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Indigenous Ways of Knowing
This page is meant to provide entry points for researchers interested in discovering more about Indigenous ways of knowing to influence their academic research. The focus of the resources provided here are on First Nations, Inuit and Métis groups in North America and primarily the area that is commonly known as Canada, though other Indigenous groups may be represented in some of the works listed.
It is important to remember that when engaging with Indigenous knowledge, people and culture, just as there are many different European cultures and people, so too are there many different Indigenous cultures and people. Indigenous people do not exist as a monolith. Indigenous ways of knowing differ between groups and cultures. It's important to be specific about the culture you are referring to and to avoid sweeping generalizations referring to Pan Indigenity.
Your feedback
This page is a work in progress. If you have comments or can recommend additional/alternative sources, please email Sarah Brown, Librarian for Gender and Social Justice.
Collaborative Indigenous Research
- Collaborative Indigenous ResearchFrom Eve Tuck at UofT's OISE. This resource was created "to promote and expand the field of Collaborative Indigenous Research". With a specific focus on research incorporating Indigenous methodologies and participatory methodologies
Databases relating to Indigenous studies
This list of over 20 databases covers a mix of scholarly and primary sources across many disciplines and timeframes.
Books
Indigenous Experiences of Pregnancy and Birth by ISBN: 9781772581355Publication Date: 2017-10-01Traditional midwifery, culture, customs, understandings and meanings surrounding pregnancy and birth are grounded in distinct epistemologies and worldviews that have sustained Indigenous women and their families since time immemorial. Years of colonization have however impacted the degree to which women have choice in the place and ways they carry and deliver their babies. As nations such as Canada became colonized, traditional gender roles were seen as an impediment. The forced rearrangement of these gender roles was highly disruptive to family structures. Indigenous women quickly lost their social and legal status as being dependent on fathers and then husbands. The traditional structures of communities became replaced with colonially informed governance, which reinforced patriarchy and paternalism. The authors in this book carefully consider these historic interactions and their impacts Indigenous women's experiences.
Indigenous Men and Masculinities by ISBN: 9780887557903Publication Date: 2015-11-06Building on Indigenous knowledge systems, Indigenous feminism, and queer theory, the sixteen essays by scholars and activists from Canada, the U.S., and New Zealand open pathways for the nascent field of Indigenous masculinities. The authors explore subjects of representation through art and literature, as well as Indigenous masculinities in sport, prisons, and gangs.
Indigenous Women and Feminism by ISBN: 0774818077Publication Date: 2010-11-04Can the specific concerns of Indigenous women be addressed within current mainstream feminist and post-colonial discussions? Indigenous Women and Feminism: Politics, Activism, Culture proposes that a dynamic new line of inquiry – Indigenous feminism – is necessary to truly engage with the crucial issues of cultural identity, nationalism, and decolonization particular to Indigenous contexts.
Living on the Land by ISBN: 9781771990424Publication Date: 2016-07-04Living on the Land examines how patriarchy, gender, and colonialism have shaped the experiences of Indigenous women as both knowers and producers of knowledge. From a variety of methodological perspectives, contributors to the volume explore the nature and scope of Indigenous women’s knowledge, its rootedness in relationships both human and spiritual, and its inseparability from land and landscape. From the reconstruction of cultural and ecological heritage by Naskapi women in Québec to the medical expertise of Métis women in western Canada to the mapping and securing of land rights in Nicaragua, Living on the Land focuses on the integral role of women as stewards of the land and governors of the community. Together, these contributions point to a distinctive set of challenges and possibilities for Indigenous women and their communities.
A Recognition of Being by ISBN: 1894549120Publication Date: 2004-09-01Over 15 years ago, Kim Anderson set out to explore how Indigenous womanhood had been constructed and reconstructed in Canada, weaving her own journey as a Cree/Métis woman with the insights, knowledge, and stories of the forty Indigenous women she interviewed. The result was A Recognition of Being, a powerful work that identified both the painful legacy of colonialism and the vital potential of self-definition
A Two-Spirit Journey by ISBN: 9780887555053Publication Date: 2016-05-03A compelling, harrowing, but ultimately uplifting story of resilience and self-discovery. "A Two-Spirit Journey" is Ma-Nee Chacaby’s extraordinary account of her life as an Ojibwa-Cree lesbian. From her early, often harrowing memories of life and abuse in a remote Ojibwa community riven by poverty and alcoholism, Chacaby’s story is one of enduring and ultimately overcoming the social, economic, and health legacies of colonialism
#IdleNoMore : and the remaking of Canada by ISBN: 9780889773448Publication Date: 2015Idle No More bewildered many Canadians. Launched by four women in Saskatchewan in reaction to a federal omnibus budget bill, the protest became the most powerful demonstration of Aboriginal identity in Canadian history. Thousands of Aboriginal people and their supporters took to the streets, shopping malls, and other venues, drumming, dancing, and singing in a collective voice.
