I read this short but important book years ago, but I didn’t take notes—which means, of course, I’ve forgotten what I read. So I’m trying again. Let’s hope that writing this summary will help the ideas this book contains stick to my forgetful brain. And, as I continue to wait for feedback on other projects, I might as well use this otherwise dead time productively.
The book’s first chapter, “Nishnaabeg Resurgence: Stories From Within,” begins with a description of a community procession of Michi Saagiig Nishnaabeg people in Peterborough, Ontario, on Michi Saagiig territory, on 21 June 2009—National Aboriginal Day. “We were not seeing recognition or asking for rights,” Simpson recalls. “We were not trying to fit into Canada. We were celebrating our nation on our lands in the spirit of joy, exuberance and individual expression” (11). But the procession was also political, Simpson notes, because it was “a quiet, collective act of resurgence. It was a mobilization and it was political because it was a reminder. It was a reminder that although we are collectively unseen in the city of Peterborough, when we come together with one mind and one heart we can transform our land and our city into a decolonized space and a place of resurgence, even if it is only for a brief amount of time” (11). It was, she continues, “an insertion of Nishnaabeg presence” (12). She felt connected to her community, but she was afraid of the responses of non-Indigenous people watching, afraid of thrown objects, confrontations, violence. Her grandmother finds it hard to believe that her great-grandchildren feel proud of their Indigeneity, and no wonder:
The Nishnaabeg have been collectively dispossessed of our national territory; we are an occupied nation. Individually, we have been physically beaten, arrested, apprehended, interned in jails, sanitariums, residential or day schools and foster care. We have endured racist remarks when shopping or seeking healthcare and education within the city. We have stories of being driven to the outskirts of our city by police and bar owners and dropped off to walk bac to our reserves. (12)
But on that day in June 2009, “we turned inward to celebrate our presence and to build our resurgence as a community” (12). It was the first time she had experienced this solidarity with other Nishnaabeg families: “I’ve never had the opportunity to celebrate our survival, our continuance, our resurgence: all the best parts of us” (12). For an hour on that day, she continues, “we created a space and a place where the impacts of colonialism were lessened, where we could feel what it feels lie to be part of a united, healthy community, where our children could glimpse our beautiful visions for their future” (12-13). They transformed National Aboriginal Day “into something about resurgence for our community” and strengthened their culture (13). And that culture, according to Nishnaabe Elder Edna Manitowabi, “brings our hearts great joy. Our culture is beautiful and loving, and it nurtures our hearts and minds in a way that enables us to not just cope, but to live” (13). “In order to have a positive identity we have to be living in ways that illuminate that identity, and that propel us towards mino bimaadiziwin, the good life,” she concludes (13).
On that day, she thought about her Ancestors, about the shame she carries “from the legacy of colonial abuse,” a shame that is individual and collective, “rooted in the humiliation that colonialism has heaped on our peoples for hundreds of years” (13). That shame comes from a feeling that her Ancestors didn’t resist hard enough, that they were tricked “into surrendering our life, land and sustenance during the Williams Treaty process” (14). That shame, she writes, “makes us think that our leaders and Elders did not do the best they could” (14). But on that day, she realized that the shame was misplaced—that such shame “can only take hold when we are disconnected from the stories of resistance within our own families and communities” (14). For that reason, she became interested in finding stories of resistance and telling them so that subsequent generations would know them. “We have nothing to be ashamed of,” she writes, “and we have done nothing wrong” (14).
Here she describes the territory of the Michi Saagiig Nishnaabeg, which runs along the north shore of Lake Ontario, a land once covered by pine forest and tall grass prairie. At the end of the eighteenth century, that nation was “forced to survive an intense, violent assault” from settlers (15). For 50 years, her people “survived pandemics, violence and assault, unjust treaty negotiations, occupation of our lands, and a forced relocation” (15). By the 1820s, “we were facing the complete political, cultural and social collapse of everything we had ever known” (15). Nevertheless, her ancestors resisted and survived what must have seemed like an apocalypse. “They resisted by holding onto their stories,” she writes. “They resisted by taking the seeds of our culture and political sysstems and packing them away, so that one day another generation of Michi Saagiig Nishnaabeg might be able to plant them” (15). As a result of that resistance, 200 years after an attempted genocide, it’s her generation’s responsibility “to plant and nurture those seeds” and make their ancestors proud (15).
“Shame traps us individually and collectively into the victimry of the colonial assault, and travels through the generations, accumulating and manifesting itself in new and more insidious ways in each re-generation,” she continues (15). Colonial thought and cognitive imperialism make it difficult for Nishnaabeg to see their ancestors’ philosophies and resistance, “the complexities of their plan for resurgence” (16). She emphasizes that resistance includes keeping languages, cultures, and systems of government alive, as well as making sure that the people themselves survive colonialism. “This, in and of itself, tells me a lot about how to build Indigenous renaissance and resurgence,” she states (16).
Simpson rejects social movement theory as a way of describing or accounting for Indigenous resistance and resurgence; it cannot see the differences between Canadian and Indigenous societies. Instead, she turns to Taiaiake Alfred’s Peace, Power and Righteousness: An Indigenous Manifesto, as well as his Wasáse: Indigenous Pathways of Action and Freedom, and in particular Alfred’s demand that Indigenous peoples reclaim their own contexts—“knowledge, interpretations, values, ethics, processes”—for their political cultures (17). “In essence, we need to not just figure out who we are; we need to re-establish the processes by which we live who we are within the current context we find ourselves,” she writes—and that work needs to happen without the approval of the Canadian state or Canadians themselves. “We must move beyond resistance and survival, to flourishment and mino bimaadiziwin,” a word that means “living the good life” (17). If nothing else, that approach will ground Indigenous peoples in their own cultures and teachings, which is “the ultimate antidote to colonialism” (17). In this book, Simpson wants to explore “these transformative contexts” from within her own Nishnaabeg culture: “Transforming ourselves, our communities and our nations is ultimately the first step in transforming our relationship with the state” (17).
To build nation-based resurgence, Simpson writes, “means significantly re-investing in our own ways of being; regenerating our political and intellectual traditions; articulating and living our legal systsems; language learning; ceremonial and spiritual pursuits; creating and using our artistic and performance-based traditions (17-18). All of that work will require Nishnaabeg “to reclaim the best practices of our traditional cultures, knowledge systems and lifeways in the dynamic, fluid, compassionate, respectful context within which they were originally generated,” and “to see the extraordinary political nature of Nishnaabeg thought” (18).
