“Playing Indian” is as old as the Boston Tea Party, when the Sons of Liberty dressed up as Mohawks to toss tea into Boston Harbor. Since the 1970s a rapidly growing share of Canadians and Americans have gone beyond play to identify themselves as Indigenous, many with little or no basis for doing so.
Why do people who have lived for generations as white people with accompanying rights and privileges, attempt to identify as Indigenous? What are the damages to actual Native individuals and to Indigenous sovereignty from race-shifting? What role do settler-state universities play in upholding Native rights and sovereignty?
Three distinguished Indigenous scholars take on these challenging questions. All three have lived, studied, written and thought deeply about the nature of Indigenous belonging and sovereignty, about colonialism as a process of erasure, and about the responsibility of contemporary institutions – whether in business, conservation, or education – to confront these issues.
Kim TallBear, Sisseton-Wahpeton Oyate citizen (Dakota), left her South Dakota reservation at 14 to further her education. An anthropologist, she holds the Canada Research Chair in Indigenous Peoples, Technoscience, and Society at the University of Alberta.
Chris Andersen, Métis sociologist, is the Dean of the Faculty of Native Studies and Special Advisor to the Office of the Provost on Leadership and Equity Diversity and Inclusion at the University of Alberta.
Brenda Macdougall, Métis historian, is Director of the Institute for Indigenous Research and Studies at the University of Ottawa, University Research Chair in Metis Family and Community Traditions, and Indigenous advisor to the president of the university.
Response by Darren Ranco, Associate Professor of Anthropology and Chair of Native American Programs at the University of Maine/Orono and member of the Penobscot Nation
Location: UVM Davis Center, Grand Maple Ballroom and Virtual
Date and Time: Friday, April 28th, 8:30 AM – 12:00 PM
Price: This event is free to attend.
Please contact Suniva Thangaraj at [email protected] with any questions.
