Graduate Theses & Dissertations

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It Flows from the Heart
Indigenous Knowledges and intellectual tradition emanate from relationship with land, water, spirit, and the beings of Creation. Knowledge mobilization occurs intergenerationally and through these relationships. The Bodwewaadmii Anishinaabeg have lived in relationship with the Great Lakes since the formation of the lakes. Our stories and practices demonstrate our intimate ties to land, water, and the other than human beings. This dissertation shares some of these practices and stories. Settler colonialism in the Great Lakes has disrupted Bodwewaadmii Anishinaabe relationships and resulted in a diaspora. Following the Federal Indian Removal Act of 1830, individual Bodwewaadmiig and families moved north and inland from the southern shores of Lake Michigan, south to the southern plains of the United States and into Mexico, or seemingly stayed in place in southwestern Michigan. As a result, Bodwewaadmii Anishinaabeg now reside in three colonial nation states—Canada, United States, and Mexico. The disruption of Great Lakes basin-based relationships continues, impacting cultural practices, language, and Knowledges as well as knowledge mobilization. Multilayered settler colonial processes have covered women’s water Knowledges and practices. This dissertation shares narratives of Bodwewaadmii migration, removal and relocation through a lens of disruption and knowledge covering. Returning to ourselves, Biskaabiiyang, is revitalization of culture, language and Knowledges. In addition, Biskaabiiyang is a way of being and a research methodology. This dissertation shares the stories and motivations of over twenty-five Anishinaabe women, men and gender fluid humans working to uncover Knowledges and practices and reweave both into their daily lives, the lives of their grandchildren and their community members. This research builds on historical literature and on a body of literature about cultural practices, water Knowledges, and Indigenous peoples’ relationships with land, water, and the beings of the Great Lakes. It contributes to Indigenous research methodology, Bodwewaadmii Anishinaabe history, and revitalization of language, Knowledges and practices. It has been written in a narrative style and for the benefit of our families and communities. Author Keywords: Anishinaabe Studies, Biskaabiiyang, Indigenous Knowledges, Indigenous Research Methodology, Potawatomi, Water
Keeping Circle
In the 1980’s, Hollow Water First Nation citizens created a healing movement to address community issues from an Indigenous perspective resulting in the development of the Community Holistic Circle Healing (CHCH) in 1989. The CHCH organization developed a Community (Restorative) Justice process as an alternative to a Western-based Justice approach to address issues such as domestic violence and sexual abuse. The CHCH organization addresses justice from a healing perspective (rather than the Western approach’s punitive/surveillance model) and includes the offender and offender’s family, the victim and the victim’s family, as well as the community to identify issues, develop plans, implement healing activities, and evaluate the outcome so that the root systemic issues affecting community can be addressed holistically. Hollow Water First Nation is much more engaged in addressing the roots of why the offence occurred and looks for Anishinaabek approaches to resolve community-defined issues. Western society tends to implement a symptomatic approach to violence deterrence through punishment rather than address issues through a healing process. My research looks at the complex history of the healing movement, the operation of the CHCH organization and the personal values that emerged from the healing movement, and Hollow Water’s next iteration of organization from the children of the people that began the healing movement. These people are now aged around mid-40’s and have seen their parents engage in a community justice movement, saw their parents develop their own way to address community issues through the emergence and operation of the CHCH organization, and now, themselves, have developed highly critical and creative skills around the workings of community development. I use Berger and Luckmann’s seminal 1966 book The Social Construction of Reality, Hallowell’s perspectives on the Anishinaabek culture in his anthropological research conducted in Beren’s River, Manitoba during the 1930’s, Max Weber’s The Theory of Social and Economic Organization (1915), interviews with the original activists, and my experiences living in Hollow Water for 4+ years (from 1997 to 2001) to give an account of the history of the healing movement and its consequent personal transformation of the people engaged in examining their thoughts, values and behavioural processes. I use the Learning Organization Theory, developed by Peter Senge (a management professor