First Nations

A collection of perspectives by and about Indigenous Toronto, past, present, and future.

Beneath every major city in North America lies a deep and rich Indigenous history that has been colonized, paved over, and ignored. Few of its current inhabitants know that Toronto has seen 12,000 years of different peoples, including the Haudenosaunee, the Anishinaabe, the Huron-Wendat, and the Mississaugas of the New Credit, and a vibrant culture and history that thrives to this day.

With original contributions by Indigenous elders, scholars, journalists, artists, activists, and historians about art, food, health, and more, this unique anthology explores the poles of erasure and cultural continuity that have come to define a crossroads city-region that was known as a meeting place long before the arrival of European settlers.

Contributors include political scientist Hayden King, historian Alan Corbiere, musician Elaine Bomberry, artist Duke Redbird, playwright Drew Hayden Taylor, educator Kerry Potts, writer/journalist Paul Seesequasis and former Mississaugas of the New Credit chief Carolyn King.

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192 pages | 5.50" x 8.50"

Amber, Bev, Chantel, Jazmyne, Faith, and Jorgina are six Indigenous women previously involved in street gangs or street lifestyles. In Indigenous Women and Street Gangs they collaborate with Robert Henry (Métis) to share an emancipatory expression of their lives through photovoice. Each author shares a narrative that begins with her earliest memory and continues to the present. This is followed by a selection of photographs the woman took to show how she has changed with her experiences. Readers can expect difficult life stories imbued with hope and humour. Throughout, these women show us the meaning of survivance; a process of survival, resistance, resurgence, and growth.

“I don’t think there is any such thing as bad; it’s called healing, you know? It is starting to fix yourself inside your heart, you know? You just got to keep doing it, that’s all I got to say.”- Jazmyne

Educator Information
Caution: mature, triggering, explicit content.

Keywords / Subjects: survivance; photovoice; Indigenous; street gang; critical gang studies; Saskatchewan; women; oral history; community engaged research; relational practice; justice; child welfare; education; health; social work; social services; criminology

Table of Contents
ix Acknowledgements
xi Introduction
3 Amber
23 Bev
39 Chantel
59 Jazmyne
77 Faith
95 Jorgina
115 Photograph Captions
123 Bibliography

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144 pages | 9.00" x 9.00" | Paperback

You take your seat in the theatre. You are given a remote control. The play begins.

An urban couple are on a getaway to visit her father at his vast rural estate. But when they arrive, they find him missing and a local Indigenous man staying there instead. They ask him to leave … and with an anonymous click of your remote, you choose what happens next.

When it’s revealed that the colonial rights to this entire property are actually up for grabs, you must continue to decide how the story unfolds, ultimately determining how the land will be stewarded, and by whom.

With humour, suspense, and a race against time, Inheritance is an interactive stage play – with over fifty possible variations – that thrusts you into the middle of a land dispute and asks you to work it out.

Replete with additional material, this unique book includes insightful forewords by President of the Haida Nation Miles Richardson and environmentalist David Suzuki, a brief history of the Secwépemc People, a detailed study guide for students and teachers, and an interview with the co-creators.

Reviews
"The creative team is definitely onto something … digs into land claims and entitlement in engaging new ways, using a lively mix of humour and interactive technology to work through heavy concepts. Viewers go out into the night with the knowledge that land issues will never be solved with an easy click of the button. And more importantly, with plenty to think about their own role in the matter."—the Georgia Straight

"Inheritance is what theatre should be. It breaks boundaries, embraces new technology … It is excellent. It should be required viewing. See it, ask questions, and enjoy the beauty of these incredible artists along the way."—Vancouver Presents

Educator Information
Includes a detailed study guide for students and teachers.

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256 pages | 8.50" x 5.50"

Iskotew Iskwew/Fire Woman is a poetry collection written during a period of trauma while the author was working as a Counsel to the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls in 2017. This book is about memories and experiences growing up on the Pelican Narrows Reserve in northern Saskatchewan in the 1980s: summers spent on the land and the pain of residential school. With this collection, the author wants to teach and inform Canadians of her experiences growing up as an Indigenous woman in Saskatchewan. She believes it is important to share her stories for others to read.