For Simpson, “the land, reflected in Nishnaabeg thought and philosophy, compels us towards resurgence in virtually every aspect” (18). This is, for her, an ethical belief. The land, and the stories about the land, “explain the resistance of my Ancestors and the seeds of resurgence they so carefully saved and planted. So I could then assume my responsibility as a Michi Saagig Nishnaabeg to care take of their garden, eventually passing those responsibilities on to my grandchildren. This is the purpose of this book” (18). Because there is no political will on the part of the Canadian state to engage in relationships with Indigenous peoples, demanding recognition “seems depressing, futile and a waste of energy” (19). Instead of intellectual work, Simpson’s approach is rooted in her spiritual and emotional life, and in her body, and in her nation and clan. She notes that she’s been taught by Elders who embody Nishnaabeg thought “in a way that I worry we are losing” (19). The values, ethics, and ways of being in the world of those elders is not exclusionary or authoritarian: “They ‘resisted’ colonialism by living within Nishnaabeg contexts” (19). She compares their flexibility and openness to the way that colonial thought and religious fundamentalism have influenced people in the southeastern regions of her territory. Her Elders taught her “that individual Nishnaabe had the responsibility of interpreting the teachings for themselves within a broader shared collective set of values that placed great importance on self-actualization, the suspension of judgment, fluidity, emergence, careful deliberation and an embodied respect for diversity” (20).
“My perspective throughout this book is that the process of resurgence must be Indigenous at its core in order to reclaim and re-politicize the context and the nature of Nishnaabeg thought,” she continues. “Nishnaabeg thought was designed and conceptualized to perpetuate the holistic well being of Nishnaabeg people through a series of cultural and political manifestations, including government, education, and restorative justice that promoted mino bimaadiziwin” (20). Nishnaabeg thought, she writes, gives Nishnaabeg people “the impetus, the ethical responsibility, the strategies and the plan of action for resurgence,” and resurgence remains a responsibility of present generations to the future (20). “Nishnaabeg thought was not meant to promote assimilation or normalization within a colonial context,” she concludes. “It was not meant to be reduced and relegated to a decorative window dressing in western scholarship” (20). Despite the suggestion that the Elders she learned from are not exclusionary, I think that last statement means that people like me—western scholars—need to keep our hands off Nishnaabeg thought. All we’re likely to do with it is use it as “window dressing,” to play with it as if it were a new toy, to miss its fundamental rootedness in people and land.
The chapter’s next section takes on the notion of reconciliation, which Simpson argues is not a new idea:
Indigenous Peoples attempted to reconcile our differences in countless treaty negotiations, which categorically have not produced the kinds of relationships Indigenous Peoples intended. I do not understand how we can reconcile when the majority of Canadians do not understand the historic or contemporary injustsice of dispossession and occupation, particularly when the state has expressed its unwillingness to make any adjustments to the unjust relationship. (21)
For Simpson, the very idea is like someone trapped in an abusive relationship whose partner wants to reconcile without changing his behaviour. “Collectively, what are the implications of participating in reconciliation processes when there is an overwhelming body of evidence that in action, the Canadian state does not want to take responsibility and stop the abuse?” she asks. “What are the consequences for Indigenous Peoples of participating in a process that attempts to absolve Canada of past wrong doings, while they continue to engage with our nations in a less than honourable way?” (21). The focus on residential schools is too narrow; it “subjugates treaty and nation-based participation by locking our Elders—the ones that suffered the most directly at the hands of the residential school system—in a position of victimhood,” when they are her nation’s “strongest visionaries” and an inspiration to imagine “alternative futures” (22). If reconciliation is to be meaningful, if it is to be decolonizing, “it must be interpreted broadly,” “grounded in cultural generation and political resurgence. It must support Indigenous nations in regenerating our languages, our oral cultures, our traditions of governance and everything else residential schools attacked and attempted to obliterate” (22). It must become “a collective re-balancing of the playing field” (22). It could be a process of regeneration—of languages, values, political processes, and philosophies—if it were understood that way. And Canada itself “must engage in a decolonization project and a re-education project that would enable its government and its citizens to engage with Indigenous Peoples in a just and honourable way in the future” (23).
That kind of restoration comes from Nishnaabeg legal systems which are restorative: “Restorative processes rely upon the abuser taking full responsibility for his/her actions in a collective setting, amongst the person s/he violated, and amongst the people both the perpetrator and the survivor hold responsibilities to—be that their extended family, clan, or community” (23). In the residential-school context, this would mean the survivors having “agency, decision-making power, and the power to decide restorative measures” (23). “Imagine government officials, church officials, nuns, priests and teachers from a particular residential school in a circle with the people that had survived their sexual, physical, emotional and spiritual abuse,” she states. “This is a fundamentally different power relationship between perpetrators of violence and survivors of that violence, where the abusers must face the full impact of their actions” (23). That would be reconciliation, “a process embodied by both the survivor and the perpetrator” (23). Of course, given the length of time the schools operated, and the age of the survivors, many of those officials, nuns, priests, and teachers are dead, and nothing could compel those who are living to appear in such a circle. It would mean that “[t]he authority to hold the state accountable then rests with Indigenous nations, not the liberal state” (24), but I’m not sure how it would have been possible to make happen.
For Simpson, the current model of reconciliation is insufficient. Her alternative model, rooted in Nishnaabeg restorative law, would “put the hens in charge of the hen house and the fox under interrogation” (24). “I can see no evidence whatsoever that there exists a political will on the part of the state to do anything other than neutralize Indigenous resistance, so as to not impinge upon the convenience of the settler-Canadians,” she continues. “The only way to not be co-opted is to use our own legal and political processes to bring about justice” (24). Here she refers to the work of Dene scholar Glen Coulthard on Indigenous political theories of resurgence, which are “transformative and revolutionary” and “are meant to propel and maintain social, cultural and political transformative movement through the worst forms of political genocide” (24). Reconciliation, she concludes, cannot take up the limited resources of Indigenous Peoples and Nations.
“What follows in this book is the beginning of an exploration of the theoretical foundations of resurgence and regeneration from within Nishnaabeg political and intellectual traditions,” she writes, noting that she hasn’t defined the term “resurgence” so that her (Indigenous) readers will decide what it means to them and to their communities (25). She concludes the chapter with a reference to the sacred Nishnaabeg Prophecy Song, “an incredible gift from my Ancestors” that “is a song of resistance and resurgence” that “fills our hearts with hope, with love, with beauty and thanksgiving,” and can liberate her people from shame (25). The chapter’s final words, “Aambe Maajaadaa,” “Come on! Let’s get going,” are that song’s first line.