from Massachusetts Institute of Technology) in his 1990 book The Fifth Discipline, interviews of CHCH staff and other community organization staff members, as well as, Indigenous authors, such as, Leanne Betasamosake Simpson’s Dancing on Our Turtle’s Back (2011) and Michael Hart’s Seeking Mino-Pimatisiwin (2002) to provide an understanding of Indigenous concepts as they apply to the process of CHCH’s healing/learning operations. From these sources and interviews, I provide an account of Hollow Water’s Healing Movement which includes the decline of the CHCH organization from late 1990s to 2020. Given the current hyperpolitical environment in Canada, Hollow Water’s next generation of community member activists are perhaps about to reclaim power and establish empowered relationships as the Indigenous Renaissance unfolds. Author Keywords: Community Healing Movement Process, Hollow Water First Nation, Indigenous Axiology and Praxis, Learning Organization, Restorative Justice, Systems-Thinking
Anishinaabe Motherhood
The purpose of this qualitative study is to investigate Anishinaabe women’s Traditional Teachings and pedagogies in a contemporary context. Through this exploration, I have uncovered the tensions, challenges, and strengths that Anishinaabe gaashiyag (mothers) face when engaging with these Traditional Teachings and pedagogies. The research methodology I have used is a branch of grounded theory called the Anishinaabe Research Methodology, and it is integral to the Anishinaabe principles of living called the Seven Grandparent Teachings: Wisdom, Love, Respect, Bravery, Honesty, Humility, and Truth. I used a research method called the Nbwaachiwi (the art of visiting) method. I used the ‘Aunties kitchen table’ style of knowledge collection, where it is open-ended and one-on-one - like you would be at your auntie's kitchen table, sharing stories and having tea. By utilizing these principles, I conducted my research through the Anishinaabe-aadiziwin (culture and language – way of life) paradigm. I addressed multilayered Anishinaabe teachings and many connections to the land and spirituality. I have found that Anishinaabe gaashiyag feel pressure to adopt Western modes of raising their children. However, some young women are returning to the traditional Anishinaabe teachings by using traditional birthing techniques, tiknigaans (traditional baby carriers), and evolving our cultural practices to fit modern ways of living. The knowledge I present within this paper can inform mothers who want to learn Traditional Teachings and pedagogies, and thereby resist ongoing intergeneration trauma and colonization. New generations are identifying what the negative effects on raising Anishinaabe children and taking a stand to break ongoing trauma and abuse so that their children do not have to be subjected to it. These mothers are informed about cultural and Traditional Teachings with the hope that they can use this knowledge to assist them on their path to, and during, motherhood. Given the determination of these young mothers to raise their babies using Anishinaabe traditional methods, the future identities and lives of their children may be significantly better in a cultural sense than their predecessors. They will be the products of their mothers’ commitment to the resurgence of Anishinaabe maternal teachings and pedagogies. Author Keywords: Anishinaabe, Indigenous Motherhood, Motherhood, Parenting, Pedagogies, Teachings
Oil is Thicker than Justice
This thesis provides a comprehensive overview of the extractive industry operating out of the Alberta tar sands region to determine how environmental violence is enacted against Indigenous women, girls, and queer or Two-Spirit peoples in the Lubicon Lake Cree Nation and beyond. Through an analysis of existing literature in the field, a case study on the Lubicon Lake Nation and a policy analysis of the Calls for Justice from the Final Report of the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women, this thesis draws links between industrialization, capitalism, the heteropatriarchy, and colonialism. Finally, this thesis offers a pathway to resurgence, through the subversion of colonial gender and sexual norms, and collective action to reclaim Indigenous territory as an alternative to state-sponsored solutions and policies. Author Keywords: Colonial heteropatriarchy, Environmental violence, Land Back, Lubicon Lake, Tar sands, Violence against Indigenous women
Ê-NITONAHK MIYO-PIMÂTISIWIN (SEEKING THE GOOD LIFE) THROUGH INDIGENOUS DANCE