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104 pages | 5.50" x 8.50"

A collection of narratives as told in the nêhiyawêwin (Cree) language by Elder Mary Louise Rockthunder, spanning her rich life and extensive knowledge of her traditions and culture.

Mary Louise (née Bangs) Rockthunder, wêpanâkit, was an Elder of Cree, Saulteaux, and Nakoda descent. Born in 1913, raised and married at nēhiyawipwātināhk / Piapot First Nation, Mary Louise, a much-loved storyteller, speaks of her memories, stories, and knowledge, revealing her personal humility and her deep love and respect for her family and her nêhiyawêwin language and culture. 
 
The recordings that are transcribed, edited, and translated for this book are presented in three forms: Cree syllabics, standard roman orthography (SRO) for Cree, and English. A full Cree-English glossary concludes the book, providing an additional resource for those learning the nêhiyawêwin language.

Educator & Series Information
This book is part of the Our Own Words series. Our Own Words is a new Indigenous language series that seeks to present longer, more extensive Indigenous texts for both intermediate and advanced learners of the language.

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264 pages | 6.00" x 9.00" | Translated by Jean L. Okimasis and Arok Wolvengrey | Paperback

Pawaminikititicikiw, Wilfred Buck, is an Ininew / Cree, Knowledge and Dream Keeper of the Opaskwayak Cree Nation of Northern Manitoba. He is the author of Tipiskawi Kisik: Night Sky Star stories, and I Have Lived Four Lives, a memoir. Kitcikisik (Great Sky) features Indigenous Star Knowledge and is the second edition of Tipiskawi Kisik.

Educator Information
Recommended by the publisher for grades 7+

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86 Pages

The Neyhiyawak (Plains Cree) word "Kitotam" translates into English as, "He Speaks to It." This is a collection of free-verse poetry by Indigenous poet and artist John McDonald. Written in two parts, these poems chronicle John's life and experiences as an urban Indigenous youth during the 1980s. The second half of the book is a look into the inspirations and events, that shaped John's career as an internationally known spoken word artist, beat poet, monologist and performance artist.

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88 pages | 5.50" x 8.50"

I have to believe my account will outpace its ending.

The danger and necessity of living with each other is at the core of Liz Howard’s daring and intimate second collection. Letters in a Bruised Cosmos asks who do we become after the worst has happened? Invoking the knowledge histories of Western and Indigenous astrophysical science, Howard takes us on a breakneck river course of radiant and perilous survival in which we are invited to “reforge [ourselves] inside tomorrow’s humidex”. Everyday observation, family history, and personal tragedy are sublimated here in a propulsive verse that is relentlessly its own. Part autobiography, part philosophical puzzlement, part love song, Letters in a Bruised Cosmos is a book that once read will not soon be forgotten.

Reviews
“Liz Howard’s Letters in a Bruised Cosmos stands as yet another masterpiece of orality and temporality in the blossoming oeuvre that is her poetic arena. We traverse through webbed histories, a multiplicity of singing bodies: human, non-human, father, lover, lake, land, galactic. Howard’s ability to unearth creation and trickster from beneath the rubble of canonic and catatonic poetics is a miracle in the making. It is no surprise to be met with yet again grace and fury in Letters in a Bruised Cosmos—as Howard has demonstrated time and time again, she is a divining starwalker of a poet.” —Joshua Whitehead, author of Jonny Appleseed
 
“In Letters in a Bruised Cosmos, Liz Howard makes sentences with the elegance and mystery of a sculptor. Howard’s aesthetic mode is a beautiful synthesis of feminist, anti-colonial, and post-structural traditions of critique and re-imagination that is singularly hers. I read each poem with the faith that I would land somewhere I couldn’t have known existed until I opened this book. That’s the mark of poetic genius. I loved this book with my whole body.” —Billy-Ray Belcourt, author of A History of My Brief Body

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80 pages | 5.75" x 8.50"

Literatures, Communities, and Learning: Conversations with Indigenous Writers gathers nine conversations with Indigenous writers about the relationship between Indigenous literatures and learning, and how their writing relates to communities.