The book’s second chapter, “Theorizing Resurgence From Within Nishnaabeg Thought,” begins by positing that “[o]ne of the most crucial tasks facing Indigenous nations is the continued creation of individuals and assemblages of people who can think in culturally inherent ways”—in “ways that reflect the diversity of thought within our broader cosmologies, those very ancient ways that are inherently counter to the influences of colonialism” (31). Indigenous nations “need intellectuals who can think within the conceptual meanings of the language, who are intrinsically connected to place and territory, who exist in the world as an embodiment of contemporary expressions of our ancient stories and traditions, and that illuminate mino bimaadiziwin in all aspect[s] of their lives” (31). That’s because, while western theory can analyze colonialism, it “has failed to recognize the broader contexualizations of resistance within Indigenous thought, while also ignoring the contestation of colonialism as a starting point” (31). Indigenous thought is more important: it “seeks to dismantle colonialism while simultaneously building a renaissance of mino bimaadiziwin” (31-32).
Indigenous people, Simpson continues, are “bathed in a vat of cognitive imperialism, perpetuating the idea that Indigenous Peoples were not, and are not, thinking peoples—ann insidious mechanism to promote neo-assimilation and obfuscate the historic atrocities of colonialism” (32). However, Indigenous thought does exist: “Elders and Knowledge Holders have always put great emphasis into how things are done,” including Indigenous resurgence, and for Simpson, “this discussion begins with our Creation Stories, because these stories set the ‘theoretical framework,’ or give us the ontological context from within which we can interpret other stories, teaching and experiences” (32). Here she agrees with Vanessa Watts, whose article on Indigenous thought begins in the same place. “Our Elders tell us that everything we need to know is encoded in the structure, content and context of these stories and the relationships, ethics and responsibilities required to be our own Creation Story,” Simpson continues (33).
Here Simpson turns to Neal McLeod’s book Cree Narrative Memory: From Treaties to Contemporary Times, a book I’ve read but don’t remember all that clearly (likely because I didn’t take careful notes–do you see a theme developing here?). McLeod contends “that the process of storytelling within Cree traditions requires storytellers to remember the ancient stories that made their ancestors ‘the people they were,’ and that this requires a remembering of language” (33). For both McLeod and Simpson storytelling is “decolonizing, because it is a process of remembering, visioning and creating a just reality where Nishnaabeg live as both Nishnaabeg and peoples. Storytelling then becomes a lens through which we can envision our way out of cognitive imperialism, where we can create models and mirrors where non existed, and where we can experience the spaces of freedom and justice” (33). Oral storytelling is more important than reading stories, “because the physical act of gathering a group of people together within our territories reinforces the web of relationships that stitch our communities together,” and because the storyteller “has to work with emergence and flux, developing a unique relationship with the audience based entirely on context and relationship,” a dynamic relationship in which the lines between storyteller and audience “become blurred as individuals mae non-verbal (and sometimes verbal) contributions to the collective event” (34). Dreams are also important, because they provide “both the knowledge from the spiritual world and processes for realizing those visions” (35).
Next, Simpson relates an Anishnaabe Creation Story, as told by one of her mentors, Edna Manitowabi. I’m not summarizing that story here, because of Simpson’s warnings about its sacred character, which suggest that I have no business doing that. I will say that story emphasizes women, and that Manitowabi concludes by stating that women “re-create this story in pregnancy. When we create a new life, it is an extension of ourselves” (39). Such sacred stories are, Simpson continues, theories, which are echoed in everyday or personal stories. In this way, “[t]he starting point within Indigenous theoretical frameworks . . . is different than from within western theories: the spiritual world is alive and influencing; colonialism is contested; and storytelling, or ‘narrative imagination,’ is a tool to vision other existences outside fo the current ones by critiquing and analyzing the current state of affairs, but also by dreaming and visioning other realities” (40). From Manitowabi’s Creation Story, Simpson concludes three things: Nishnaabeg thought “is personal,” Nishnaabeg “were created out of love,” and that love “is unconditional, complete,” and “without judgment” (41). “By inserting ourselves into these stories, we assume responsibilities—responsibilities that are not necessarily bestowed upon us by the collective, but that we take on according to our own gifts, abilities and affiliations,” she continues. “Nishnaabeg theory has to be learned in the context of our own personal lives, in an emotional, physical, spiritual and intellectual way” (41). Nishnaabeg stories “draw individuals into the resurgence narrative on their own terms and in accordance to their own names, clan affiliations and gifts. For just a moment, they are complete in the absence of want—decolonizing one moment at a time” (41). “Indigenous thought can only be learned through the personal; this is because our greatest influence is on ourselves, and because living in a good way is an incredible disruption of the colonial narrative in and of itself,” she writes (41).
The Creation Story also suggests “that there is no limit on Indigenous intellect,” because all Nishnaabeg thoughts come from the Creator (42). It also tells us that creativity is “the most powerful process in the universe” (42). “My Creation Story tells me that collectively we have the intellect and creative power to regenerate our cultures, languages and nations,” Simpson writes. “My Creation Story tells me another world is possible and that I have the tools to vision it and bring it into reality. I can’t think of a more powerful narrative” (42). Nishnaabeg have access to all of the Creator’s knowledge, which can be accessed “by singing, dancing, fasting, dreaming, visioning, participating in ceremony, apprenticing with Elders, practicing our lifeways and living our knowledge, by watching, listening and reflecting in a good way” (42). That knowledge needs to be accessed through relationships; its meaning “comes from the context and the process, not the content” (42-43). For that reason, through performance, meaning is collective rather than individual; that collective meaning, though, is “continuously generated from those individual truths we carry around inside ourselves. Our collective truths exist in a nest of individual diversity” (43).
“Interpreting Creation Stories within a culturally inherent framework provides several insights into Nishnaabeg thought,” Simpson continues (43). That thought is “highly personal,” and “[a]ll Nishnaabeg people are theorists in the sense that they hold responsibilities to maing meaning for their owh creation and their own life,” a process that happens within the context of name, clan, community, personal attributes, and life experiences (43). In addition, those Creation Stories “tell us that collectively and intellectually we have access to all of the knowledge we need to untangle oursleves from the near destruction we are draped in,” because all of the Creator’s thoughts are in “our full bodies” (44). “It tells us that each of us must live in a good and balanced way—physically, intellectual[ly], emotionally and spiritually—in order to access this knowledge,” she concludes (44).
Chapter Three, “Gdi-nweninaa: Our Sound, Our Voice,” is about the teachings housed in Indigenous languages. “The process of speaking Nishnaabemowin . . . inherently communicates certain values and philosophies that are important to Nishnaabeg being,” Simpson writes (49). That’s because the language and its etymologies hold meaning and lessons. This chapter’s purpose is to look at those meanings in order to “deepen our understandings of decolonization, assimilation, resistance and resurgence from within Nishnaabeg perspectives” (49).
