The Science of Settler Colonialism: A Canadian History of the Thrifty Gene Hypothesis

This dissertation interrogates the history of the thrifty gene hypothesis, or the idea that Indigenous bodies are genetically predisposed to type-II diabetes. Though the hypothesis has been rejected by the scientific community at large as well as the very scientists who invented it, it continues to inform Canadian state literature and clinical guidelines in 2018. Thus, in an attempt to historicize (rather than debunk) the failed but long-lived hypothesis, I trace its origins through four successive chapters focused singularly on major figures in its production. All of these figures are white male scientists who travelled to Indigenous communities, made scientific observations, and contributed to a colonialist discourse of Indigenous disappearance by suggesting that Indians or Aboriginal people were biologically unfit to survive contact with (settler) colonial societies despite centuries of evidence to the contrary. Thus, while my main critique in this dissertation concerns the reproduction of a baseless and racist hypothesis within the registers of Canadian healthcare administration, I am also heavily exercised with documenting a history wherein southern settler scientists have travelled to northern Indigenous communities, extracted blood, bone marrow, and other biological materials, and used their scientific observations to cast Indigenous bodies rather than settler structures as the root cause of high-rates of chronic disease across the Canadian north. Troublingly, I note that the University of Torontos Sioux Lookout Project was deeply embedded in these histories of settler colonial science. Thus, on the basis of the history reviewed in this dissertation, I argue that the post-war professionalization of Canadian genetics, endocrinology, epidemiology, as well as nutritional and metabolic sciences has as a historical condition of possibility the settler colonial creation of the reserve system and the production of an isolated Indigenous population that faces chronically high rates of nutrition-related diseases

Foreclosing Accountability: The Limited Scope of the Seven Youth Inquest in Thunder Bay, Ontario

Between 2000 and 2011 seven students from First Nation communities across northern Ontario lost their lives while attending high school in Thunder Bay. These losses of Indigenous life became the subject of a joint provincial inquest that concluded in the summer of 2016. In this article the author offers a critical examination of the scope of this inquest as well as a broader chronological review of its proceedings. The focus is on the ways in which the presiding coroner shaped the scope of the inquest to include things like the alcohol consumption of the students and to exclude things like the quality of police investigations. The issue of First Nation Jury Representation and its role in delaying the inquest for several years is also contextualized. Ultimately, it is argued that the Seven Youth Inquest conforms closely to what Sherene Razack (2011; 2015) has written about the colonial function of inquests into the deaths of Indigenous peoples: mainly that such proceedings stage decontextualized narratives of First Nation dysfunction that are hostile to structural analysis and unlikely to animate opportunities for institutional accountability. Finally, it is argued that non-Indigenous coroners – who are trained in forensic pathology but lack training in federal Indian policy, treaty rights, and Indigenous histories – are unqualified to preside over provincial inquests into the deaths of First Nation people. In fact, this training (or lack thereof) may facilitate setting woefully limited scopes and therefore reproducing victim-blaming of First Nation youth in Canadian courtrooms.RésuméEntre 2000 et 2011, sept étudiants Autochtones ont trouvé la mort alors qu’ils poursuivaient des études secondaires à Thunder Bay. Ces derniers venaient de plusieurs communautés des Premières Nations à travers l’Ontario. La mort de ces jeunes Autochtones a été le sujet d’une enquête du coroner de la province de l’Ontario qui a été conclue à l’été 2016. Les auteurs de cet article offrent une explication critique de la portée de cette enquête ainsi qu’une analyse chronologique plus vaste des procédures. Le thème principal est la façon dont le coroner qui présidait l’enquête a orienté sa portée afin d’inclure, entre autres, la consommation d’alcool des étudiants tout en excluant d’autres éléments tels la qualité des enquêtes policières. Le problème de la représentation des Premières Nations sur la liste des jurés et le rôle que cela a joué sur le retardement du procès pendant plusieurs années sont aussi mentionnés. De plus, l’enquête sur la mort de ces sept étudiants se rapproche beaucoup à ce que Sherene Razack a écrit au sujet du rôle colonialiste des enquêtes qui touchent la mort des personnes autochtones (2011 ; 2015). Son argument principal étant que ces procédures mettent en scène des récits décontextualisés du dysfonctionnement des Premières Nations qui vont à l’encontre de l’analyse structurale et qui rendent la possibilité de démontrer la responsabilité institutionnelle peu probable. Pour finir, ils disputent le fait que les coroners non autochtones ne sont pas qualifiés pour présider les enquêtes provinciales liées à la mort des personnes autochtones. Bien qu’ils aient la formation nécessaire en médecine légale, ces derniers manquent de formation quant aux Lois sur les Indiens, aux droits issus des traités et à l’histoire des Autochtones. En effet, cette formation (du moins, ces lacunes) faciliterait la fixation d’une portée manifestement limitée, permettant, par conséquent, la condamnation répétée de la victime chez les jeunes des Premières Nations dans les salles d’audience canadiennes.Mots clés: Enquête du coroner; colonialisme de peuplement; loi sur les Indiens; éducation des Premières Nations; études autochtones; histoire des traités; Thunder Bay

