Intellectual Self-Determination and Sovereignty: Implications for Native Studies and for Native Intellectuals

Indigenous self-determination, neoliberalization, and the right to the city : rescaling aboriginal governance in Ottawa and Winnipeg

“…20 Firmly linking a people to land, Indigenous 21 is thus an intrinsically territorializing and spatial referent (Malkki 1997). 22 Indigenist methodologies seek to de-naturalize and transcend settler state boundaries so as to not reproduce and reinforce settler spatiahties In keeping with the hemispheric approach that Forbes (1998) and others advocate for, I include a discussion of the Latin American coloniality/ modernity research program in this chapter The materialist orientation of scholars affiliated with this paradigm adds to the understanding of the de/spatiahzation of Indigenous peoples as an mtegral feature of coloniality m Canada 21 The term Indigenous is not the preferred language of the state in Canada According to the Department of Indian and Northern Affairs (2004), "Indigenous means 'native to the area' In this sense, Aboriginal people are indeed mdigenous to North America As a proper name for a people, the term is capitalized to form 'Indigenous peoples' Its meaning is similar to 'Aboriginal peoples', 'Native peoples' or 'First Peoples' The term is rarely used in the Department, and when it is used, it usually refers to Aboriginal people internationally Outside the Department, the term is gaming currency, particularly among some Aboriginal scholars " It is, however, a term that is widely used, not only among scholars and activists, but also by the United Nations and other international forums It is precisely in the abstraction from local and state contexts that this concept politicizes being Indigenous and fosters solidarity (Smith 1999) Castree (2004 notes that "the term has thereby created -or has attempted to create -a new world-historical Indigeneity also denotes an inherently transformational politics, as Maaka and Fleras (2000, 89) point out:…”

“…Most Indigenist authors stress the importance of self-determination and autonomy as fundamental to the collective, personal, and intellectual decolonization of Indigenous peoples and Indigenous-settler relations (Alfred 1995;Alfred and Corntassel 2005;Ladner2001, 2003Forbes 1998). As the following quote by Green illustrates, a fundamental shift in the relationships between Indigenous peoples and the state is required.…”

“…Through intertwined sociospatial technologies of power, the state has produced this void in order to keep Indigenous peoples (in and) out of place and to legitimize a property regime premised on their dispossession. Looking at the relationship between the historical and ongoing production of urban space in Canada and the closely linked fictions of terra nullius and Crown sovereignty helps to elucidate the terrain 3 Sovereignty is not used in the conventional Western, state-centric sense (Forbes 1998;Alfred 1999). According to Barker (2005, 1), "following World War II, sovereignty emerged not as a new but as a particularly valued term within indigenous discourses to signify a multiplicity of legal and social rights to political, economic, and cultural self-determination.…”

Educational Manifest Destiny: Exclusion, Role Allocation, and Functionalization in Reservation Bordertown District Admission Policies

“…As Francis and Munson (2017) note, "the idea of sovereignty is complex and wrought with colonial ideology, though the concept has also been subverted by Indigenous people to hold deeper meaning that reflects survival, perseverance, ceremony, tradition, and celebration" (50). Furthermore, the political and policy-making implications associated with educational sovereignty are closely related to what Indigenous scholar Forbes (1998) terms "intellectual sovereignty," or "the state we achieve through a steady struggle for self-determination, a result of many cumulative decisions that we make for ourselves as we move toward self-governance and intellectual self-direction" (15).…”

Australian Indigenous Studies: A Question of Discipline

“…This view of Indigenous Studies as a discipline that can be developed from within Indigenous epistemologies to continue tribal knowledge traditions is a strong ongoing strand in the international literature (e.g. Ermine 1995;Forbes 1998;Wheaton 1998;Grande 2000;Smith 2000;Walker 2000;Wildcat and Pierotti 2000;Battiste, Bell and Findlay 2002). Very few of these international scholars discuss Indigenous Studies in their own contexts without reference to the underlying philosophy of tribal knowledge systems and its differences from Western knowledge.…”