Relevant, reflexive, and critical, these conversations explore the pressing topic of Indigenous writings and its importance to the well-being of Indigenous Peoples and to Canadian education. It offers readers a chance to listen to authors’ perspectives in their own words.

This book presents conversations shared with nine Indigenous writers in what is now Canada: Tenille Campbell, Warren Cariou, Marilyn Dumont, Daniel Heath Justice, Lee Maracle, Sharron Proulx-Turner, David Alexander Robertson, Richard Van Camp, and Katherena Vermette. Influenced by generations of colonization, surrounded by discourses of Indigenization, reconciliation, appropriation, and representation, and swept up in the rapid growth of Indigenous publishing and Indigenous literary studies, these writers have thought a great deal about their work.

Each conversation is a nuanced examination of one writer’s concerns, critiques, and craft. In their own ways, these writers are navigating the beautiful challenge of storying their communities within politically charged terrain. This book considers the pedagogical dimensions of stories, serving as an Indigenous literary and education project.

Educator Information
Educators teaching Indigenous literatures will be interested in this book as a resource / topical.

Introduction addresses controversies such as appropriation and debates around authors such as Joseph Boyden gives Indigenous writers an opportunity to address direct questions around why writing matters to them and their communities.

Table of Contents
Acknowledgements
Introduction: Writing-in-Relation
“Being able to tell stories from the North” / A Conversation with Richard Van Camp
“It starts from a place of knowledge and truth” / A Conversation with David Alexander Robertson
“I realized that I could write what I see” / A Conversation with Katherena Vermette
“It comes back to relationship” / A Conversation with Warren Cariou
“That’s the purpose of story” / A Conversation with Lee Maracle
“I hope my writing can help others” / A Conversation with Sharron Proulx-Turner
“Indigenous literatures matter” / A Conversation with Daniel Heath Justice
“A beautiful bomb” / A Conversation with Tenille Campbell
“To write myself back into visibility” / A Conversation with Marilyn Dumont
Conclusion: Listening to Writers
Notes
Bibliography

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200 pages | 6.00" x 9.00"

Little Red Warrior is the last remaining member of the Little Red Warrior First Nation. One day, he discovers a development company has begun construction on his ancestral lands. In a fit of rage, Little Red attacks one of the engineers and is arrested for assault and trespassing on his own lands. In jail he meets his court-appointed lawyer, Larry, who agrees to help Little Red get his lands back. Larry convinces his wife, Desdemona, to allow Little Red to move into their basement while they sort out Red’s case. Desdemona and Red strike up an uneasy relationship. When Red notices that one of Desdemona’s eyes is slightly lazy she becomes increasingly neurotic, convinced that Little Red is up to something. Despite herself Desdemona, who is not accustomed to being thrown off her game, is increasingly drawn to Red’s apparently hypnotic Indigenous charisma. As sparks begin to fly between them Larry prepares to fight for Little Red’s Land Rights. An unexpected intervention by a greater power occurs in the court case, and nothing will ever be the same.

Educator Information
Cast of one Indigenous man; two settler men; one settler woman; and one male, female, or non-binary person in drag.

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96 pages | 5.50" x 8.50"

PLAN YOUR YEAR WITH THE LIVING FULL CIRCLE PLANNER. In this planner, author Jenene Wooldridge shares her insights and personal experience on how she incorporates teachings of the medicine wheel around balance and living with purpose to live her life and achieve success. She shares the importance of contemplation, preparation, goals and how they connect to Living Full Circle.

Discover what works for you, develop healthy habits and create goals with intention to live your best. With twelve themed months and 52 weeks of guided reflection, this planner provides a foundation for your ideal life. Track your progress and learn from its useful tips and inspiration as you grow.

