Indigenous Culture / Identity

A wide-ranging anthology that shines a light on untold Indigenous stories as chronicled by Indigenous creators, compiled by the acclaimed team behind What the Eagle Sees and Sky Wolf’s Call.

For too long, stories and artistic expressions from Indigenous people have been written and recorded by others, not by the individuals who have experienced the events.

In Ours to Tell, sixteen Indigenous creators relate traditions, accounts of historical events, and their own lived experiences. Novelists, poets, graphic artists, historians, craftspeople, and mapmakers chronicle stories on the struggles and triumphs lived by Indigenous people, and the impact these stories have had on their culture and history. Some of the profiles included are:

• Indigenous poet E. Pauline Johnson
• acclaimed novelist Tommy Orange
• brave warrior Standing Bear
• poet and activist Rita Joe

With each profile accompanied by rich visuals, from archival photos to contemporary art, Ours to Tell brilliantly spotlights Indigenous life, past and present, through an Indigenous lens. Because each profile gives an historical and cultural context, what emerges is a history of Indigenous people.

Educator Information
Recommended for ages 12+.

Table of Contents

A Note about Language and Terms 
Introduction: Ours to Tell 

Part One: We Tell Our Story in Images and Symbols

Part Two: We Report the Story

Part Three: Our History Is in Our Poems, Songs, and Written Stories

Part Four: Our Stories Bear Witness

Part Five: Our Hands Tell Our Story

Afterword: Our Stories Go On

Sources
Index 

Additional Information

136 pages | 7.50" x 9.25" | Paperback

Place names are powerful, and their significance extends far beyond words. Learning and embracing the original Indigenous phrases used to describe the world around us acknowledges the impact of colonization, recognizes First Peoples’ ongoing relationship to the land, and honours their traditional way of being. In Snuneymuxw Mulstimuxw, Traditional Knowledge Keeper and respected Elder Geraldine Manson, C’tasi:a offers an extensive survey of the history and meaning of local Hul’q’umi’num place names and origin stories of the Snuneymuxw First Nation.

Produced through a partnership between Snuneymuxw First Nation, Vancouver Island University, and New Society Publishers, this beautifully illustrated, full-colour booklet gathers and shares the rich history of the Snuneymuxw’s living landscape as passed down through generations from time immemorial. From how Xw’ulhquyum (Snake Island) and other sites of significance got their names to ancient stories such as the bringing of fire by Qeyux to the Tle:ltxw people, the cultural history chronicled in these pages provides a unique lens through which to view and understand nearby lands and waters.

In addition to the sacred cultural narratives distilled from the teachings of the Ancestors, Snuneymuxw Mulstimuxw delves into more recent historical events, told from the perspective of those who experienced them firsthand or whose families are still experiencing the intergenerational effects. This invaluable work is complemented by a series of maps integrating traditional Hul’q’umi’num place names into their present day context.

Educator Information
In Snuneymuxw Mulstimuxw Elder C’tasi:a offers an extensive survey of Hul’q’umi’num place names, sites of significance, and origin stories of the Snuneymuxw Nation.

Embracing the original Indigenous names for the world around us, this book acknowledges the impact of colonization and honours First Peoples’ ongoing relationship with the land.

Additional Information
42 Pages | 8.5" x 11" | Paperback

All proceeds from the sale of this work are donated to Youth and Elders events and youth who need finances to attend events.

For over two centuries, the Métis have fought for recognition as an Indigenous people and as a Nation. This struggle has played out on the battlefield, in the courts, and at the negotiating table, often over issues of governance, land rights, and resources. It wasn’t until 1982, when the government patriated the Constitution, that Métis rights were officially recognized by Canada. The True Canadians chronicles Métis challenges and achievements over those 40 years and well before. Focused on Alberta, the book traces the growth of the Métis Nation of Alberta, which in 2022 ratified its own Constitution, the same year as the 40th anniversary of Canada’s Constitution Act. The title refers to the fact the Métis are the people born of this land.

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11.00" x 9.00" | Hardcover

​Updated and expanded 2nd edition of the national best seller!

First Nations 101 provides a broad overview of the day-to-day lives of Indigenous people, traditional Indigenous communities, colonial interventions used in an attempt to assimilate Indigenous people into mainstream society, the impacts those interventions had on Indigenous families and communities, and how Indigenous people are working towards holistic health and wellness today.