The first word she discusses is biskaabiiyang, a verb that means “to look back,” but which can also mean “returning to ourselves,” “a process by which Anishinabek researchers and scholars can evaluate how they have been impacted by colonialism in all realms of being” (49). In that way, biskaabiiyang is a synonym for “decolonizing”—“to pick up the things we were forced to leave behind, whether they are songs, dances, values, or philosophies, and bring them into existence in the future” (49-50). “In our current state, it becomes important to carry the essence of Biskaabiiyang with me through my daily life; it is not something that I can do at the beginning of a project and then forget,” she continues, because colonialism is an ongoing process, and therefore so too must be biskaabiiyang (50). In addition, while biskaabiyang is “an ongoing individual processes,” one cannot engage in it effectively in isolation (51). “As communities of people, we need to support each other in this process and work together to stitch our cultures and lifeways back together,” Simpson writes. “In this way, Biskaabiiyang is both an individual and collective process that we must continually replicate” (51).
Biskaabiiyang “does not literallly mean returning to the past, but rather re-creating the cultural and political flourishment of the past to support the well-being of our contemporary citizens,” Simpson contends. “It means reclaiming the fulidity around our traditions, not the rigidity of colonialism; it means encouraging the self-determination of individuals within our national and community-based contexts; and it means re-creating an artistic and intellectual renaissance within a larger political and cultural resurgence” (51). When Simpson first encountered this word in a book by a writer from outside Michi Saagiig Nishnaabeg territory, she took it to her language teacher and Elder, because “unless concepts have local meaning, it is difficult for them to have local resonance” (51). Her teacher and Elder recognized the word and identified with the concept, which is not always the case when she brings other words to them.
Another word, zhaaganashiiyaadizi, “encompasses the process and description of living as a colonized or assimilated person,” and that happens “when a person tries to live his or her life as a non-Native at the expense of being Nishnaabeg,” thereby negatively influencing the core of their being” (52). “My understanding of this word is indicative of theh processes or the continual decisions that one might cho[o]se to make—decisions and choices which, in this case, supplant all of the beautiful and diverse ways of living as a contemporary Nishnaabeg,” she writes (52). There’s no single way of being Nishnaabeg, she emphasizes, but “there is a set of processes, values, and philosophies embedded in our language and culture that one needs to embrace in order to live as Nishnaabeg” (53).
“While Biskaabiiyang is a useful context to begin to explore what liberation and resurgence looks like within Indigenous thought, it is just the beginning,” Simpson continues. She notes that traditional Nishnaabeg political and social cultures “were profoundly non-hierarchical, non-authoritarian and non-coercive,” and that the culture saw “individuals figuring out their own path, or their own theoretical understanding of their life and their life’s work based on individual interpretation of our philosophies, teachings, stories and values” as paramount (53). Individuals “were afforded a high level of autonomy within the community,” which is sometimes called “an ‘ethic of non-interference’” by other community members (53). But that autonomy “is also coupled or twinned with individual responsibilities of figuring out one’s place in the cosmos and how to contribute to the collective while respecting oneself and one’s inner being” (54).
The next word Simpson explores is aanjigone, “the idea that one needs to be very, very careful with making judgments and with the act of criticism” (54). This word represents “a concept that promotes the framing of Nishnaabeg values and ethics in the positive,” and “that if we criticize something, our spiritual being may take on the very things we are criticizing” (54). If someone does something wrong, she continues, “the ‘implicate order’” of the spiritual world “will come back on that person and correct the imbalance in some other way” (54). The perpetrators of destructive actions will pay for their behaviour in one way or another.
“Aanjigone ensures that if change or transformation occurs, it promotes Nishnaabeg ways and prevents Zhaaganashiiyaadizi,” Simpson continues. “It also ensures that the interrogation or critique of decisions—or the consideration of all the possible consequences of a particular decision—is focused on the concept or decision rather than the individual. In a sense, critique is an internal process and the outcome is an individual action rather than an attack on another” (54). When an Elder is upset with a student, for instance, the Elder will remain silent rather than criticizing the student’s actions. “To me, this means that we must not spend all of our time interrogating and criticizing,” she states (55). Critique cannot bring change; only biskaabiiyang can. For Simpson, “Aajigone propels me towards the idea of focusing the majority of my energy on Nishnaabeg flourishment,” she continues (56). That doesn’t mean not acting against the colonizer to protect lands, knowledges, or lives, but rather “it encourages us to think carefully and strategically about our responses rather than blindly reacting out of anger” (56).
The third word or concept Simpson discusses is naakgonige, “a culturally embedded concept that means to carefully deliberate and decide when faced with any kind of change or decision” (56). It warns agains change for its own sake, and “reminds Nishnaabeg that our Elders and our Ancestors did things a certain way for a reason,” such as not telling stories outside of the winter months (56). The decisions of the Ancestors need to be trusted. “Naakgonige encourages Nishnaabeg people to make decisions slowly and carefully,” she continues (57). The concept exemplifies resistence to her, first because it protects against zhaaganahiiyaadizi, and second because it represents “culturally embedded processes that require individuals, clans and communities to carefully deliberate, not just in an intellectual sense, but using their emotional, physical and spiritual beings as well” (57). Those deliberations include thinking about the impact of decisions on subsequent generations, as well as on the community.
The next word Simpson thinks about is debwewin, a word normally translated into English as “truth,” but which literally means “the sound of the heart,” or of one’s own heart, since everyone’s truth is different (59). That sense of diversity is important, a necessary part of the larger whole, since any individual expression of truth is an individual’s interpretation.
The end of the chapter returns to the word gdi-nweninaa, I think. “Listening to the sound of our voice means that we need to listen with our full bodies—our hearts, our minds and our physicality,” Simpson writes. “It requires an understanding of the culturally embedded concepts and teachings that bring meaning to our practices and illuminate our lifeways” (61). Learning Indigenous languages needs to include the “deeper, layered understanding” of words so that learners can “take with us those sounds that hold the greatest meaning in our own lives and in our resurgence” (61).
In the fourth chapter, “Niimtoowaad Mikinaag Gijiying Bakonaan (Dancing On Our Turtle’s Back): Aandisokaanan and Resurgence,” Simpson turns to the Seven Fires Prophecy. “In a time of peace and flourishment, seven prophets came to the Nishnaabeg people and made seven predictions for the future,” she writes (65). Those prophets also described an epic journey from the Atlantic Ocean to the western end of the Great Lakes, a journey that would provide “protection against the coming colonizers” (65). For Simpson, that journey suggests that “[w]e are a culture that embodies both movement and collectivity” (65).
