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The renowned Cree artist unmasks a whitewashed, Eurocentric history through provocative paintings full of sexuality and drama

One of Canada’s most renowned artists, interdisciplinary Cree artist Kent Monkman challenges the art historical narrative of settler cultures that colonized First Peoples from North America. He incorporates influences from the canon of European and Euro-American painting, reframing historical, contemporary and speculative future Indigenous experiences. Taking inspiration from Western artists such as George Catlin, as well as from the Old Masters, Monkman’s monumental history paintings feature white colonizers in violent conflict with Indigenous people. The depictions range from early colonial encounters to modern and contemporary clashes between Indigenous communities and uniformed police or clergy. In borrowing the visual language of his oppressors, Monkman reclaims the narrative written by Western art history about the brutalization and cultural genocide carried out against Indigenous North American communities.
History is Painted by the Victors accompanies the artist’s first major exhibition in the United States. The catalog gathers rich analysis of Monkman’s art from prominent scholars, expanding our understanding of his oeuvre and offering new insight via queer theory, historical and contemporary contexts, visual analysis and lived experience.

Kent Monkman was born in 1965 in Ontario, Canada and is a member of Fisher River Cree First Nation in Treaty 5 Territory. Monkman’s works have been exhibited at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, Hayward Gallery, Philbrook Museum of Art, Palais de Tokyo and many more. He is the author of two bestselling novels, The Memoirs of Miss Chief Eagle Testickle, Volumes 1 and 2, which are based on his gender-fluid alter ego who often appears in Monkman’s work as a time-traveling, shape-shifting, supernatural being who reverses the colonial gaze to challenge received notions of history and Indigenous peoples. He lives and works in New York City and Toronto.

This book was published in conjunction with Denver Art Museum; Montreal Museum of Fine Arts.

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176 pages | 9.50" x 12.00" | 86 Illustrations | Hardcover 

Profoundly honest and moving, Kihiani is the uplifting story of an Inuk artist’s journey to healing and self-discovery

Born in Fort Churchill, Manitoba, but raised in Arviat, a predominantly Inuit community on the western edges of Hudson Bay, Susan and her six siblings grew up in a humble but loving home. But while living in Rankin Inlet, when she was eight years old, Susan’s life was disrupted by a life-changing event, a distinct separation that created a schism inside her for many years and from which she continues to heal.

At fifteen, she started writing poems that spilled out of her, and when Susan had the choice to leave her community, she grabbed it like a lifeline. Eventually, Susan was approached by a producer at CBC who was making a compilation album of Arctic artists and years later signed with a major label for her third album, This Child.

The disruption and milestones, the turmoil and joy, the devastation and healing—this is Susan Aglukark’s story of discovering her Inuk self.

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272 pages | 6.00" x 9.00" | Hardcover

In ᑭᐢᑭᓱᒥᑐᐠ kiskisomitok: ᓀᐦᐃᔭᐤ to remind each and one other, nêhîyaw educator ᑳᐯᓵᑳᐢᑌᐠ reuben quinn uses the spirit marker writing system as a foundation for teaching ᓀᐦᐃᔭᐁᐧᐃᐧᐣ nêhîyawewin. The spirit marker writing system holds forty-four spirit markers and fourteen minor spirit markers. Some people call that system the star chart. Each spirit marker holds a law. These laws are meant to guide us in ways that support us in life. They are meant to guide us in ways of living well with the elements: fire, land, water, and air. The spirit markers remind us that these elements form the foundations of all relationships on earth.

Educator Information
In ᑭᐢᑭᓱᒥᑐᐠ kiskisomitok: ᓀᐦᐃᔭᐤ, reuben quinn uses the spirit marker writing system as a foundation for teaching ᓀᐦᐃᔭᐁᐧᐃᐧᐣ nêhîyawewin.

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96 pages | 5.51" x 8.50" | Paperback

Kunuuksayuukka: The Spirit of Winter Storms is a story of Inuvialuk (Western Arctic Inuk) Elder Rose Kirby's early life, beginning from her vibrant traditional life on the land, to being taken away on a "ship of tears" to residential school in Aktlarvik (Aklavik), before moving around different DEW Line sites following her father Joseph Saraana Thrasher's work. Known for her powerful memory and storytelling skills, Rose vividly recounts stories from her childhood and even infancy.

Kunuuksayuukka: The Spirit of Winter Storms honours the important lessons that Rose has learned from her Elders and family, through watching how they interacted with one another, as well as with the larger natural world. Rose uses Kunuuksayuukka-the spirit of winter storms-and its slow disappearance from her life, to describe her own transition from traditional, nomadic life on the land to moving into housing settlements created by tan'ngit (white people).