This 2nd edition has over 75 chapters, including new ones on rematriation, water for life, governance ‘options’, Indigenous feminisms, decolonization, (mis)appropriation, Indigenous Knowledge, and how to become a great ally.

Educator Information
Author Lynda Gray’s accessible writing style makes First Nations 101 the perfect primer for all to read. She notes that although governments may encourage and fund reconciliation activities, true reconciliation can only happen through the ongoing commitment and consistent actions of individuals, groups, organizations, governments, and businesses.

$1 from each book sold will be donated to the Ts’msyen Revolution Fund which Lynda Gray and her children, Dr. Robin Gray and artist Phil Gray, started in 2022. The Fund will help support Ts’msyen language and culture revitalization in laxyuubm Ts’msyen (Ts’msyen territory).

Lynda Gray is member of the Ts’msyen Nation from Lax Kw’alaams on the Northwest Coast of B.C. The book’s cover art was created by her son Phil Gray and features a 'neełx (killerwhale) to represent the author and her children’s clan (Gisbutwada).

The 2nd edition has over 75 chapters, with 16 new ones including rematriation, what is reconciliation, traditional economies, water for life, Indigenous feminisms, (mis)appropriation, economic development, Indigenous Knowledge, how to become a great ally, and more.

Additional Information
336 Pages | Updated and expanded 2nd edition

From healing to astronomy to our connection to the natural world, the lessons from Indigenous knowledge inform our learning and practices today.

How do knowledge systems get passed down over generations? Through the knowledge inherited from their Elders and ancestors, Indigenous Peoples throughout North America have observed, practiced, experimented, and interacted with plants, animals, the sky, and the waters over millennia. Knowledge keepers have shared their wisdom with younger people through oral history, stories, ceremonies, and records that took many forms.

In Sky Wolf’s Call, award-winning author team of Eldon Yellowhorn and Kathy Lowinger reveal how Indigenous knowledge comes from centuries of practices, experiences, and ideas gathered by people who have a long history with the natural world. Indigenous knowledge is explored through the use of fire and water, the acquisition of food, the study of astronomy, and healing practices.

Reviews
"An authoritative tribute to Indigenous knowledge systems that's a must-have for every library and classroom." - Kirkus Reviews

“Sky Wolf’s Call has an astoundingly broad scope introducing Indigenous Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK) in North America from time immemorial to the current day … This fast paced celebration of Indigenous innovation and technology is riveting.” - The British Columbia Review

Educator Information
Interest Age: 11+
Grade: 6+
Reading Age: 11+

A Junior Library Guild Gold Standard Selection

Table of Contents
Author’s Note

1: Sky Wolf’s Call: The Gift of Indigenous Knowledge: Foundational ideas behind Indigenous Knowledge and the importance of retaining, maintaining, and learning this sacred knowledge.

2: Water Knowledge Ways: Water links us all and is sacred. Indigenous people have fought to protect the gift of water from harm, and the critical role it has played in transportation, agriculture, irrigation, and food.

3: Fire and Smoke Knowledge: Fire and smoke are great gifts, including the burning of tobacco. In sacred ceremonies, smoke connects our breath with the heavens. Fire cooks our food, helps grow our crops, and even keeps our waters clean. Cultural burns are used to benefit the land.

4: Indigenous Knowledge and Food Security: Sharing, growing, and receiving food with family, community, and visitors is both an honour and a tradition. By understanding the traditional practices of salmon fishing, clam gardens, planting and harvesting certain crops, or hunting buffalo, Indigenous Peoples have respected what Mother Earth has to offer.

5: Healing Knowledge Ways: The use of the medicine wheel and the sweat lodge have been used over centuries and still help sick and troubled people. Games such as lacrosse and chunkey have helped in building individual strength and community spirit. And braiding together Indigenous healing and western science has opened new learning opportunities.

6: Sky Knowledge: From the earliest Indigenous astronomers to modern astrophysicists, these sky watchers have studied the sacred gifts of the sky: the sun, moon, planets, and stars that have produced maps, calendars, beliefs about how to govern, and even directions for building homes.

7: Keeping the Knowledge: Indigenous People hold oral narratives in high esteem because that was the way knowledge passed from one generation to the next. People in North America recorded important events with symbols, pictographs (paintings), and petroglyphs (carvings). Language Keepers and Knowledge keepers are making sure that Indigenous knowledge is never forgotten.

8: Sky Wolf’s Call: Indigenous knowledge is based on the idea that this world is a gift. Understanding the idea of connections (the skies with the earth, people with animals, the practical with the spiritual) is an important lesson with the challenges of climate change, pandemics, and wars. The wisdom of Indigenous Knowledge can help the whole world.