Place-Based Identity in Northwestern Ontario Anishinaabe Literature

Place-based identity for Indigenous peoples in the land currently known as Canada, although foundational to many Indigenous land ethics, has been fraught by colonial processes of displacement, reserve designation, and racism. Definitions of home and belonging are often complicated by colonial divisions of urban and reserve spaces, and racist stereotypes that work to dispossess urban Indigenous lands. Moreover, settler amnesia problematically quells settler responsibility and guilt, while more damagingly attempting to remove Indigenous story from the land. This process of tearing story from land is discursive and ideological colonization. This dissertation examines the role of Indigenous literature in reuniting story and land, reasserting Indigenous presence, practicing place-based resurgence, and ultimately imagining and supporting decolonial futurities. Through a relational regional theoretical framework merged with elements of literary nationalism, I examine Anishinaabe literature from Northwestern Ontario, namely stories of Great Lynx, Mishipeshu, and works by Al Hunter, George Kenny, Ruby Slipperjack, and Richard Wagamese, to explore representations and methods of Anishinaabe relationship and connection to land. I theorize that an interaction between both physical land and the discursive space of stories encompasses an Anishinaabe sense of place and enacts Anishinaabe ways of being by studying these works as they broadly reflect the four aspects of self as represented by an Anishinaabe Medicine Wheel. Ultimately, by reclaiming both physical place and discursive space, land and story, the Anishinaabeg generate a definition of home rooted in the physical place of sacred fires and maintained and transported through migrations and transmotion: a mobile, adaptive, resilient, sovereign, resurgent, and grounded place-based identity

Place-Based Identity in Northwestern Ontario Anishinaabe Literature

Place-based identity for Indigenous peoples in the land currently known as Canada, although foundational to many Indigenous land ethics, has been fraught by colonial processes of displacement, reserve designation, and racism. Definitions of home and belonging are often complicated by colonial divisions of urban and reserve spaces, and racist stereotypes that work to dispossess urban Indigenous lands. Moreover, settler amnesia problematically quells settler responsibility and guilt, while more damagingly attempting to remove Indigenous story from the land. This process of tearing story from land is discursive and ideological colonization. This dissertation examines the role of Indigenous literature in reuniting story and land, reasserting Indigenous presence, practicing place-based resurgence, and ultimately imagining and supporting decolonial futurities. Through a relational regional theoretical framework merged with elements of literary nationalism, I examine Anishinaabe literature from Northwestern Ontario, namely stories of Great Lynx, Mishipeshu, and works by Al Hunter, George Kenny, Ruby Slipperjack, and Richard Wagamese, to explore representations and methods of Anishinaabe relationship and connection to land. I theorize that an interaction between both physical land and the discursive space of stories encompasses an Anishinaabe sense of place and enacts Anishinaabe ways of being by studying these works as they broadly reflect the four aspects of self as represented by an Anishinaabe Medicine Wheel. Ultimately, by reclaiming both physical place and discursive space, land and story, the Anishinaabeg generate a definition of home rooted in the physical place of sacred fires and maintained and transported through migrations and transmotion: a mobile, adaptive, resilient, sovereign, resurgent, and grounded place-based identity