• Created by you, for you!
• Delivers clarity for daily living
• Guided reflection to increase self-awareness and productivity
• Goal setting, habit tracking and intentional living

Educator Information
52 Week Undated Planner

Additional Information
160 pages | 8.00" x 10.00"

In Naomi Fontaine’s Governor General’s Literary Award finalist, a young teacher’s return to her remote Innu community transforms the lives of her students, reminding us of the importance of hope in the face of despair.

After fifteen years of exile, Yammie, a young Innu woman, has come back to her home in Uashat, on Quebec’s North Shore. She has returned to teach at the local school but finds a community stalked by despair. Yammie will do anything to help her students. When she accepts a position directing the end-of-year play, she sees an opportunity for the youth to take charge of themselves.

In writing both spare and polyphonic, Naomi Fontaine honestly portrays a year of Yammie’s teaching and of the lives of her students, dislocated, embattled, and ultimately, possibly, triumphant.

Reviews
“A story of lived experience in which serene language and sensitively drawn images come together in short chapters like a succession of small touches of paint on a canvas.” — Le Devoir

“Here is a novel of courage, of surpassing oneself, and of resilience. This is a profoundly moving, human, beautiful book.” — ICI-Radio Canada

“Naomi Fontaine leads us to discover students who are sometimes endearing and sometimes disturbing, but always does so with poetry.” — Chatelaine.

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5.25" x 8.00" | Paperback | Translated by Luise Von Flotow

First Nations, Métis and Inuit artists, activists, educators and writers, youth and elders come together to envision Indigenous futures in Canada and around the world.

Discussing everything from language renewal to sci-fi, this collection is a powerful and important expression of imagination rooted in social critique, cultural experience, traditional knowledge, activism and the multifaceted experiences of Indigenous people on Turtle Island.

In Me Tomorrow: 
Darrel J. McLeod, Cree author from Treaty-8 territory in Northern Alberta, blends the four elements of the Indigenous cosmovision with the four directions of the medicine wheel to create a prayer for the power, strength and resilience of Indigenous peoples.

Autumn Peltier, Anishinaabe water-rights activist, tells the origin story of her present and future career in advocacy—and how the nine months she spent in her mother’s womb formed her first water teaching. When the water breaks, like snow melting in the spring, new life comes.

Lee Maracle, acclaimed Stó:lō Nation author and educator, reflects on cultural revival—imagining a future a century from now in which Indigenous people are more united than ever before.

Other essayists include Cyndy and Makwa Baskin, Norma Dunning, Shalan Joudry, Shelley Knott-Fife, Tracie Léost, Stephanie Peltier, Romeo Saganash, Drew Hayden Taylor and Raymond Yakeleya.

For readers who want to imagine the future, and to cultivate a better one, Me Tomorrow is a journey through the visions generously offered by a diverse group of Indigenous thinkers.

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224 pages | 5.50" x 8.50" | Paperback

Frank Surprenant is a Cree Elder from the Sucker Creek Band on Lesser Slave Lake in Alberta, Canada. He is a Pipe Carrier and Sweat Lodge Keeper. For more than 30 years Frank has been involved in Medicine Wheel Gatherings across Canada and his Teachings have been listened to by countless people. He decided it was time to set these Teachings down in writing and make them more widely accessible.

Medicine Wheel Teachings is an easy-to-follow guide explaining what a Medicine Wheel is and how it is relevant to our lives today. Frank’s vision for this book is that it will be an invaluable tool to understand the connectedness with all things – human, animal, mineral, plant, insect, and more.

The book explains the Medicine Wheel layer by layer. Each layer is illustrated with a diagram. These diagrams build up a complete Medicine Wheel. Each part explains how to find your place on the Medicine Wheel and what you can learn from it – beginning from a starting point of something as simple as your date of birth. The final section gives ideas on making a personal Medicine Wheel.

This book will act as a spark and ignite a further pursuit of Medicine Wheel Teachings and Indigenous Knowledge. Moving forward with healing, understanding and reconciliation.

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75 Pages