacts relating to the Irish Repeal movement and the British Great Reform Act of 1832 provide examples.

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Losing colonies, dreaming of settler ones: M. Godfroy, Kourou and the Struggle for a French America, Palgrave 2015

12Oct16

Description: Kourou was to be a wonderful revenge, a French colony in America after the Seven Years War in 1763. However, the fantastic ideal became a grand failure and political disaster, marking the end of the French attempts for an American colony.

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On Marxism and indigenous struggles (part of a special issue on Red Skin, White Masks): Roxanne Amanda Dunbar-Ortiz, ‘The Relationship between Marxism and Indigenous Struggles and Implications of the Theoretical Framework for International Indigenous Struggles’, Historical Materialism, 24, 3, pp. 76–91

09Oct16

Abstract: Glen Coulthard’s masterly work, Red Skin, White Masks, raises the theoretical work of Indigenous scholarship in North America to a new level, bringing Marxism into the mix in looking at the political-economic effects of settler-colonialism on Indigenous peoples in North America. He charts a way forward for Indigenous activism outside the state, eschewing the politics of recognition. In addition to assessing Coulthard’s perspective on Marxism, this paper poses questions about privileging Indigenous social movements without addressing the national question and without including the role of the robust international Indigenous movement that has entered its fortieth year.

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On dispossession without proletarianisation (that is, on settler colonialism; part of a special issue on Red Skin, White Masks): George Ciccariello-Maher, ‘Dispossession without Labour: Bridging Abolition and Decolonisation’, Historical Materialism, 24, 3, 2016, pp. 62–75

09Oct16

Abstract: Glen Coulthard’s Red Skin, White Masks makes two decisive interventions. First, it shifts our lens from the capital relation to the colonial relation, disarticulating the process of primitive accumulation to emphasise its component parts: dispossession and proletarianisation. To do so is to both liberate the concept from its European origins by centring those contexts in which dispossession is not followed by proletarianisation, and to pose the political unity of different forms of dispossession: of land (as in settler-colonialism) as well as labour (as in chattel slavery). Second, Coulthard draws convincingly upon Frantz Fanon, whose work is essential for grasping both colonialism and white supremacy, but crucially their complex interrelation.

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Indigenous countersovereignty as decolonial practice (part of a special issue on Red Skin, White Masks): Geoff Mann, ‘From Countersovereignty to Counterpossession?’ Historical Materialism, 24, 3, 2016, pp. 45–61

09Oct16

Abstract: Although neither sovereignty nor possession are explicit themes of Glen Coulthard’s Red Skin, White Masks, both concepts are essential to his critique of ‘recognition’ and the ongoing dynamics of Canadian colonialism. In this response, I offer a critical examination of the status of these liberal concepts in Coulthard’s work, and suggest that he has in fact given us a powerful theory of ‘countersovereignty’. Countersovereignty forces us to consider the meanings of possession and dispossession that animate the book, which in turn allow us to grasp the radical significance of Coulthard’s emphasis on the reciprocity at the heart of Indigenous relations with the land.

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Protecting the settler common against indigenous incursions: Nick Martino, Conservation and Treaty Rights: A Critical Analysis of a Sport Organization’s Perspective on Indigenous Peoples’ Hunting and Fishing, MA dissertation, McMaster University, 2016

09Oct16

Abstract: The Ontario Federation of Anglers and Hunters (OFAH) is an influential sport/interest group that has a long history of advocacy and involvement with policies and management related to the conservation of wildlife and outdoor recreation. Since the 1990’s, the OFAH have been outspoken with their criticisms towards particular Indigenous treaty hunting and fishing rights, co-management agreements, and land claims which are perceived to threaten conservation, future recreational opportunities, and the outdoor economy. Using semi-structured interviews with 20 Indigenous and non-Indigenous respondents and a content analysis of the OFAH’s official documents, this thesis analyzes and compares the views surrounding treaty rights between the OFAH leadership and ordinary hunters and fishers inside and outside the organization. Discourse Analysis, Group Position Theory, and Colour Blind Racism theory were used to flesh out how the meanings and perceived legitimacy of treaty rights are constructed and negotiated, and whether opposition to Indigenous harvesting rights reflects a reactionary response to defend settler-Canadians’ sense of superiority, privileges, and access to resources. The results showed that the OFAH and 55% of the respondents expressed feelings of concern, resentment, and in some cases opposition, revealing an established sense of group position. Although the OFAH leaders and 45% of the respondents displayed varying and limited degrees of support for treaty rights, the general pattern showed how OFAH leaders and respondents drew on similar repertoires with arguments and justifications based on equality, fairness, and a concern for wildlife conservation in order to criticize and/or oppose treaty rights. Consequently, these criticisms directly and indirectly work to define and redefine treaty rights and Indigenous treaty hunters and fishers in a negative manner. This case shows how resentment of and opposition to treaty rights within a settler colonial context embodies a perceived threat to settlers’ sense of group position and the status quo.

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On the international little settler house: Emily Anderson, ‘Adapting the Transnational Prairie: Little House, Little Mosque, and Little Laos’, Popular Culture, 49, 5, 2016, pp. 1003–1022

09Oct16

Access the article here.

