Rethinking Perspectives

“The name is a bit of a mouthful, but cultural appropriation happens when a dominant culture takes things from another culture that is experiencing oppression. We know there are a lot of technical sounding words here, so click here to break it down.

Nawalakw means supernatural in Kwak’wala, the language that has been spoken in the Kwakwaka’wakw Territory in the southern Great Bear Rainforest for thousands of years. The word encapsulates ancestral heritage while representing a vision for the future — it is the name of an ambitious social venture and sustainable Indigenous enterprise that is a catalyst for healing and connection.  |  Learn about the village HERE.  

"Lalakenis/All Directions demonstrates how deeply traditional practices can be deployed to address and engage urgent contemporary politics. The copper-breaking ceremony practiced in Haida and Kwakwaka'waka communities for generations is not relegated to sealed-off past but has been activated through political act."  |  Read more HERE.

Native Land Digital strives to create and foster conversations about the history of colonialism, Indigenous ways of knowing, and settler-Indigenous relations, through educational resources such as our map and Territory Acknowledgement Guide.

In her university-level classes, Pam Palmater often sees students cry, get angry, or be surprised at the realities of racism in Canada. In this web series called "First Things First," Palmater explains how to handle emotions in difficult conversations. Learning has the power to ignite potential.  

Remembrance Day Resources

Elements of Indigenous Style offers Indigenous writers and editors—and everyone creating works about Indigenous Peoples—the first published guide to common questions and issues of style and process. Everyone working in words or other media needs to read this important new reference and to keep it nearby while they’re working.

Called Challenging Racist “British Columbia, the booklet focuses on six areas of racist history: Indigenous dispossession, dispersion of Black communities, discriminatory voting laws, anti-Asian immigration laws that led to B.C. having a white majority and the attempted ethnic cleansing of Japanese Canadians.
New resource dives into 150 years of racist policy in B.C. ~ North Delta Reporter. Read more HERE.

"The sort of jokes that I make on the site are really not that much different than the actual defenses people have of statues," Fontaine said... He said it's laughable that people think toppling a statue that depicts a historic figure erases history."

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie  |  The Danger of a Single Story
Our lives, our cultures, are composed of many overlapping stories. Novelist Chimamanda Adichie tells the story of how she found her authentic cultural voice -- and warns that if we hear only a single story about another person or country, we risk a critical misunderstanding.

This episode talks with Wampanoag scholars Paula Peters and Linda Coombs, who tell us the real story of Thanksgiving, from an Indigenous Perspective. 

U of A archeologist helps Indigenous communities uncover their own stories.