Indigenous History Reading List
The History of First Nations in Canada
This Selkirk College Library guide will help you find print and electronic resources on the history of First Nations in Canada, including books, journals and magazines, databases and websites.
History of First Nations Library Guide
Featured titles:
Skyscrapers Hide the Heavens: A History of Native-Newcomer Relations in Canada by J.R. Miller
"First published in 1989, Skyscrapers Hide the Heavens continues to earn wide acclaim for its comprehensive account of Native-newcomer relations throughout Canada's history. Author J.R. Miller charts the deterioration of the relationship from the initial, mutually beneficial contact in the fur trade to the current displacement and marginalization of the Indigenous population. The fourth edition of Skyscrapers Hide the Heavens is the result of considerable revision and expansion to incorporate current scholarship and developments over the past twenty years in federal government policy and Aboriginal political organization. It includes new information regarding political organization, land claims in the courts, public debates, as well as the haunting legacy of residential schools in Canada. “
The Sleeping Giant Awakens: Genocide, Indian Residential Schools, and the Challenge of Conciliation by David B. MacDonald
Confronting the truths of Canada's Indian Residential School system has been likened to waking a sleeping giant. In this book, David B. MacDonald uses genocide as an analytical tool to better understand Canada's past and present relationships between settlers and Indigenous peoples. Starting with a discussion of how genocide is defined in domestic and international law, the book applies the concept to the forced transfer of Indigenous children to residential schools and the "Sixties Scoop," in which Indigenous children were taken from their communities and placed in foster homes or adopted. Based on archival research and extensive interviews with residential school survivors, officials at the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada, and others, this offers a unique and timely perspective on the prospects for conciliation after genocide, exploring how moving forward together is difficult in a context where many settlers know little of the residential schools and the ongoing legacies of colonization, and need to have a better conception of Indigenous rights.
Moonshot: The Indigenous Comics Collection, Volume 1 edited by Hope Nicholson
- PN 6790 N72 M66 2015
- https://bcs.bc.catalogue.libraries.coop/eg/opac/record/117012326?locg=1590
Moonshot is a project that is a thrilling new collection that showcases diverse aboriginal representation in comic books. This is an anthology of stories about identity, culture, and spirituality told by writers and artists from a range of communities across North America
Resurgence and Reconciliation: Indigenous-Settler Relations and Earth Teachings edited by Michael Asch and James Tully
The two major schools of thought in Indigenous-Settler relations on the ground, in the courts, in public policy, and in research are resurgence and reconciliation. Resurgence refers to practices of Indigenous self-determination and cultural renewal whereas reconciliation refers to practices of reconciliation between Indigenous and Settler nations, such as nation-with-nation treaty negotiations. Reconciliation also refers to the sustainable reconciliation of both Indigenous and Settler peoples with the living earth as the grounds for both resurgence and Indigenous-Settler reconciliation. Critically and constructively analyzing these two schools from a wide variety of perspectives and lived experiences, this volume connects both discourses to the ecosystem dynamics that animate the living earth. Resurgence and Reconciliation is multi-disciplinary, blending law, political science, political economy, women's studies, ecology, history, anthropology, sustainability, and climate change. Its dialogic approach strives to put these fields in conversation and draw out the connections and tensions between them. By using "earth-teachings" to inform social practices, the editors and contributors offer a rich, innovative, and holistic way forward in response to the world's most profound natural and social challenges. This timely volume shows how the complexities and interconnections of resurgence and reconciliation and the living earth are often overlooked in contemporary discourse and debate.