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The visual discourse of reconciliation: Lara Elise Corinne Fullenwieder, Unsettling Histories: Representation and Indigenous Creative Art Praxis in Official Indian Residential School Redress, PhD dissertation, Queen’s University, 2016

09Oct16

Abstract: This dissertation offers an investigation of the role of visual strategies, art, and representation in reconciling Indian Residential School history in Canada. This research builds upon theories of biopolitics, settler colonialism, and race to examine the project of redress and reconciliation as nation and identity building strategies engaged in the ongoing structural invasion of settler colonialism. It considers the key policy moments and expressions of the federal government—from RCAP to the IRSSA and subsequent apology—as well as the visual discourse of reconciliation as it works through archival photography, institutional branding, and commissioned works. These articulations are read alongside the creative and critical work of Indigenous artists and knowledge producers working within and outside of hegemonic structures on the topics of Indian Residential School history and redress. In particular the works of Jeff Thomas, Adrian Stimson, Krista Belle Stewart, Christi Belcourt, Luke Marston, Peter Morin, and Carey Newman are discussed in this dissertation. These works must be understood in relationship to the normative discourse of reconciliation as a legitimizing mechanism of settler colonial hegemony. Beyond the binary of cooptation and autonomous resistance, these works demonstrate the complexity of representing Indigeneity: as an ongoing site of settler colonial encounter and simultaneously the forum for the willful refusal of contingency or containment.

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Settler colonialism needs environmental reconciliation: Esme Greene Murdock, Ecological reconciliation: Bridging humanity and nature for justice, Michigan State University, 2016

06Oct16

Abstract: The disciplines of political philosophy and environmental ethics are both concerned with the articulation and analysis of harms as well as the creation of normative and sustainable remedies. However, these disciplines rarely overlap in either the scope of their analysis of harm or their remedies. For they largely articulate harm as either “political” or “environmental,” and not importantly, both. “Ecological Reconciliation: Bridging Humanity and Nature for Justice” explores this separation between political philosophy and environmental ethics as exemplified in the separation of the literatures of political reconciliation and ecological restoration. This dissertation argues that both political reconciliation and ecological restoration attempt to articulate processes of reconciliation as remedies to harms—where reconciliation is defined as the instantiation of right relations out of harmful ones. However, both the analysis of political and environmental harm and the proposed processes of reconciliation regarding these harms can be improved through the incorporation of more inclusive ecological relations within political reconciliation and through the incorporation of more inclusive political relations within ecological restoration. Ecological relations, roughly, track the physical processes and functionalities of ecosystems, while political relations track the human perspectives, lived experiences, and values that construct human relationships to power. Political reconciliation can come closer to its aspirations toward social justice from understandings of how environmental injustices both aggravate and contribute to social and political marginality; ecological restoration can come closer to its aspirations to create greater environmental responsibility from analysis of how social and political injustices infuse and color restoration plans and projects.

This dissertation argues that the integration of ecological relations and political relations is key to better analyzing harm, as well as to the construction of sustainable, practical remedies. For example, the disproportionate siting of commercial toxic waste facilities in poor, communities of color in the United States is an instance of both social/political injustice and environmental injustice. Both levels of harms must be analyzed and addressed through reconciliatory frameworks that are expanded to account for them both. As solutions, this dissertation explores the literatures of environmental justice and Indigenous environmental ethics as areas of inquiry that center the relatedness of political and environmental harms/remedies. Both environmental justice and Indigenous environmental ethics prioritize the wedding of inclusive ecological relations and political relations to the instantiation of right relations and, thus, produce integrated, better models of reconciliation, which overcome limitations of both political reconciliation and ecological restoration models explored in the first part of the dissertation. Environmental justice tracks the ways in which environmental, social, and political ills disproportionately affect already vulnerable and marginalized communities, which illustrates the inextricable links between political and environmental injustice. Similarly, Indigenous environmental ethics examines how the rampant injustices (especially to the environment and ecosystems) of settler colonialism engender networks of harm that are deeply political and ecological, which call for reconciliatory processes that result in the ability of Indigenous communities to live in and experience the world in just, authentic, and culturally appropriate ways.

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Trauma carries on: D. A. Brownridge, T. Taillieu, T. Afifi, et al., ‘Child Maltreatment and Intimate Partner Violence Among Indigenous and Non-Indigenous Canadians’, Journal of Family Violence, 2016

06Oct16

Abstract: Indigenous peoples of Canada face an elevated risk of intimate partner violence (IPV) compared to non-Indigenous Canadians. Few empirical studies have been conducted to understand this elevated risk, and none have examined child maltreatment (CM) as a predictor. This study used data on a nationally representative sample of 20,446 Canadians to examine CM and proximal risk factors for IPV against Indigenous and non-Indigenous respondents. Results showed that Indigenous respondents had greater risk of experiencing both CM and IPV. All three forms of CM (exposure to violence, direct physical and/or sexual abuse victimization, as well as both exposure and direct victimization) were associated with increased odds of IPV in adulthood. CM along with proximal risk factors accounted for Indigenous peoples’ elevated odds of IPV (AOR = 1.62; NS). These results were consistent with the theory that Indigenous peoples’ elevated risk of IPV is largely due to effects of historical trauma from past and continuing colonization. Reducing Indigenous peoples’ disproportionate risk of IPV requires efforts to reduce CM and its negative developmental effects among Indigenous peoples as well as resolving the manifestations of historical and contemporary trauma within Indigenous society.

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