Through almost 300 pages, Rose's book weaves through candid stories of human relationships, loss, love and care for one another, humour, pain, strength, and resilience. Most importantly, it is a heartfelt tribute to Inuvialuit culture, language, history, life, and experiences-all through the eyes of an Inuvialuk who has learned to move with the changing world as she grew up. This book is a must-read for anyone who wants to learn about how Inuvialuit lived long ago.

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6.00" x 9.00" | 25 b&w photographs | Paperback 

A residential school survivor finds his way back to his language and culture through his family’s traditional stories.

When reflecting on forces that have shaped his life, Solomon Ratt says his education was interrupted by his schooling. Torn from his family at the age of six, Ratt was placed into the residential school system—a harsh, institutional world, operated in a language he could not yet understand, far from the love and comfort of home and family. In kâ-pî-isi-kiskisiyân / The Way I Remember, Ratt reflects on these memories and the life-long challenges he endured through his telling of âcimisowin—autobiographical stories—and also traditional tales.

Written over the course of several decades, Ratt describes his life before, during, and after residential school. In many ways, these stories reflect the experience of thousands of other Indigenous children across Canada, but Ratt’s stories also stand apart in a significant way: he managed to retain his mother language of Cree by returning home to his parents each summer despite the destruction wrought by colonialism.

Ratt then shifts from the âcimisowina (personal, autobiographical stories) to âcathôhkîwina, (sacred stories) the more formal and commonly recognized style of traditional Cree literature, to illustrate how, in a world uninterrupted by colonialism and its agenda of genocide, these traditional stories would have formed the winter curriculum of a Cree child’s education.

Presented in Cree Th-dialect Standard Roman Orthography, syllabics, and English, Ratt’s reminiscences of residential school escapades almost always end with a close call and a smile. Even when his memories are dark, Ratt’s particularly Cree sense of humour shines, making kâ-pî-isi-kiskisiyân /The Way I Remember an important and unique memoir that emphasizes and celebrates Solomon Ratt’s perseverance and life after residential school.

Reviews
"Sol is an international treasure the whole world should enjoy." —Buffy Sainte-Marie

"The Way I Remember is inarguably the most important book yet to be published for the preservation of the Cree language and an understanding of the importance of the oral tradition to Cree culture and education." —Jesse Archibald-Barber, First Nations University of Canada

"As he looks back over his life journey reclaiming, breathing new and old life back into our beautiful language, Solomon credits the late Reverend Edward Ahenekew for helping me "to put the pieces together." kista meena dear Solomon, ekosi aytotumawiyak. This is an important book because you have also put pieces together for us so that we can have a good journey. Kinahnaskomtin." —Maria Campbell, author of Halfbreed

"A gift to future generations...Full of humour and resilience in equal measure, these Cree/English stories offer us a glimpse into a world as it was, and future that could be" —Chelsea Vowel, author of Indigenous Writes

Educator & Series Information
Presented in Cree Th-dialect Standard Roman Orthography, syllabics, and English.

This book is part of the Our Own Words series.

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264 pages | 6.00" x 9.00" | Paperback

An unflinching reimagining of Legacy: Trauma, Story, and Indigenous Healing for young adults.

Written specifically for young adults, reluctant readers, and literacy learners, Killing the Wittigo explains the traumatic effects of colonization on Indigenous people and communities and how trauma alters an individual’s brain, body, and behavior. It explores how learned patterns of behavior — the ways people adapt to trauma to survive — are passed down within family systems, thereby affecting the functioning of entire communities. The book foregrounds Indigenous resilience through song lyrics and as-told-to stories by young people who have started their own journeys of decolonization, healing, and change. It also details the transformative work being done in urban and on-reserve communities through community-led projects and Indigenous-run institutions and community agencies. These stories offer concrete examples of the ways in which Indigenous peoples and communities are capable of healing in small and big ways — and they challenge readers to consider what the dominant society must do to create systemic change. Full of bold graphics and illustration, Killing the Wittigo is a much-needed resource for Indigenous kids and the people who love them and work with them.

Educator Information
Recommended for ages 12 to 17.

The adult version of this book can be found here: Legacy: Trauma, Story, and Indigenous Healing

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160 pages | 5.50" x 8.50" | Paperback

The 25th anniversary of a historically significant collection, presented in Cree and English.

kôhkominawak otâcimowiniwâwa / Our Grandmothers’ Lives is a collection of reminiscences and personal stories from the daily lives of seven Cree women over the past century, presented here in Cree and English. Recorded in their own language, these women share their memories of their lives and the history of their peoples, describing activities such as household chores, snaring rabbits and picking berries, going to school, marriage, bearing and raising children, and providing insights into the traditional teachings of a society in which the practical and spiritual are never far apart.