“What can we learn from the Seven Fires Prophecy about modern-day Nishnaabeg resurgence?” Simpson asks (65). According to the Fourth Fire, light-skinned people would arrive “with the face of goodwill” or “the face of death,” and those people could not be trusted until they proved their goodwill (66). The Fifth and Sixth Fires describe “periods of immense destruction. European conquest and occupation permeated our territory, yet the prophecy played an important part in the resistance” (66). The Seventh Fire describes a resurgence after colonialism, and forewarned by the prophecies, people hid scrolls and performed ceremonies underground, and families hid in the bush from Indian Agents, residential schools, and child-welfare agencies. “Our Grandmothers and Grandfathers planted the seeds of resurgence in the Fifth and Sixth fires,” she writes (66). “For Nishnaabeg thinkers,” she continues, “resistance and resurgence are not only our response to colonialism, they are our only responsibility in the fact of colonialism” (66). “Resurgence,” she states emphatically, “is our original instruction” (66).
“Many Nishnaabeg thinkers believe we are in the period of the Seventh Fire,” Simpson writes, and in that time, the responsibility of the people is “to pic up the pieces of our lifeweays, collectivize them and build a political and cultural renaissance and resurgence” (66). If this is done “in a good way, it has the power to transform settler society[,] generating political relationships based on the Indigenous principles of peace, justice, and righteousness as embodied in mino bimaadiziwin” (66-67). That suggestion that settlers can change and learn is the first time in this book that Simpson has said something encouraging about us.
Next, she turns to the word Chibimoodaywin, a way of describing the Seven Fires mobilization, the movement to the Great Lakes, a word which suggests that “mobilization, resistance, and resurgence involves sacrifice, persistence, patience and slow, painful movement” (67). That movement took ten generations, she suggests, or five hundred years. “Chibimoodaywin inspires me to begin to try and reclaim the community-based processes that inspired generations of Nishnaabeg people to mobilize and to carry out this prophecy,” she continues, noting that the migration suggests “that spiritual visioning, followed by individual commitment and action, is a cornerstone of Nishnaabeg mobilization, resistance and now, resurgence” (67). Visionaries are necessary to “realize and build resurgence,” but those visionaries “must have the skills to excite, inspire and illuminate our peoples to unite, committing to transform that vision into sustained and committed action” (67).
Now Simpson discusses the theme of emergence or resurgence within the Seven Fires Profecy, which is “echoed to current generations through our Re-creation Stories” (68). Those stories express important teachings, including “Aakde’ewin, the art of having courage; Dbadendiziwin, humility; Debwewin, truth or sincerity; Mnaadendiwin, respect; Nbwaakawin, wisdom; Gwekwaadiziwin, honesty; and Zaagidewin, love” (68). “The process of starting over, Aanji Maajitaawin[,] is embodied in our Re-creation Stories,” She states (68). One of those stories is about Waynabozhoo and the Great Flood, in which the culture hero and the animals recreate the earth with mud brought from under the water by Zhaashkoonh, the muskrat, which is placed on the back of Mikinaag, the turtle. “This emphasizes the idea that we each have to dive down to the bottom of the vast expanse of water and search for our handful of earth,” she explains (69). That action needs to then be “collectivized,” so that “other members of the community act on our actions and carry the vision forward. Resurgence cannot occur in isolation” (69). After all, the animals dancing together spread out the muskrat’s pawful of earth into the continent. “In order to dance a new world into existence, we need the support of our communities in a collective action,” Simpson explains. “This story tells us everything we need to know about resurgence. Together, we have all of the pieces. In Nishnaabeg thought, resurgence is dancing on our turtle’s back; it is visioning and dancing new realities and worlds into existence” (69-70).
The chapter’s next section thinks about Wiindigo stories, particularly those that involve a young woman named Gezhizhwazh. “For our ancestors, Wiindigo represented a serious and specific danger in the winter months,” Simpson writes. “More generally, the Wiindigo concept also warns against greed, excesses, and engaging in relationships in which indulgence leads to even more indulgence (various forms of addiction), creating realities based on an imbalance” (70). Often the Wiindigo figure is used to refer to colonialism and capitalism, particularly the hunger of governments and corporations for natural resources, which “resonates with Indigenous Peoples who read this as cannibalistic. When one harms the earth, one harms oneself because we are part of that whole” (70). Simpson relates a story about Gezhizhwazh and a Wiindigo in both Anishnaabemowin and English; she spends time with the Wiindigoo, sacrificing parts of her body to learn how to kill them. “The Gezhizhwazh stories provide a theoretical foundation for resistance that places strategy and intelligence at the core of the model,” she continues. “Gezhizhwazh was not physically stronger than the Wiindigo, but she was smarter, more cunning, strategic and committed to achieving her goal, and this was done within the ever-changing conditions of the Nishnaabeg cosmology” (72).
Next, Simpson considers Nanabush stories. “Nanabush or Nanabozho is a prominent being in the Nishnaabeg worldview—teaching us lessons by never learning and representing the ordinary human struggle to live a good life,” she writes. “S/he is cast as a beign that is constantly succumbing to his or her own weanesses, the consequences of which are demonstrated to the Nishnaabeg through countless stories” (73). Nanabush is often called the Elder Brother; to refer to that figure as a “trickster” is incorrect, since he or she is not a clown. When Nanabush takes on the role of a buffoon, it is only to teach, and in some stories, Simpson contends, “Nanabozho exudes vision, brilliance, strategy and power” or “behaves as our most loving companion, teacher and mentor” (74). Nanabozho stories are wideely available in English, but without the appropriate cultural context. For that reason, Simpson tells a traditional Nanabush story “that embodies the values of gentleness, re-balancing and love” (74). That story—appropriate to read on a March afternoon—is about the bobcat people who got addicted to drinking maple syrup directly from the tree because of its sweetness, and Nanabozho accidentally dilutes the syrup into plain sap by peeing on the trees in the sugar bush. Then he taught the bobcat people how to make that sap into syrup by boiling it. For Simpson, the story “represents a resurgence narrative”: “Nanabozho diagnoses the problem, seeks out knowledge from his Nokomis, his Elder, works with all aspects of his being to collectivize the problem and its solution and he builds a clan-based, community-based restoration plan, which results in a local resurgence to realign the people with Creation and mino bimaadiziwin” (80-81).
