Thou Shalt Forget: Indigenous sovereignty, resistance and the production of cultural oblivion in Canada
- Author(s)
- Pierrot Ross-Tremblay
- Series
- HRC series Open access titles
Description
Following a decade-long research project, this devastating book examines colonial state imperatives to oppress indigenous peoples and history from mainstream national narratives. Through the study of his community, the Essipiunnuat or, ‘People of the Brook Shells River’, the author hopes to combat the erasure of First Nations people from colonial history-books by shedding a light on historical and current systematic and territorial oppression. From land grabs, to genocide and irreversible ecological warfare, the book demonstrates the impact of psychological colonialism on agency and resistance, the value of elders and community story-telling in empowerment and self-actualisation, and the role of the state and local elites in creating and warping our perception and understanding of history. A critical text for those with an interest in indigenous people, their history and human rights, Thou Shalt Forget also serves as an important tool for remembrance and a starting point for resistance and change.
Table of contents
List of figures
Acknowledgements
Introduction
1. The Essipiunnuat, the Salmon War and cultural oblivion
2. The sources of war: colonialism and the emergence of collective agency
3. Capturing who we were: heroic postures in tragic circumstances
4. Stories on the transformative experience of war: from self-empowerment
to a metaphysics of domination
5. The Essipiunnuat’s actuality in light of the past
Conclusion
Postface | Heirs of oblivion: leaders’ interiority as a public issue
Bibliography
Annex 1 – Methodological notes
Reviews
"On almost every page of 'Thou Shalt Forget' Pierrot
Ross Tremblay reveals himself as someone deeply engaged (and enraged) with what is happening to indigenous peoples today. Tremblay joins several important
scholars such as Taiaiake Alfred, Val Napoleon and the late Vine Deloria on
shining a light on the paradoxes of indigenous sovereignty in the face of
ongoing colonialism. He is one of the few scholars defending an indigenous perspective in Quebec and bringing it into wider public debate."
-Professor Colin Samson (University of Essex)
-Professor Colin Samson (University of Essex)