Through Idle No More, Aboriginal people have declared that they are a vital and necessary part of Canada's future. The spirit of the drumming, singing and dancing lives on in empowered and confident young Aboriginal people who will shape the future of this country for decades to come.
Claiming Anishinaabe by ISBN: 9780889774919Publication Date: 2017-09-23One woman's personal journey of moving deeper into Indigenous knowledge and working to resist the racist and sexist legacy of the Indian Act.
Indigenous Nationhood by ISBN: 9781552667958Publication Date: 2015-10-01This book is a collection of the best blogs from Indigenous Nationhood produced by well-known lawyer, activist and academic Pamela Palmater. Her blogs offer critical legal and political commentary and analysis on legislation, Aboriginal rights, Canadian politics, and First Nation politics and social issues like murdered and missing Indigenous women, poverty, economics, and identity and culture. The intent of the blogs and the book is to help rebuild the connections between Indigenous citizens and their home communities, local governments, and Indigenous Nations for the benefit of future generations.
The Limits of Settler Colonial Reconciliation by ISBN: 9789811026539Publication Date: 2016-11-24This book investigates whether and how reconciliation in Australia and other settler colonial societies might connect to the attitudes of non-Indigenous people in ways that promote a deeper engagement with Indigenous needs and aspirations. It explores concepts and practices of reconciliation, considering the structural and attitudinal limits to such efforts in settler colonial countries. Bringing together contributions by the world's leading experts on settler colonialism and the politics of reconciliation, it complements current research approaches to the problems of responsibility and engagement between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal peoples.
Recovering the Sacred by ISBN: 9780896087125Publication Date: 2005-03-01An overview of efforts by Native Americans to regain cultural and genetic patrimony and the conditions needed for traditional spiritual practices, including tribal histories, analysis of changes to nutrition, economy, and physical environment, and actions taken toward pollution abatement, dam removal, land and cultural reclamation, and alternative energy production
States of Race by ISBN: 9781897071595Publication Date: 2010-07-31What is a Canadian critical race feminism?
As the contributors to this book note, the interventions of Canadian critical race feminists work to explicitly engage the Canadian state as a white settler society. The collection examines Indigenous peoples within the Canadian settler state and Indigenous women within feminism; the challenges posed by the settler state for women of colour and Indigenous women; and the possibilities and limits of an anti-colonial praxis.
Unsettling Canada by ISBN: 1771131772Publication Date: 2015-07-09Arthur Manuel (1951–2017) was one of the most forceful advocates for Indigenous title and rights in Canada; Grand Chief Ron Derrickson, one of the most successful Indigenous businessmen in the country. Together, they bring a fresh perspective and bold new ideas to Canada’s most glaring piece of unfinished business: the place of Indigenous peoples within the country’s political and economic space.
Unsettling the Commons by ISBN: 9781894037976Publication Date: 2017-11-28Drawing on interviews with 51 anti-authoritarian organizers to investigates what it means to struggle for "the commons" within a settler colonial context, Unsettling the Commons interrogates a very important debate that took place within Occupy camps and is taking place in a multitude of movements in North America around what it means to claim "the commons" on stolen land. Travelling back in history to show the ways in which radical left movements have often either erased or come into clear conflict with Indigenous practices of sovereignty and self-determination--all in the name of the "struggle for the commons," the book argues that there are multiple commons or conceptualizations of how land, relationships, and resources are shared, produced, consumed, and distributed in any given society. As opposed to the liberal politics of recognition, a political practice of unsettling and a recognition of the incommensurability of political goals that claim access to space/territory on stolen land is put forward as a more desirable way forward
Indigenous Scholars
You may want to look further into the works and research of the academics listed below. This is by no means an exhaustive list but a good place to start for leaders in particular areas of study.
- Kim AndersonUniversity of Guelph professor in Department of Family Relations & Applied Nutrition
- John BorrowsUniversity of Victoria professor in the faculty of Law.
- Robyn BourgeoisBrockU professor in Women's and Gender Studies
- Bonita LawrenceYork University professor in Indigenous Studies Program
- Pamela PalmaterToronto Metropolitan University professor in Indigenous Governance
- Audra SimpsonDepartment of Anthropology at Columbia University
- Raven SinclairUniversity of Regina professor in School of Social Work
- Jesse ThistleYork University faculty member in Department of Humanities
- Eve TuckUniversity of Toronto professor of Critical Race and Indigenous Studies in OISE