Storying Solidarities: Sites of Autonomy and Alliance in Indigenous Literary Arts

DAY 1: May 28th, 2016 8:30 a.m. – 9:00 a.m. Opening Ceremony with Keith Chief Moon (Science A-106) Featuring:

• Representatives of Making Treaty 7 9:15 a.m. – 10:45 a.m. Panel #1: The Erotics of Alliance: Empowerment, Ecology, and the Body (Science A-106) (member organized session) Co-Organized and Chaired by Sam McKegney

• The Ancient Presence of the Erotic in Louise Halfe's The Crooked Good (Lesley Belleau) • Embodied Alliance in Eden Robinson’s ‘Terminal Avenue’ (Michelle Coupal) • Born of Beasts: On Other-than-Human Kinship as More than Metaphor (Daniel Heath Justice) • “These Animals on Stage, These Creatures”: Rene Highway’s Erotic Ecology (June Scudeler) • Health Sovereignty, Erotics, and Early Indigenous HIV/AIDS Activism in the U.S.: The Legacy of Carole laFavor (Lisa

Tatonetti, co-organizer) 11:00 a.m. – 12:30 p.m. Keynote Talk by Eldon Yellowhorn: Stories of the Once-Were People (Science A-106)

• Akaitapiiwa is the Blackfoot term for ancestors and its literal translation is the 'once-were people'. The Blackfoot phrase niitakksikaitapitsinikii means 'I will tell stories of ancient times'. When these old stories are retold today we accept that they come to us from time immemorial. This implies that they are immune to chronology. Since the days of Franz Boas, anthropologists too have accepted that myths exist outside of time. That mythology is better conceived as a psychological device rather than a record of the past. My studies in archaeology brought me back to those old Blackfoot stories and I decided to revisit that idea of time immemorial. I began to explore Blackfoot mythology to see if I could use those old stories to interpret the archaeological record of the northern plains. I wondered if I could use them to construct theories to explain the origin of archaeological sites and if so then I could determine the antiquity of those old stories. I began with the premise that oral narratives were inspired by lived experience and from my studies I discovered that time immemorial is vulnerable to chronology. My presentation will reveal the insights I gained about Blackfoot oral narratives and exactly how old are those olden days.

12:30 p.m. – 2:00 p.m. Renate Eigenbrod Mentorship Lunch (Social Sciences 105)

• Meetings between emergent scholars and established mentors in their fields, chaired by Deanna Reder 2:00 p.m. – 3:30 p.m. (#2) Beyond Anthropocentrism: The Poetics of Kinship (Science A-13) Chaired by Sarah Henzi

(#3) Coercion and Refusal: Decolonizing Gender and Territoriality (Science A-15) Chaired by Warren Cariou

(#4) The Complex “Terrain of Solidarity”: Troubling “Recognition,” Complicating “Community” (Science A-17)(member organized session)

• Duncan Mercredi and Wolf: Animal Alliance in the Urban Environment (Michael Minor)

• Regenerative Language: Peter Kalifornsky’s Literary Method as Praxis (Jasmine Spencer)

• peyâhtik (quietly, softly, slowly, carefully): reading nehiyaw poetry (Angela Van Essen)

• Writing Metis Gender Relations: post-WWII Indigenous Masculinity in Western Canada (David Parent)

• Tloo-qwah-nah and Nuu-chah-nulth recognition: poetics and politics in George Clutesi’s Potlatch (Natalie Knight)

• Reading Contemporary Unikkaaqtuat (Traditional Stories): Revenge, Responsibility, and Sexual Violence in the Works of Alootook Ipellie, Rachel Qitsualik and Sean Tinsley (Brandon Kerfoot)

• Towards a Narrative Ethics: Storying Community-Based Research Practice (Shaun Stevenson)

• Carceral Recognition in Canada’s penal system: An Analysis of the Okimaw Ohci Healing Lodge (Margaret Boyce)

• Colonialism and/as University-Community Engagement: Toward a Decolonizing Praxis (Amber Dean)

4:00 p.m. – 5:30 p.m. (#5) Singularities and Solidarities: Expressive Culture Amid Political Constraint (Science A-13) Chaired by Jesse Archibald-Barber

(#6) Radical Pedagogy and Anticolonial Alliance (Science A-15) Chaired by Deanna Reder

(#7) Indigenize Now!: Transformations Inside and Outside the Academy (Science A-17) (member organized session)

• Smallest Victories: Creating a Resistant Archive Through Story (Jade McDougall)

• Telling Johnny’s Story: The Participatory Refusal of Sahtu Dene Orature (Alana Fletcher)

• Solidarity Between Bars?: Writing from the Saskatoon Correctional Centre (Nancy Van Styvendale)

• “Forts and Furs”: Building Alliance in Treaty 7 Territory (Shaina Humble & Buddy Wesley)

• Burning the Totem Pole: Violence and Decolonization in a Graduate Indigenous Literature Seminar (Marc André Fortin)