Reviews
"[T]hese ... are good stories to share ... and are absolute treasures." —Chelsea Vowel, author of Buffalo is the New Buffalo 

Educator & Series Information
This book is part of the Our Own Words series.

Presented in Cree and English.

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418 pages | 6.00" x 9.00" | Paperback

A Quebec bestseller based on the life of Michel Jean's great-grandmother that delivers an empathetic portrait of drastic change in an Innu community.

Kukum recounts the story of Almanda Siméon, an orphan raised by her aunt and uncle, who falls in love with a young Innu man despite their cultural differences and goes on to share her life with the Pekuakami Innu community. They accept her as one of their own: Almanda learns their language, how to live a nomadic existence, and begins to break down the barriers imposed on Indigenous women. Unfolding over the course of a century, the novel details the end of traditional ways of life for the Innu, as Almanda and her family face the loss of their land and confinement to reserves, and the enduring violence of residential schools.

Kukum intimately expresses the importance of Innu ancestral values and the need for freedom nomadic peoples feel to this day.

Educator Information
Translated by Susan Ouriou.

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224 pages | 5.50" x 8.50" | Paperback

Indigenous methodologies have been silenced and obscured by the Western scientific means of knowledge production. In a challenge to this colonialist rejection of Indigenous knowledge, Anishinaabe re-searcher Kathleen Absolon describes how Indigenous re-searchers re-theorize and re-create methodologies. Indigenous knowledge resurgence is being informed by taking a second look at how re-search is grounded. Absolon consciously adds an emphasis on re with a hyphen as a process of recovery of Kaandossiwin and Indigenous re-search. Understanding Indigenous methodologies as guided by Indigenous paradigms, worldviews, principles, processes and contexts, Absolon argues that they are wholistic, relational, inter-relational and interdependent with Indigenous philosophies, beliefs and ways of life. In exploring the ways Indigenous re-searchers use Indigenous methodologies within mainstream academia, Kaandossiwin renders these methods visible and helps to guard other ways of knowing from colonial repression. This second edition features the author’s reflections on her decade of re-search and teaching experience since the last edition, celebrating the most common student questions, concerns, and revelations.

Educator Information
Table of Contents
Part One: Preparation For The Search

1) An Introduction to Preparing for Re-Search: Having Tea & Bannock
Re-storying and restoring location
Restoring self: Locating My Self
Decolonizing and Indigenizing My Re-search
Language and Terminology
Chapter Outlines

2) Indigenous Re-Search: Past, Present and Future
Indigenous Peoples’ Cultural History and Research
Oral Traditions and Narrative
Indigenous Knowledge Resurgence: Shifting Landscapes
Trailblazers: Re-searchers and their Searches

3) Colonial Research Trauma My Own Search: A Journey of Making Meaning

4) The Search Trail and Pathway

Part Two: Wholistic Re-Search Methodologies

5) Wholistic Worldviews and Methodologies

6) The Roots: Paradigms, Worldviews and Principles
Paradigms and Worldviews
Principles

7) The Flower Centre: Self as Central
Self
Location
Situate Self in the Search
Memory
Motive and Purpose
Search for Congruency

8) The Leaves: The Methodological Journey
An Organic Process
Travelling
Transformation
Healing

9) The Stem: Backbone and Supports  
Critical Consciousness
The Role of Critically Conscious Indigenous Scholars
Indigenous Searchers’ Strengths and Supports

10) The Petals: Diverse Methodologies
Spirit: Protocols, Ceremony and Honour
Heart: Relationships, Reciprocity and Community
Mind: Respecting Indigenous Knowledge
Body: Doing, Working and Creating

11) The Enviro-Academic Context
Fences and Gatekeepers
Allied Theories
The Committee
Writing Oral Traditions and Other Ironies
Thorny Prickly Challenges

12) Indigenist Re-Search Projects and Methodologies: The Last 10 Years

13) Leaving Good Footprints and Winding Down

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304 pages | 6.00" x 9.00" | Paperback | 2nd Edition

Kent Monkman's art has been described as "stupendous" (New York Times), "sure to alarm and educate" (The Observer), and beating "Western history painting at its own game" (The Globe and Mail). Subversive, bold, and groundbreaking, the work of this Cree artist has transformed contemporary Canadian visual culture. Monkman's art is included in major Canadian and international public institutions and he is the only artist in this country to be commissioned by The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Kent Monkman: Life & Work is the first comprehensive book about the celebrated Monkman (b.1965). It is the only publication to trace the arc of his career, from his early abstract paintings to his rise to fame creating works that re-visit and reinterpret historic paintings to offer a powerful commentary on Indigenous resistance, remembrance, and the re-thinking of history.