This thesis is about the ways in which Indigenous dance serves as a social determinant of Indigenous health and well-being. Utilizing both contemporary and traditional versions of the Medicine Wheel for the framework, analysis and organization of the thesis allows for a holistic perspective which includes the spiritual, physical, emotional and mental aspects. The importance of Indigenous dance for Indigenous health and well-being is confirmed through: existing literature; interviews with Indigenous choreographers, dancers, theatre artists, and performers; Indigenous exponents of the forms; and Indigenous Elders. In order to contextualize current practices of Indigenous dance, the history of Indigenous dance in relation to colonization is presented. The research and experiences of co-researchers show the need for Indigenous dance and culture to be supported as a social determinant of health and well-being. Author Keywords:
Experiencing buhts’an qu’inal from sHachel jwohc’ a’tel through sna'el ya'beyel stuc te bin ay ma'yuc
This thesis shows and emphasizes the importance of Indigenous Knowledge (IK) in informing collaborative efforts that promote sustainable economic development in Indigenous communities. It tells the story of a participative research study undertaken with six Tseltal communities located in the Region Selva of Chiapas, Mexico, in the context of the Covid19 pandemic of 2020 and early 2021. In this study, the research participants reflect on their endeavours pursuing projects focused on the economic self-sufficiency of their communities. Their initiatives, which are deeply grounded in Tseltal practices while accompanied by the local non-profit organization IXIM AC, focus on developing economically self-sustaining enterprises in self-organized groups led by local Indigenous women. The findings offer a deep immersion into two aspects that emerge from Tseltal knowledge: The Nucleus of Tseltal community wellbeing and the Four Elements of Buhts’an qu’inal (Tseltal community wellbeing). The study’s results show that these two IK grounded aspects guide the participants’ endeavours in developing sHachel jwohc’ a’tel (Tseltal initiatives of entrepreneurship) while also enabling opportunities for gender transformative collaborative work and sustained engagement in local initiatives of sna'el ya'beyel stuc te bin ay ma'yuc (Tseltal economic development oriented to community wellbeing). Author Keywords: Community Wellbeing, Indigenous Entrepreneurship, Indigenous Knowledges, Indigenous Women, Participative Action Research, Sustainable Development
collaborative ecotoxicological risk assessment of in-place pollutants in Owen Sound Bay, Lake Huron within the Saugeen Ojibway Nation Territory
Owen Sound Bay, which is located within the traditional territory of the Saugeen Ojibway Nation (SON), is contaminated as a result of historical industrial and shipping activity. Gross contamination of the sediments in the inner part of the Bay (i.e., Owen Sound Harbour) includes high concentrations of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) and other organic compounds, as well as metals that may pose a risk to the SON fishery for lake whitefish (Coregonus clupeaformis). However, evaluating the environmental risks posed by contaminated sediments is a challenge, as these risks are dependent upon several factors and require multiple lines of evidence. Including Indigenous communities in environmental risk assessment and the management of those risks is vital for sustaining ecosystem integrity, as well as respecting Treaty Rights. In this study, a risk assessment framework was developed that included several risk assessment tools used in Western science and also encompassed the concerns and values of the SON, including the application of SON-ecological knowledge. Methods for risk evaluation included gathering lines of evidence though community workshops, as well as field sampling in the Bay to determine the concentrations of PAHs and other organic contaminants in sediments and in the water column. Laboratory studies of toxicity to early life stages of lake whitefish and Japanese medaka (Oryzias latipes) and sediment disturbance simulations to evaluate biological responses in juvenile lake whitefish were also completed as lines of evidence. The results indicate that leaving the harbour “as is” without a thorough analysis of remediation options fails to address the concerns of the people within the SON communities. Overall, this research demonstrated a successful process for developing a collaborative risk assessment framework that recognizes the sovereignty of Indigenous peoples and promotes Nation-to-Nation decision making. Author Keywords: biomarkers, Coregonus clupeaformis, Indigenous knowledge, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, risk assessment, source tracking
Canoeing through Resurgence