Chapter Five, “Bubbling Like a Beating Heart: A Society of Presence,” begins with the words, “Social mobilization, in its most fundamental form, is at the core of Nishnaabeg governance” (85). Simpson defends Nishnaabeg governance from claims that it is simplistic, demonstrating instead its complexity. “Our lifeway required cyclical and rhythmical movements,” she writes. “Our governance required annual social and political mobilizations in a way that is unnown to state governing systems, to such a degree that mobilization was normative within our political culture” (85). Dissent was a respected part of political processes. However, she does not frame Indigenous resurgence as a form of dissent; rather, that resurgence is about restoring balance, justice, and good health, both to the lands and to the peoples who depend on those lands. Indigenous political thought “is a principled and radically different way of being—one that compels us to act against the forces that attempt to assimilate us into the fabric of Canadian society” and “compels us to regenerate processes within our communities to hear a diversity of perspectives, while also building a united front against colonialism” (87).
Simpson notes that the construction of the Trent Severn waterway led to the loss of salmon and eels, which represented forms of convergence between the way that people and fish organized themselves. The fluidity of movement involved in that organization is represented in Anishnaabemowin, which uses verbs more than nouns. She sees the pre-colonial treaty between the Nishnaabeg and the Haudenosaunee as representing communication and good relations, and notes that Nishnaabeg accepted immigrants to their nation, granting them full citizenship. “Community acceptance was dependent then upon the individual’s commitment to and expression of the values and philosophies of mino bimaadiziwin,” she explains (90). So Nishnaabeg thought “embodies transmotion and fluidity,” as well as emergence, because it “comes from the land” (90-91). Nishnaabeg thus align themselves “with the transformation and flux of the implicate order (creation)” (91). “The goal of life then becomes the maintenance and promotion of good relations within the emergence of the flux of the natural world to maintain and promote balance,” Simpson writes (91). Biskaabiiyang is a way to rebalance the unhealthy relationships created by colonialism, and diversity is a strength in resisting colonialism.
Simpson is struck by the fact that, in pre-colonial times, her ancestors were constantly creating things: “making clothes, food, shelter, stories, games, modes of transportation, instruments, songs and dances. They created circumstances to commune with the implicate order, and also created a new generation of Nishnaabeg, based on bringing out their personal gifts and creativity. Creating was the basis of our culture” (92). Creativity ensured diversity and innovation. “In essence, Indigenous societies were societies of doing; they were societies of presence,” she continues. “Our processes—be they political, spiritual, education or healing—required a higher degree of presence than modern colonial existence” (92).In comparison, she describes contemporary society as a “culture of absence” because a consumer culture needs unfilled desires to function (92). “Creating aligns us with our Ancestors because when we engage in artistic or creative processes, we disconnect ever so slightly from the dominant economic system and connect to a way of being based on doing, rather than blind consumption,” she states (93).
Here Simpson turns to thinking about the Otonabee River. The name comes from an Anishinaabemowin word that means “beating heart,” which refers to the way the rapids on the river appear (94). She thinks about related words through stories and etymology. “My point in writing this is that the word “Otanabee” is heard or read differently by Canadians and Nishnaabeg peoples,” she writes “When I hear or read the word ‘Otonabee,’ I think ‘Odenabe,’ and I am immediately connected to a physical place within my territory and a space where my culture communicates a multi-layered and nuanced meaning that is largely unseen and unrecognized by non-Indigenous peoples” (95). That’s no doubt true of anyone who doesn’t know Anishinaabemowin. “My consciousness as a Michi Saagig Nishnaabeg woman, a storyteller and a writer comes from the land because I am the land,” she continues. “Nishnaabemowin seamlessly joins my body to the body of my first mother; it lins my beating heart to the beating river that flows through my city” (95). She wants her writing to “pull people into a Michi Saagig Nishnaabeg-constructed world, even if just for a few seconds” as well (95).
In the chapter’s last section, Simpson describes an art and performance event featuring Rebecca Belmore that took place outside a supermarket in Peterborough, which drew her “into a decolonizing space where my presence and attention became completely focused in a similar fashion to what happens during natural childbirth, or ceremony. I lost sense of time and space. I was transported into a world that Belmore as the artist/storyteller had envisioned—a world where Nishnaabeg flourished and where justice prevailed, a world where my voice and my meanings mattered” (97). That event, she continues, “disrupted the narrative of normalized dispossession and intervened as Nishnaabeg presence—not as a victim, [b]ut as a strong non-authoritarian Nishnaabekwe power” (98). Indigenous art can provide “a glimpse of a decolonized contemporary reality” and “a mirroring of what we can become” (98).
In chapter 6, “Resurgence in Our Political Relationships,” Simpson describes the “acts of not-so-hidden resistance” to colonialism, which “involve parents teaching their kids the language or a song, Mothers and Aunties working so hard to keep their children fed and cared for in the face of poverty, oppression and often violence, as well as individuals standing up for themselves or their loved ones in courts, banks and doctors’ offices” (101). Such acts are told in family stories of survivance. As long as there has been colonialism on Indigenous lands, there has been resistance.
“From my perspective as a Nishnaabekwe, whenever one throws a stone into the lake with intent, commitment and vision, the implicate order or spiritual world mobilizes to provide support and open doors,” Simpson continues. “The emergent nature of Nishnaabeg mobilization, resistance and resurgence means that it is impossible to predict which stones will cascade through time and space, producing impacts, shifts, and transformations” (102). In stories, dreams, and visions, echoes of past resistance come into the present. Those stories are acts of Nishnaabeg presence. “Storytelling is an emergent practice, and meaning for each individual listener will necessarily be different,” Simpson writes. “The relationships between the storyteller and the listeners become the nest that cradles the meaning. The storyteller creates both the context and the content and collectively a plurality of meanings are generated through the experiences of the audience” (104). In an oral context, stories are fragile, and need to be lived or else they will disappear.
Next, Simpson tells a story—a Dibaajimowinan—about giving birth to and breastfeeding her two children, and the connection between those activities and treaties. She notes that the perspective of Indigenous Peoples on the treaties with the Crown is not the same as that of the federal government, partly because Indigenous Peoples “had been maing treaties with animal nations and with other Indigenous nations for generations” before contact (106). “Breastfeeding is the very first treaty,” she contends, and children lean about children through breastfeeding, because treaties are about a relationship—not between mother and child, but between nations (106-07). Like breastfeeding, treaties benefit both parties involved. Telling stories about breastfeeding led Simpson to other stories about Nishnaabeg political relationships. She describes the 1850 Robinson Huron Treaty. “From the perspective of Indigenous Peoples, treaties were viewed as sacred relationships between independent and sovereign nations, including agreements between humans and non-humans,” she writes (109). For instance, the Michi Saagiig Nishnaabe had treaties with the fish nations. She relates a story about a treaty with the deer nations she found in John Borrows’s book Recovering Canada: The Resurgence of Indigenous Law, in which the deer left the land because they felt they were being disrespected, and only a treaty brought them back so that the Nishnaabeg did not starve. “First and foremost, treaties are about maintaining peace through healthy relationships,” she concludes. “They require commitment and work, but when done correctly can bring about a lasting peace for all involved” (111). She hasn’t mentioned the Robinson Huron Treaty, but perhaps her point is that it was not that kind of treaty.