Thanks and Acknowledgments

Glossary

Selected Reading

Sources and Contacts

Additional Information
120 pages | 7.50" x 9.25" | Paperback

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.

Additional Information
192 pages | 5.50" x 8.50"

An accessible and educational illustrated book profiling 50 notable American Indian, Alaska Native, and Native Hawaiian people, from NBA star Kyrie Irving of the Standing Rock Lakota to Wilma Mankiller, the first female principal chief of the Cherokee Nation

Celebrate the lives, stories, and contributions of Indigenous artists, activists, scientists, athletes, and other changemakers in this beautifully illustrated collection. From luminaries of the past, like nineteenth-century sculptor Edmonia Lewis—the first Black and Native American female artist to achieve international fame—to contemporary figures like linguist jessie little doe baird, who revived the Wampanoag language, Notable Native People highlights the vital impact Indigenous dreamers and leaders have made on the world.

This powerful and informative collection also offers accessible primers on important Indigenous issues, from the legacy of colonialism and cultural appropriation to food sovereignty, land and water rights, and more. An indispensable read for people of all backgrounds seeking to learn about Native American heritage, histories, and cultures, Notable Native People will educate and inspire readers of all ages.

Additional Information
144 pages | 7.26" x 9.29" | Hardcover

This book, and accompanying Vimeo documentary link, is a collection of stories about culture, history, and nationhood as told by Métis women. The Métis are known by many names — Otipemisiwak, “the people who own ourselves;” Bois Brules, “Burnt Wood;” Apeetogosan, “half brother” by the Cree; “half-breed,” historically; and are also known as “rebels” and “traitors to Canada.” They are also known as the “Forgotten People.” Few really know their story.

Many people may also think that Métis simply means “mixed,” but it does not. They are a people with a unique and proud history and Nation. In this era of reconciliation, Stories of Métis Women explains the story of the Métis Nation from their own perspective. The UN has declared this “The Decade of Indigenous Languages” and Stories of Métis Women is one of the few books available in English and Michif, which is an endangered language.

Reviews
"With this book, some of these important and unique perspectives and worldviews about who we are as a people, how we have survived as people and how we will carry on and thrive as a people are shared through the writings of the daughters, mothers, aunties and grandmothers of the Métis Nation. I congratulate the Métis women who have taken the time to share and write down some of this knowledge for generations to come." —­Jason Madden, Métis rights lawyer and citizen of the Métis Nation

Additional Information
240 pages | 6.00" x 9.00" | 50 black and white illustrations | Paperback

An exploration of the historical and future significance of Canada's Native soul.

Eatenonha is the Wendat word for love and respect for the Earth and Mother Nature. For many Native peoples and newcomers to North America, Canada is a motherland, an Eatenonha - a land in which all can and should feel included, valued, and celebrated.

In Eatenonha Georges Sioui presents the history of a group of Wendat known as the Seawi Clan and reveals the deepest, most honoured secrets possessed by his people, by all people who are Indigenous, and by those who understand and respect Indigenous ways of thinking and living. Providing a glimpse into the lives, ideology, and work of his family and ancestors, Sioui weaves a tale of the Wendat's sparsely documented historical trajectory and his family's experiences on a reserve. Through an original retelling of the Indigenous commercial and social networks that existed in the northeast before European contact, the author explains that the Wendat Confederacy was at the geopolitical centre of a commonwealth based on peace, trade, and reciprocity. This network, he argues, was a true democracy, where all beings of all natures were equally valued and respected and where women kept their place at the centre of their families and communities.

Identifying Canada's first civilizations as the originators of modern democracy, Eatenonha represents a continuing quest to heal and educate all peoples through an Indigenous way of comprehending life and the world.

Reviews
"Eatenonha is a unique interweaving of self, family, First Nation, and Indigenous peoples of the Americas and elsewhere." - John Steckley, Humber College

Educator Information
Recommended in the Canadian Indigenous Books for Schools 2020/2021 resource list for grades 10 to 12 for use in these areas: English Language Arts and Social Studies.

Additional Information
200 pages | 6.00" x 9.00"

Inconvenient Skin challenges how reconciliation has become a contested buzzword filled with promises and good intentions but rarely any meaningful follow-through. While Canada's history is filled with darkness, these poems aim to unpack that history to clean the wounds so the nation can finally heal. Powerful and thought-provoking, this collection will draw you in and make you reconsider Canada's colonial legacy. The cover features the art of Kent Monkman, and the interior features work by Joseph Sanchez, a member of the Indian Group of Seven.