Anishinabai are jiimaan people. The traditional building of wiigwaas jiimaan is a part of a resurgence project that is restoring and maintaining cultural connection to our homelands, the water, and community members. An approach to cultural resurgence, such as the wiigwaas jiimaan, is an attempt to generate a better connection to our homeland, self- determination, and forms of healing within a cultural context. Through diverse research methodologies, this project will open new doors to cultural resurgence methods, Indigenous knowledge and the story telling of the wiigwaas jiimaan. Over the summer of 2018, I built a wiigwaas jiimaan in my home community of Temagami First Nation. It is from this experience that this research shaped. Through the approach of storytelling to my reflective notes, while incorporating an Indigenous knowledge and resurgence methodology. It is important that when you are reading this, that you keep an open mind, sit comfortably and enjoy the interweaving of story and research. The thesis creates a better understanding of resurgence practices, the history of the Teme- Augama Anishinabai, my story and experience with the wiigwaas jiimaan, and the rebuilding of my community through this cultural initiative. Moving forward I hope that this research continues and evolves to other communities, who look for healing and cultural reclaiming through the land. Miigwetch. Author Keywords: Culture, Healing, Land-Based, Resurgence, Temagami First Nation, Wiigwaas jiimaan
“It's like getting a new car without the manual”
This study explored teacher infusion of Indigenous curriculum content through interviews with ten non-Indigenous teachers of social studies and history. The interviews centered on teacher perceptions of preparedness to implement Ontario’s recent TRC curriculum revisions, which include more about the contributions, histories, cultures, and perspectives of Indigenous peoples. A brief analysis of Ontario’s First Nation, Métis, and Inuit Education Policy Framework is included, alongside critiques of the Eurocentrism at the heart of education systems. The interviews revealed that many of the teachers were committed to Indigenous education and learning more, but they felt unprepared and lacked resources to teach Indigenous curriculum content with confidence. This study highlighted the critical role of settler teachers in Indigenous education and the importance of teachers undertaking settler unsettling in order to be effective and appropriate in Indigenous curriculum delivery. Individual changes must occur alongside educational system decolonization with a particular focus on teacher preparation. Author Keywords: cognitive imperialism, Indigenous Education, Ontario, settler educator, settler unsettling, TRC curriculum
An Application of Virgilio Enriquez's Indigenization Method on Filipino-Canadian Discourse
In Disturbing Invisibility (Coloma, McElhinny, Tungohan, Catungal, Davidson, 2012), the most comprehensive book on Filipino-Canadian studies to date, issues were identified in the afterword as to how Filipino-Canadian studies relates to indigenous identity. This thesis attempts to address this issue by applying Enriquez’s (1992) Indigenization Method onto Filipino-Canadian discourse. It attempts to do this by: exploring the colonial context and history in the Philippines and its effect on the formation of a Filipino indigenous identity; exploring Filipino indigenous thought as described by Enriquez (1992) in his seminal book From Colonial to Liberation Psychology; understanding Filipinos in Canada with the inclusion of literature from Filipino-American studies and the Filipino Indigenization movement; and how orienting Filipino-Canadian discourse with the indigenous concepts brought forward by Enriquez might look like, with emphasis on how Filipino-Canadian discourse could interact with Indigenous issues relating to Indigenous People in Canada today. It becomes clear that the Filipino Indigenization movement has reached grassroots Filipino organizations in Canada, and that uncritically ignoring their own Filipino indigenous roots would be denying themselves the unique cultural gifts that those roots provide. As being both Filipino and Canadian, Filipino-Canadians who seek to reclaim their indigenous roots would find that the indigenous concept of kapwa (“the self in the other”) would encourage an examination of issues pertaining to Indigenous People in Canada as commonalities exist in their experiences with colonization. Author Keywords: Canada, discourse, Filipino-Canadians, indigenization, indigenous, Philippines
Hoop Dance Project
This dissertation explores a 2017 elementary school Hoop Dance project that was organized by a white music teacher, and taught by an Indigenous artist in Peterborough, Ontario. It aims to respond to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission Calls to Action, numbers 10 and 63, which ask the federal government to sufficiently fund legislation that incorporates the following principles: “… developing culturally appropriate curricula” (p. 2), and “building student capacity for intercultural understanding, empathy, and mutual respect” (p. 7). The dissertation asks the question: In what ways will a seven-week Indigenous Hoop Dance Unit, taught by an Indigenous performing artist and facilitated by a white school teacher, contribute to reconciliation in an elementary school classroom in Ontario? I am the teacher in this study and have worked at this elementary school for five years. Throughout the