Author Shirley Madill chronicles the origins of Miss Chief Eagle Testickle—Monkman's time-travelling, shape-shifting, gender-fluid alter ego, who features prominently in his work—and details his youth in Manitoba growing up as a member of the Fisher River First Nation, where he first became aware of profound social injustice. Madill explores Monkman's provocative interventions into Western European and American art history, and shows how he created a body of work that raises awareness of the critical issues facing Indigenous peoples by fiercely addressing North America's legacy of colonialism, while also critiquing Western art history. Kent Monkman: Life & Work is the definitive publication for anyone passionate about Indigenous issues, art in North America, and contemporary culture.

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144 pages | 8.00" x 11.00" | Hardcover 

From the winner of the 2021 Governor General's Award for literature, a revelatory look into an obscured piece of Canadian history: what was then called the Eskimo Identification Tag System

In 2001, Dr. Norma Dunning applied to the Nunavut Beneficiary program, requesting enrolment to legally solidify her existence as an Inuk woman. But in the process, she was faced with a question she could not answer, tied to a colonial institution retired decades ago: “What was your disc number?”

Still haunted by this question years later, Dunning took it upon herself to reach out to Inuit community members who experienced the Eskimo Identification Tag System first-hand, providing vital perspective and nuance to the scant records available on the subject. Written with incisive detail and passion, Dunning provides readers with a comprehensive look into a bureaucracy sustained by the Canadian government for over thirty years, neglected by history books but with lasting echoes revealed in Dunning’s intimate interviews with affected community members. Not one government has taken responsibility or apologized for the E-number system to date — a symbol of the blatant dehumanizing treatment of the smallest Indigenous population in Canada.

A necessary and timely offering, Kinauvit? provides a critical record and response to a significant piece of Canadian history, collecting years of research, interviews and personal stories from an important voice in Canadian literature.

Reviews
"‘Mom, what are we’? a question asked by Inuit scholar and writer Norma Dunning, which remains like a floating specter over the course of this highly original and devastating book, vividly recalling the disembodying process of colonization. Much more than this, however, this highly personal, evocative and robustly researched amalgam of wrenching memories, historical records, and testimony, Kinauvit? What’s Your Name?, is a multi-dimensional life’s work that demonstrates the power and will of Indigenous peoples’ reclamation of self."— Brendan Hokowhitu, Professor of Indigenous Research, The University of Queensland, August 2022

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184 pages | 5.50" x 8.50" | Hardcover

Knowledge Within: Treasures of the Northwest Coast looks into seventeen of the numerous sites in the Pacific Northwest region with major collections of Northwest Coast material culture, bringing attention to a wide range of approaches to caring for and exhibiting such treasures. Each chapter is written by one or more people who work or worked in the organization they write about. Each chapter takes a different approach to the invitation to reflect upon their institution: some narrate a history of the institution, some focus on particular pieces in the collection, and some consider the significance of the work currently being done for the present and future. They do more than fill in the gaps and background of an already existing discussion. They show that these are places and moments in a much longer story, still ongoing, with many characters - individuals, institutions, communities, artworks, treasures - on different, although often parallel or intersecting, journeys.

Featuring ‘Ksan Historical Village and Museum, Museum of Northern British Columbia, Sealaska Heritage Institute, Haida Gwaii Museum, U’mista Cultural Centre, Museum at Campbell River, Nuyumbalees Cultural Centre, Art Gallery of Greater Victoria, Royal BC Museum, Vancouver Airport Authority / YVR Art Foundation, Museum of Anthropology at UBC, Bill Reid Gallery of Northwest Coast Art, Vancouver Art Gallery, Stó:lō Resource Centre, Museum of Vancouver, Squamish Lil’wat Cultural Centre, and Audain Art Museum.

“Every generation shapes history according to its own particular needs. The current shaping of social relations between First Nations people in Canada and the settler population is embedded in the essays in this collection. It is about regional museums and their holdings of Northwest Coast First Nations cultural treasures, but it is also about much more. The inquisitive reader has much of value to discover here.”—Ḥaa’yuups

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192 pages | 10.00" x 12.00" | Hardcover

Indigenous Voices Award winner Cole Pauls returns with a robust collection of stories that celebrate the cultural practices and experiences of Dene and Arctic peoples. Gathering Pauls's comics from magazines, comic festivals and zine making workshops, these comics are his most personal work yet. You'll learn stories about the author's family, racism and identity, Yukon history, winter activities, Southern Tutchone language lessons and cultural practices. Have you ever wanted to learn how to Knuckle Hop? or to acknowledge and respect the Indigenous land you’re on? Or how to be an ally to Indigenous people? Well, gather around and hear this Kwändǖr! (Story!).

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140 pages | 6.50" x 10.00" Paperback

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