Next, Simpson tells a story about a treaty between the Nishnaabeg nation and the Dakota nation, in which the drum became a ceremony that created peace between the two nations. She also describes the Gdoo-naaganinaa, the “Our Dish” treaty between the Nishnaabeg and the Haudenosaunee Confederacy—a treaty also known as the “Dish With One Spoon” by the Haudenosaunee. “The dish represented the shared territory,” she writes. “It represented harmony and interconnection, as both parties were to be responsible for taking care of the Dish. Neither party could abuse the resource” (112). The Dish represents shared rights and responsibilities, but it did not mean that the Haudenosaunee “could fully colonize Nishnaabeg territory or assimilate Nishnaabeg people into Haudenosaunee culture,” or that either nation would be asked to give up their sovereignty (113). The models these treaties provide indicate that “our Ancestors did not intend for our nations to be subsumed by the British Crown or the Canadian state when they negotiated those original treaties,” such as the Robinson Huron Treaty (115).
In the next chapter, “Protecting the First Hill:” Nurturing Eniigaanzid in Children,” Simpson argues that while resurgence movements need leadership, they need the kind of leadership she has seen in “Elders who embody gentleness, kindness, respect, humility, and have grounded, authentic sources of power that come from working within the emergent forces of nature and the implicate order, rather than fro mauthoritarian power” (119). Those Elders “teach by allowing students to direct their own learning” (119). Traditional Nishnaabeg leadership was pluralistic, with communities often having more than one leader; leadership was “diffused, shared, and emergent arising out of need” (120-21). For that reason, she continues, “within our political traditions we should have ways of recognizing, respecting, and reconciling different leaders within our communities” (120). Fortunately, that kind of leadership is flourishing in Nishnaabeg communities, both on- and off-reserve. “Our system of governance has not been lost; it needs attention and support, but it is not lost,” she states (121).
The term “Eniigaanzid” means “the one to go first,” “the first to face the future,” or “the first to face danger,” as well as “the one that should be acting as protector” (121). That word suggests a form of leadership “based on humility, emergence, collectivity in decision making, sharing of the work and in action, and listening” (121). It’s difficult to find such leaders, though, because “they are counter to nearly all of the narratives on leadership our children are exposed to, as well as those leadership styles we mirror and model in our daily lives” (122). Parents model leadership for their children, and the kind of leadership represented by Eniigaanzid needs to be taught to children through the actions of their parents.
Nishnaabeg Elders see the four stages of life—babies and children, youth, adults, and Elders—as a series of four hills. Sometimes a different metaphor is used, and Elders will talk of Seven Stages of Life. In either model, in the pre-colonial Nishnaabeg nation, children were valued for their insights, humour, and contributions; they were “seen as Gifts, and parenting was an honour” (123). They were considered to have greater spiritual power; adults could learn much from them. A community-based form of parenting “created highly autonomous individuals that were also community-minded” (123). Because interdependence was seen as a core value, leaders “were able to build consensus by listening to the people,” by being humble, responsible, and respectful, and by sacrificing for the nation (123). “It was a kind of leadership based on shared, not absolute power,” Simpson continues, “and it created communities that were profoundly lessauthoritarian, less coercive and less hierarchical than their European counterparts” (123).
Europeans did not recognize Nishnaabeg parenting philosophies because of their lack of punishment and coercion and hierarchy; they “failed to recognize that Nishnaabeg parenting was rooted in attachment, following children through their stages of development, with empathy, patience, unconditional love, mutual respect, and freedom of choice” (123). These values are “reflected in broader Nishnaabeg society, particularly in gender relations, diplomacy and the political culture of the pre-colonial Nishnaabeg nation” (124).
Here Simpson returns to the Seven Grandfather, or Grandmother, Teachings: courage, truth, respect, love, honesty, wisdom, and humility. She relates how an Elder explained those virtues to her through Anishinaabemowin etymologies. “As a Nishnaabeg mother, I see it as a core responsibility of mine to ensure my children are grounded in Nishnaabeg values and ethics as best I can,” Simpson notes, including those Grandmother Teachings (126-27). She suggests that decolonizing parenting “means figuring out the kinds of citizens we want to create, the kinds of communities we want to live in, and the kinds of leaders we want to create, then tailoring our parenting and our schooling to meet the needs of our nations” (127).
Now Simpson unpacks the Seven Stages of Life, which are typically seen as a circle, a non-hierarchical form. So children teach their parents, for instance, instead of simply the other way around. The Seven Stages of Life also teaches that the entire extended family is responsible for nurturing children. “Everyone is both a teacher and a learner in this model; each individual both teaches and learns different things at different stages in their lives,” she states (129). In Nishnaabeg parenting, gentleness is paramount, as is attachment parenting and a recognition that infants are completely dependent on their parents. So too is teaching children by showing rather than telling them—to teach by example, in other words. Punishment was not used in pre-colonial Nishnaabeg society, even for adults who broke the nation’s laws. “The same is true for criticism,” Simpson writes. “I have never heard a legitimate Nishnaabeg Elder ever offer anything remotely resembling criticism, and sometimes members of my generation mistakenly interpret this as complacency. In my experience, nothing could be further from the truth” (132). Criticism and anger are communicated by silence, she explains. Non-interference is also an important part of parenting, which “encourages children to have control over their lives and to make decisions” (133). But non-interference only works “in a system where children are highly connected and attached to their parents and extended family, where the culture is inherently child-friendly” (133). The “good choices” need to be easy to make because the children are integrated into every part of daily life (133). “Raising children with a commitment to traditional parenting styles requires a tremendous amount of time and commitment, since the quality of the relationship between the parent and the child is the base for all of life’s learning,” she continues. “Allowing children to have freedom of choice in a detached, individualistic, adult environment would of course put children in danger; and this is the misunderstanding that settler societies continue to make in reference to Indigenous parenting philosophies” (133). Ritual, protocol, and storytelling taught children to respect boundaries, “thus protecting the safety and security of [the] primary nurturing relationship” (134). “Strong positive, nurturing connections between the child and his or her family brought out a strong desire to respect those individuals and relationships, not out of fear of punishment, but out of love, honour and genuine respect,” she writes (134). This form of parenting is difficult, which explains why the contribution of the extended family is so important. The emphasis on dealing with strong emotions, such as anger, through a “‘conservative withdrawal’ ethic,” is also important; emotional restraint is important.