Place-Based Identity in Northwestern Ontario Anishinaabe Literature

Place-based identity for Indigenous peoples in the land currently known as Canada, although foundational to many Indigenous land ethics, has been fraught by colonial processes of displacement, reserve designation, and racism. Definitions of home and belonging are often complicated by colonial divisions of urban and reserve spaces, and racist stereotypes that work to dispossess urban Indigenous lands. Moreover, settler amnesia problematically quells settler responsibility and guilt, while more damagingly attempting to remove Indigenous story from the land. This process of tearing story from land is discursive and ideological colonization. This dissertation examines the role of Indigenous literature in reuniting story and land, reasserting Indigenous presence, practicing place-based resurgence, and ultimately imagining and supporting decolonial futurities. Through a relational regional theoretical framework merged with elements of literary nationalism, I examine Anishinaabe literature from Northwestern Ontario, namely stories of Great Lynx, Mishipeshu, and works by Al Hunter, George Kenny, Ruby Slipperjack, and Richard Wagamese, to explore representations and methods of Anishinaabe relationship and connection to land. I theorize that an interaction between both physical land and the discursive space of stories encompasses an Anishinaabe sense of place and enacts Anishinaabe ways of being by studying these works as they broadly reflect the four aspects of self as represented by an Anishinaabe Medicine Wheel. Ultimately, by reclaiming both physical place and discursive space, land and story, the Anishinaabeg generate a definition of home rooted in the physical place of sacred fires and maintained and transported through migrations and transmotion: a mobile, adaptive, resilient, sovereign, resurgent, and grounded place-based identity

Accessing Indigenous Foods in Urban Northwestern Ontario: Women’s Stories of Indigenous Food Sovereignty and Resistance to Policy

Indigenous populations living in urban northern Ontario have been repeatedly ignored in research regarding Indigenous Peoples food insecurity and food systems, despite the large proportion of Indigenous Peoples living in the region and the unique challenges of the urban northern food environment. The purpose of this thesis is to explore and better understand how Indigenous Peoples in the urban northwestern Ontario service hubs of Sioux Lookout and Thunder Bay access Indigenous foods and the relationship of Indigenous food to their food security and Indigenous food sovereignty. The methodology of this project is based upon on the principles of community-based participatory research, intersectional feminist theory, and the USAI Framework (utility, self-voicing, access, and inter-relationality). Data were collected in open-ended interviews with stakeholders from three groups across the two cities (1) Indigenous female community members (n=6), (2) non-Indigenous staff of Indigenous-serving organizations (n=6), and (3) policymakers (i.e. those related to wild food policy or its implementation)(n=6). Two analyses were conducted. First, a thematic analysis of interview data from Indigenous community members and non-Indigenous staff of Indigenous-serving organizations characterized the impact of place and urbanicity on accessing Indigenous foods in both urban northwestern Ontario cities. Second, an Intersectionality-Based Policy Analysis framework was applied to analyze interview data from the entire sample which illuminated how the provincial and federal policy contexts have historically and continue to impact Indigenous women and their communities’ experiences of accessing wild foods in urban northwestern Ontario. Both place and urbanicity are central to how Indigenous populations in these towns harvest, share, and consume their Indigenous foods. On the community and individual levels, Indigenous Peoples in these towns are often in situations of food insecurity due to financial, geography, and policy barriers. Participants highlighted the abundance of ways that Indigenous food sovereignty is being expressed. Building food networks and sharing practices amongst friends, family, and broader communities (both inside and outside the city) was central to promoting access to Indigenous food for Indigenous Peoples in this study. Indigenous women pointed to colonial policies which make it impossible for most people to harvest in a self-determined way; thus, resistance is necessary. We found that stakeholder groups defined the policy problem differently and brought different values to their place in the systems which impede or facilitate access to wild foods. There was an acknowledgment of the conflict of Western food safety and natural resource management principles with Indigenous rights and Indigenous food sovereignty in theory and application. Implementation of food and natural resource policy is often unclear due to the tensions of government jurisdiction and the erasure of Indigenous Peoples’ experiences within Canadian cities. This thesis reiterates that Indigenous-led and culturally safe collaborations between the Indigenous community and other organizations are critical to improving Indigenous food sovereignty in these urban settings. Illuminating the non-Indigenous actors’ understandings of Indigenous Peoples' food security and sovereignty in urban settings is key as they hold power in colonial institutions. There is a continued need for Indigenous distinctions-based and intersectional approaches in all policy at all levels – from the federal to the institutional