Written in English and Cree.

Educator Information
This collection of poems features Shane Koyczan's well-known poem, "Inconvenient Skin," delivered in a dual-language format of English and Cree and paired with illustrations, artwork, and photography.

Recommended in the Canadian Indigenous Books for Schools 2019-2020 resource list as being useful for grades 11 and 12 for these subjects: Art Education, English Language Arts.

This poem talks about sexual assault, genocide, and violence.  Some of the artwork shows violence and nudity.  This could be triggering for some readers.

Additional Information
80 pages | 8.50" x 8.50" | Colour Illustrations

Gabriel Dumont Institute Press is honoured to publish Cecile Blanke’s Lac Pelletier: My Métis Home. A prominent Métis Elder living in Swift Current, Saskatchewan, but with deep roots in nearby Lac Pelletier, Cecile has been a tireless presence on the Métis and larger cultural scene in southwest Saskatchewan for many years. The history of the southwest Saskatchewan Métis is not widely known, and this book contributes significantly to our knowledge of this community. With her vivid memories of Lac Pelletier’s local families and traditions, we are left with an enduring portrait of a caring Métis community which maintained close family ties and lived in harmony with Lac Pelletier’s flora and fauna. Cecile also chronicles the racism that the local Métis often faced and discussed how colonization made her and others question their Métis identity. With time and perspective, she overcame this self-hatred and became proud of her Métis heritage, becoming its biggest promoter in her region of Saskatchewan.

Educator Information
Recommended by Gabriel Dumont Institute for these grade levels: Secondary/Post-Secondary/Adult

Our parents always taught us well. They told us to look on the good side of life and to accept what has to happen. 

The Man Who Lived with a Giant presents traditional and personal stories told by Johnny Neyelle, a respected Dene storyteller and Elder from Déline, Northwest Territories. Johnny Neyelle used storytelling to teach Dene youth and others to understand and celebrate Dene traditions and identities. Johnny’s entertaining voice makes his stories accessible to readers young and old, and his wisdom reinforces the right way to live: in harmony with people and places. Storytelling forms the core of Dene knowledge-keeping. A volume dedicated to making Dene culture strong, The Man Who Lived with a Giant is a vital book for Dene readers, researchers working with Indigenous cultures and oral histories, and scholars preserving Elders’ stories. Even more, it is a book for the Dene people of today and tomorrow.

Additional Information
152 pages | 6.00" x 9.00"

Saul Indian Horse has hit bottom. His last binge almost killed him, and now he’s a reluctant resident in a treatment centre for alcoholics, surrounded by people he’s sure will never understand him. But Saul wants peace, and he grudgingly comes to see that he’ll find it only through telling his story. With him, readers embark on a journey back through the life he’s led as a northern Ojibway, with all its joys and sorrows. 

With compassion and insight, author Richard Wagamese traces through his fictional characters the decline of a culture and a cultural way. For Saul, taken forcibly from the land and his family when he’s sent to residential school, salvation comes for a while through his incredible gifts as a hockey player. But in the harsh realities of 1960s Canada, he battles obdurate racism and the spirit-destroying effects of cultural alienation and displacement. Indian Horse unfolds against the bleak loveliness of northern Ontario, all rock, marsh, bog and cedar. Wagamese writes with a spare beauty, penetrating the heart of a remarkable Ojibway man.

Awards

• 2013 Burt Award for First Nations, Métis, and Inuit Literature
• 2013 First Nation Communities Read Award

Reviews
"Richard Wagamese is a master storyteller, who blends the throb of life with spiritual links to the land, hard work, and culture to find success, his words take you into the soul of Indian Horse, to experience his pain, his growing resentments, his depression, and his fear which has to be faced if he is to regain the joy of life. This book is meant for youth, adults, and elders, to be shared, to be lived, and to be treasured for the clear message of hope and the need to go the distance." — Wawatay News

“…The hockey chapters are compelling; they evoke Sherman Alexie’s fiction that examines contemporary life on American Indian reservations through the lens of basketball. But it is as a story of reconciliation that this novel reveals Wagamese’s masterful subtly…In a single image, Wagamese complicates in blinding ways the entire narrative; in a single page, Indian Horse deepens from an enjoyable read to a gripping critique of Canada.” — Kyle Carsten Wyatt, The Walrus, 2012

Educator Information
Grades 10-12 BC English First Peoples resource for units on Lost People, Reconciliation, and Place-Conscious Learning.