project, I acted as facilitator, participant, and researcher, while Indigenous dancer and instructor Beany John planned and delivered the Hoop Dance content. Theoretically, the dissertation is organized around the Anishinabek seven grandmother/grandfather teachings, as taught by Ojibwe/Odawa educator and author Pamela Toulouse (2011). I believe that these seven traditional teachings are a meaningful basis upon which to build the project, not only because they inform Indigenous knowledge in the arts, but also because frequent reflection and referral to the teachings help remind me to remain connected to the “higher” purpose of the research throughout the project, which is to further the reconciliation process in Canada, and more broadly, to benefit society. Regarding methodology, I use arts based research (Leavy, 2015) and a constructivist grounded theory analysis, which embraces the subjectivity and positionality of the researcher (Creswell, 2012). The overall conclusion of the dissertation is that although the Hoop Dance project did not significantly address issues of Indigenous sovereignty in education nor our shared inherited legacy of colonial harm, it was a constructive step in the reconciliation project, largely due to the contributions of Beany John, whose teaching gently unsettled conventional educational practice at our school. Author Keywords: Arts Education, Hoop Dance, Indigenous Education, Indigenous Peoples, Settler Colonialism, Truth and Reconciliation
Following ininaahtigoog Home
Indigenous peoples’ sur-thrivance in global, settler colonial, historical, and nation-specific economic contexts is a broadly studied subject that fails to emphasize Indigenous economic sovereignty. Indigenous knowledges regarding the land-based relationalities which formulate an aspect of Indigenous economic sovereignty is lacking. So too is knowledge on Indigenous womxn’s land and water-based relationalities from which her economic sovereignty flows. Writing within and for Anishinaabeg sur-thrivance in Anishinaabewaki, this research examines Anishinaabeg womxn’s relationship with the sugar bush during the spring harvest as a site of gendered nation-specific economic sovereignty. Epistemicide has attenuated land-based knowledges in gendered ways; and, missionary and settler colonial processes in Canada, the U.S., and within Anishinaabeg communities have alienated Anishinaabeg womxn from inherent land and water-based relationships. By employing an Anishinaabeg methodology of “critically returning to ourselves” that is oriented towards Anishinaabe approaches to history and Anishinaabe ways of seeing history as worlds, this research recovers information about womxn’s sugar bush relationships. This recovery begins with literary, documentary, and oral sources. Through anishinaabe feminist interpretation, I reveal that womxn’s sugar bush relationships engender whole worlds that are animated and generated by her legendary connections with the natural and spiritual world, her social-economic commitment and savvy, and her enduring labour. I further interpret that her connections, her savvy, and her labour is mediated with variable aspects of settler colonial gendered influences such as patriarchy, omnipresent heterosexuality and/or gender binaries, marriage, class, and values attributed to womxn that are inconsequential to sur-thriving in land and water-based worlds. In conclusion this research tells three distinct, but connected, “sticky and sweet [story] strands” which illuminate the significance, beauty, complexity, and un-romance of Anishinaabeg womxn’s relationship with the sugar bush. Simultaneously, it prompts Anishinaabeg to reflect on the worlds we have lived in, are living in now, and want to create in terms of land-based relationships and relationalities. In effort to disrupt and bring attention to the restrictions and distortions that several hundred years of missionary, settler colonial, (hetero)patriarchal, heterosexist, and capitalist forces have had on Anishinaabeg gender and relational formations, my method in writing (i.e. spelling) is to prompt consciousness of gender and relational fluidity and diversity. This approach presses for Anishinaabeg committed orientation towards the necessities and possibilities of correcting and transforming imposed and internalized settler gender and relational formations and structures. This research builds on a body of literature about Indigenous womxn’s relationship with land and water in Turtle Island in order to signify and illuminate Anishinaabeg womxn’s dynamic and varied relationship with the sugar bush. It contributes to Indigenous research methodology, Indigenous and Anishinaabeg women’s history, Indigenous women’s labour, and Indigenous literary studies. Author Keywords: Anishinaabeg Studies, economic sovereignty, Indigenous feminism, Indigenous relationship with land, Indigenous women, sugar bush

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Format: 2024/03/28