Indian Residential Schools and the Internet: Sites of (De)Colonialization

Using the Indian Residential School (IRS) system as an example, this paper examines the internet as a decolonial site. To do so, I will draw on decolonial concepts as well as ideas from spatial theory. Through the analysis of Indigenous-led organizations and a Facebook group dedicated to the collective memory work of the IRS system, I argue that social media platforms can contribute to revitalize culture and foster communal bonds. Amongst others, digital storytelling, the establishment of common symbols, and the organization of joint actions in the offline world have emerged as digital strategies. These are complemented by collecting and sharing memories and educational materials online

Towards Implementing the Truth and Reconciliation Commission\u27s Calls to Action in Law Schools: A Settler Harm Reduction Approach to Racial Stereotyping and Prejudice Against Indigenous Peoples and Indigenous Legal Orders in Canadian Legal Education

Many Canadian law schools are in the process of implementing the Truth and Reconciliation Commissions Call to Actions #28 and #50. Promising initiatives include mandatory courses, Indigenous cultural competency, and Indigenous law intensives. However, processes of social categorization and racialization subordinate Indigenous peoples and their legal orders in Canadian legal education. These processes present a barrier to the implementation of the Calls. To ethically and respectfully implement these Calls, faculty and administration must reduce racial stereotyping and prejudice against Indigenous peoples and Indigenous legal orders in legal education. I propose that social psychology on racial prejudice and stereotyping may offer non-Indigenous faculty and administration a familiar framework to reduce the harm caused by settler beliefs, attitudes, and behaviors to Indigenous students, professors, and staff, and to Indigenous legal orders. Although social psychology may offer a starting point for settler harm reduction, its application must remain critically oriented towards decolonization

The Meaning of Mount McKay: Anemki-waucheau and Settler Colonial Reterritorialization in Thunder Bay, Ontario

This article interrogates the settler colonial history of Thunder Bay through place names and argues that gendered forms of anti-Indigenous violence are part of the city’s social architecture. Between 1860 and 1910, settlers produced vast amounts of wealth and built a local industrial economy founded upon land-based resources such as silver, timber, and shale; at the same time, settlers forcefully relocated Anishnaabe peoples to multiple reserve sites, prevented them from participating in the emergent industrial economy, and used their sacred mountain as a quarry for brick-making and as a stop-butt for a settler rifle range. The article deploys the concept of settler colonial reterritorialization to critique the ways in which this history has been sanctioned and celebrated through local place names such as Mount McKay, Fort William, Port Arthur, and Simpson Street. Ultimately, I show that the material violence of enfolding the land and its resources into an exploitative and exclusive settler colonial economy emerged in tandem with the power to name the land in honour of white men who played primary roles in that very violent historical process.Le présent article étudie l’histoire du colonialisme de peuplement à Thunder Bay sous l’angle des noms de lieux et soutient que les formes sexospécifiques de violence anti-autochtone font partie de la structure sociale de la ville. Entre 1860 et 1910, les colons ont produit de grandes quantités de richesses et ont développé une économie industrielle locale tirée des ressources de la terre telles que l’argent, le bois et le schiste. Ce faisant, ils ont déplacé de force des populations anishnaabe vers de multiples réserves; ils les ont empêchées de participer à l’économie industrielle émergente et ont transformé leur montagne sacrée en carrière pour la fabrication de briques et en butte pour un champ de tir. L’article utilise le concept de reterritorialisation colonialiste pour critiquer la façon dont cette histoire a été sanctionnée et commémorée par des noms de lieux locaux tels que mont McKay, Fort William, Port Arthur et rue Simpson. En fin de compte, il montre que l’importante violence engendrée par l’exploitation de la terre et de ses ressources dans une économie au bénéfice exclusif du colonisateur a été accompagnée du pouvoir de nommer la terre en l’honneur des hommes blancs qui ont joué un rôle primordial dans ce processus historique très violent