Caution: Substance Abuse, Mature Content 

Additional Information
232 pages | 5.50" x 8.50"

This special edition of Richard Wagamese’s novel Indian Horse has been released to coincide with the release of the film Indian Horse in the spring of 2018.

Indigenous perspectives much older than the nation itself shared through maps, artwork, history and culture.

The Royal Canadian Geographical Society, in partnership with Canada's national Indigenous organizations, has created a groundbreaking four-volume atlas that shares the experiences, perspectives, and histories of First Nations, Inuit and Métis peoples. It's an ambitious and unprecedented project inspired by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission's Calls to Action. Exploring themes of language, demographics, economy, environment and culture, with in-depth coverage of treaties and residential schools, these are stories of Canada's Indigenous Peoples, told in detailed maps and rich narratives.

This extraordinary project offers Canada a step on the path toward understanding.

The volumes contain more than 48 pages of reference maps, content from more than 50 Indigenous writers; hundreds of historical and contemporary photographs and a glossary of Indigenous terms, timelines, map of Indigenous languages, and frequently asked questions. All packaged together in a beautifully designed protective slipcase.

Educator Information
Recommended for ages 13+.

The Indigenous Peoples Atlas of Canada includes a four volume print atlas, an online atlas, an app, and more!

Additional Information
322 pages | 10.50" x 12.87"

Cultural tourism is frequently marketed as an economic panacea for communities whose traditional ways of life have been compromised by the dominant societies by which they have been colonized. Indigenous communities in particular are responding to these opportunities in innovative ways that set them apart from their non-Indigenous predecessors and competitors. 

Indigenous Tourism Movements explores Indigenous identity using “movement” as a metaphor, drawing on case studies from throughout the world including Botswana, Canada, Chile, Panama, Tanzania, and the United States.

Editors Alexis C.Bunten and Nelson Graburn, along with a diverse group of contributors,  frame tourism as a critical lens to explore the shifting identity politics of Indigeneity in relation to heritage, global policy, and development. They juxtapose diverse expressions of identity – from the commodification of Indigenous culture to the performance of heritage for tourists – to illuminate the complex local, national, and transnational connections these expressions produce. 

Indigenous Tourism Movements is a sophisticated, sensitive, and refreshingly frank examination of Indigeneity in the contemporary world.

Educator Information

TABLE OF CONTENTS
List of Figures
Notes on Contributors
Acknowledgments
Preface
1. Current Themes in Indigenous Tourism, Alexis Celeste Bunten and Nelson H.H. Graburn
PART 1: IDENTITY MOVEMENTS
1. Deriding Demand: A Case Study of Indigenous Imaginaries at an Australian Aboriginal Tourism Cultural Park, Alexis Celeste Bunten
2. The Masaai as paradoxical icons of tourism (im)mobility, Noel Salazar
3. The Alchemy of Tourism: From Stereotype and Marginalizing Discourse to Real in the Space of Tourist Performance, Karen Stocker
PART II: POLITICAL MOVEMENTS
1. Indigenous tourism as a transformative process: the case of the Embera in Panama, Dimitrios Theodossopoulos
2. San Cultural Tourism: Mobilizing Indigenous Agency in Botswana, Rachel Giraudo
3. The Commodification of Authenticity: Performing and Displaying Dogon Material Identity, Laurence Douny
PART III: KNOWLEDGE MOVEMENTS
1. Streams of Tourists: Navigating the Tourist Tides in Late 19th Century Southeast Alaska, Kathryn Bunn-Marcuse
2. Experiments in Inuit Tourism: The Eastern Canadian Arctic, Nelson H.H. Graburn
3. Beyond Neoliberalism and Nature: Territoriality, Relational Ontologies and Hybridity in a Tourism Initiative in Alto Bio Bio, Chile, Marcela Palomino-Schalscha
Epilogue

Reviews
"Indigenous Tourism Movements is a major contribution to research. It provides insightful case studies based on longitudinal, immersive field work that spans decades. Thoroughly informed by the relevant literature and theoretical insights, Indigenous Tourism Movements will be well received by academics and students of anthropology, geography, and cultural and tourism studies." - Anna Carr, Department of Tourism, University of Otago

Additional Information
288 pages | 6.00" x 9.00"