Simpson tries to put all of these values into practice, although it is not easy, because the support of extended families is not always available, and Nishnaabeg people “do not necessarily live in communities that are able to gently convey a cohesive set of values to our children” (135). Nevertheless, she argues that “many facets of this parenting philosophy are ‘do-able’ in a modern context for many Nishnaabeg families,” and she believes that “they are vital to passing on a legacy of responsibility, hope and love to the next generation” (135).
The book’s final chapter is “Shi-Kiin: New Worlds.” It begins with the question of whether there is a Nishnaabeg concept for “sustainable development.” The answer is no: “humans should be taking as little as possible, giving up as much as possible to promote sustainability and promot mino bimaadiziwin in the coming generations” (141). In a similar way, there is no word for “culture” in Nishnaabemowin, because, for the Nishnaabeg, “our ‘culture’ was and is a series of interrelated processes that engage our full beings and require our full presence” (141). The closest terms to “culture” mean something like “the desire to produce more life” (142). Again, Simpson turns to the etymology of Nishnaabemowin to explain this point. “Biiskaabiyaang, Naakgonige, Aanjigone and Debwewin produce and continue to produce more life,” she writes. “Colonialism has only created a loss of life in terms of extinct and endangered species of animals and plants, and a drastic and traumatic decline in the quality of life for the fraction of Nishnaabeg that survived the original conquest” (143). For that reason, resurgence movements “must be movements to create more life, propel life, nurture life, motion, presence and emergence” (143).
For that reason, “our interventions into colonialism must be consistent with these core values of continuous rebirth, motion, presence and emergence,” she continues (144). Living in the right way as individuals will set in motion “influences and impacts that are impossible to predict” (144). Individual actions and decisions within the family affect “how we relate to human and non-human entities” in a spiral radiating in seven directions—inward and outward in the four cardinal directions, upwards, downwards, and through time as well (144). For Simpson, resurgence works the same way: “As resurgence is collectivized, it moves from being an individual act, vision or commitment, to one that functions on the level of a family. It then moves to a group of families, then a portion of a community, then a community, and so on” (144). The idea of collectivizing is communicated by the Nishnaabemowin word “Nkweshkgdaadiwin, the art of meeting together” (144). Resurgence, she continues, “starts with individuals aligning themselves with Biskaabiiyang, Naakgonige, Aanjigone and Debwewin,” which is then “osmotically collectivized through our interactions with our families, especially our children, and our communities” (145).
“Many resurgence or re-creation mobilizaitons within Nishnaabeg thought [start] with a vision or a dream,” Simpson writes (146). These visions or dreams “create Shki-kiin, new worlds” (146). However, she continues, “[v]ision must be coupled with intent: intent for transformation, intent for re-creation, intent for resurgence. One must have the intention of Biskaabiiyang in order to be effective and to mobilize help from the spirit world” (147). “Naakgonige once again becomes an important process in resurgence as a way of collectivizing, strategizing and making the best decisions possible,” and “Aanjigone is also important because it ensures that we tread very carefully, to be deliberate to the best of our abilities and that we act out of a tremendous love for our lands, our peoples and our culture,” rather than acting our of “responsive anger or criticism,” which “can cloud strategic responses designed to promote life” (145). And finally, “Skodewin means the art of setting a fire” (145). “If you bring Biskaabiiyang, Naakgonige, Aanjigone and Debwewin with intent, vision, motion, emergence, the mobilization of the spiritual world and committed action, one sets a fire,” she explains. “It is a fire that needs to be collectively fed and maintained, grown when it needs to be grown, and reduced to embers at certain times as well, until it is no longer needed for heat, warmth and resilience” (145). That metaphorical fire is needed “to propel us through the hoops and challenges of resurgence” (145).
In the book’s conclusion, Simpson suggests that it is “a call for Indigenous Peoples to delve into their own culture’s stories, philosophies, theories and concepts to align themselves with the processes and forces of regeneration, revitalization, remembering, and visioning. It is a call for Indigenous Peoples to live these teachings and stories in the diversity of their contemporary lives, because that act in and of itself is the precursur to generating more stories, processes, visions and forces of regeneration, propelling us into new social spaces based on jusstice and peace” (148). The regeneration or resurgence she is calling for will require “sacrifice, commitment and countless selfless acts” (148). It will require “strategy, commitment and a ‘one mindedness,’ built from the diversity of our perspectives and understandings” (148). “Bringing the old into the neew is our way forward,” she concludes. “This becomes clear when, like Zhaashkoonh, we place our piece on the back of our turtle and dance a new world into existence” (148-49).
Dancing On Our Turtle’s Back is an inspiring book. Simpson certainly makes traditional Nishnaabeg teachings sound appealing and attractive. I wish there was a sense here that such wisdom might be available to settlers, but I don’t see one, and perhaps such generosity isn’t deserved—not after, or during, the ongoing genocide. I sense a certain amount of golden aging going on in the book, though—were pre-contact societies really devoid of conflict or problems?—but given the apocalypse that First Nations have experienced since contact with Europeans, a tendency towards seeing the past in the best possible light is completely understandable. After all, what came before colonization must have been infinitely better than colonization itself. Perhaps—and this idea just occurred to me, and it may make little sense—settlers could attempt, in their own way, to practice mino bimidaaziwin without making a lot of noise about it, without attempting to horn in on Nishnaabeg ceremonies or take up the time and energy of Nishnaabeg Elders and communities. I’m not sure. I’d like to think so. At the same time, though, I’m certain that such an attempt, on one’s own, would be doomed to fail, since as Simpson insists, mino bimidaaziwin requires collective support and engagement. In any case, for all our sakes, I hope Nishnaabeg nations are able to put Simpson’s ideas into practice.
Works Cited
Simpson, Leanne. Dancing On Our Turtle’s Bacak: Stories of Nishnaabeg Re-Creation, Resurgence and a New Emergence, ARP, 2011.
Watts, Vanessa. “Indigenous Place-Thought and Agency Amongst Humans and Non-Humans (First Woman and Sky Woman Go On a World Tour!).” Decolonization: Indigeneity, Education & Society, vol. 2, no. 1 (2013), 20-34.
