Speaking of Nature
Robin Wall Kimmerer
In the English language, we reserve the pronouns of personhood for humans—”he,” “she,” “they”—and not for animals, plants, and landscapes. Yet in many of America’s indigenous languages, such barriers are dissolved, and so, too, is the sense of distance between human and nonhuman. Robin Wall Kimmerer, a speaker of Potawatomi and an enrolled member in the Citizen Band Potawatomi, writes about how to find a language that affirms our kinship with the natural world.
How to Be Better Ancestors
Winona LaDuke
How long are you going to let others determine the future for your children? Are we not warriors? When our ancestors went to battle they didn’t know what the consequences would be, all they knew is that if they did nothing, things would not go well for their children. Do not operate out of a place of fear, operate out of hope. Because with hope anything is possible…
12 Easy Steps for Canadians to Follow If They’re Serious About Reconciliation
Shady Hafez
A 12-step program to reconciliation. It starts with land and ends with showing the hell up.
Decolonizing Antiracism
Bonita Lawrence & Enakshi Dua
This article is about (im)migrants/racialized groups and Indigenous peoples: intersections and tensions. The second part takes a critical look at the complicity and participation of racialized peoples in the colonization of Indigenous lands and people. This is explosive radical anti-racism and immigration theory, from a decolonized framework.
Decolonizing Together: Moving beyond a politics of solidarity toward a practice of decolonization
Harsha Walia
“Indigenous self-determination must become the foundation for all our broader social justice mobilizing…(it is) intertwined with struggles against racism, poverty, police violence, war and occupation, violence against women and environmental justice.”
This is my Winnipeg: addressing racism with open hearts
Heather Plett
This article details the format and approach to a conversation in Winnipeg following the racist comments towards First Nations people there and the Maclean’s article that came out naming Winnipeg “the most racist city in Canada.” 4Rs uses this methodology in our gatherings (World Cafe).
Love as Political Resistance: Lessons from Audre Lorde and Octavia Butler
adrienne maree brown
Audre Lorde taught us that caring for ourselves is “not self-indulgence, it is an act of political resistance,” and although we know how to meme and tweet those words, living into them is harder.
I Commit to Treating Others as Fully Human
Leah Penniman
Voluntary standards for how we treat one another in the movement: “It is my hope that all of our formations-collectives-organizations in the movement will have conversations and develop commitments as to how we treat each other. These will not all look the same. I hope that some of the language below catalyzes these important dialogues. We cannot succeed in building a just world if we are not reflecting those same values within our activist communities.”
Weaponized Feelings: Mental Health, Accountability, and Movement Building
B.B. Buchanan
Too rarely do we discuss mental health and trauma in our movement spaces. That said, when it is talked about there are some common tropes, standard ways of talking about disability and trauma, that fail to both make space for disability and hold community members accountable. By reproducing standard frames around disability we open up space for abuse and toxicity with no recourse for justice, restorative or otherwise.
Resetting Normal: The Impacts of COVID-19 on First Nations, Metis, and Inuit Youth
Taylor Arnt and Courtney Vaughn – The Canadian Women’s Foundation
This report sheds light on the realities of women, Two-Spirit, and gender diverse youth with over 80% of survey respondents identifying as such. Thus, it explores the impact of the pandemic on Indigenous youth and gender-based violence, and shares recommendations for how to better serve First Nations, Métis and Inuit youth moving forward.
Do you have something to add to this resource collection?
Please share your favourite resources with us!