Convened by Ashok Mathur Featuring: • Krista Arias • Karolina Bialkowska • Monica Good • Lindsay Harris • Amberley John • David Lacho

7:00 p.m. – 10:00 p.m. Poetry Reading and Open Mic Night (Senate Room, Hotel Alma)

Featuring: • Kateri Akiwenzie-Damm • Joanne Arnott • Marilyn Dumont • Lee Maracle • Gregory Scofield • Richard Van Camp

Also Featuring Book Launches by: • Blaire Stonechild • Deanna Reder & Linda Morra • Keavy Martin & Dylan Robinson

And Featuring Opportunities to Play the Video Game Never Alone

DAY 2: May 29th, 2016 9:00 a.m. – 10:30 a.m. (#8) Examining the Terrain of Alliance among Indigenous, Diasporic, and Settler Peoples (Science A-13) Chaired by Sophie McCall

(#9) Forging Futurities: Technology, Territory, and Genre (Science A-15) Chaired by Jesse Archibald-Barber

(#10) Re-Storying in Solidarity: A Roundtable on the Kahswentha Indigenous Knowledges Initiative (Science A-17) (member organized session Chaired by Sam McKegney)

• “The Pain of Glass”: Strategies for Indigenous/Diasporic Alliance in Lee Maracle’s “Yin Chin” and Joy Kogawa’s Itsuka (Aloys Fleischmann)

• Good Neighbours: Relationality in Leanne Simpson’s “nogojiwanong” (Maral Moradipour)

• “‘As intersecting circles combine’: Kinship, Alliance, and Autonomy in the Poetry of Marilyn Dumont, Kateri Akiwenzie-Damm, and Moe Clark” (Johannah Bird)

• Fear of a Red Planet: Decolonization and Resistance in Indigenous Science Fiction (Jordan Fischer)

• Physical Realms, Dreams and Spaces of Indigeneity in Aaron Paquette's Lightfinder (Blake Bilmer)

• Colonial Narratives of Kingston and Queen’s (Jennifer Hardwick)

• Instructions of the Two-Row Wampum (Kanonhsyonne Janice Hill)

• Enacting the Kahswentha (Rebecca Rolfe)

• Situating KIKI within Settler/Colonialism and Indigenous Studies (Karl Hardy)

• Re-Storying Space: Talkin’ Back to Johnny Mac (Erin Sutherland)

• Kingston’s Prison for Women and Indigenous Storytelling (Natasha Stirrett)

• Solidarity as Action (Trevor Phillips)

11:00 a.m. – 12:30 p.m. (#11) Inuit Intellectual and Literary Genealogies (Science A-13) Chaired by Sarah Henzi

(#12) Kisima Inŋitchuŋa (Never Alone): Researching and Teaching Indigenous Video Games (Science A-15)

(member organized session)

(#13) Towards a Two Row Research Methodology: Between Autonomy and Alliance (Science A-17)

(member organized session) • Intellectual Genealogies: An analysis

of An Antane Kapesh’s Eukuan nin matshimanitu Innu-iskueu/Je suis une maudite sauvagesse and Mini Aodla Freeman’s Life Among the Qallunaat (Elise Couture-Grondin)

• The Unspoken in Life Among the Qallunaat (Keavy Martin)

• Writing Life Among the Qallunaat (Mini Aodla Freeman)

• Performance, Kinetic Memory, and Oral Traditions in Kisima Inŋitchuŋa (Never Alone) (Warren Cariou)

• How Should I Play These?: Teaching Video Games in Indigenous Literature Classrooms (David Gaertner)

• Digital Indigenous Storytelling: Video Games, Storytelling and the Impacts on Indigenous Peoples (Nathan Lagace)

• Intergenerational Indigenous Gaming: Conceptualizing Youth Perspectives on Never Alone” (Maize Longboat)

• Competing Sovereignty: Gaming Iñupiat Protocols and Storytelling in Kisima Inŋitchuŋa (Katherine Meloche)

• Roles in and Responsibilities to Multiple Communities (Carrie McMullin)

• Towards a Two Row Politics of Respect (Daniel Coleman)

• Ohen:ton Karihwatehkwen, Thanksgiving, and Bi-Cultural Discourse in Research (Kaitlin Debicki)

• The History of the Two Row and the Internal Script that Drives Our Thinking (Rick Hill)

• The Two Row Wampum and the Boundaries of Knowledge Mobilization (Rick Monture)

12:30 p.m. – 1:30 p.m. Lunch Break 1:30 p.m. – 3:30 p.m. Aboriginal Roundtable— “Decolonial Solidarities and the Work of Sharron Proulx-Turner: A Roundtable Discussion” (Senate Room, Hotel Alma) MC’d by Richard Van Camp Organized by Keavy Martin, Sophie McCall, and Aruna Srivastava Featuring:

• Joanne Arnott • David Bateman • Susan Briscoe • Weyman Chan • Marilyn Dumont • Hiromi Goto • Tasha Hubbard • Larissa Lai • Beverly Little Thunder • Ashok Mathur • Sharanpal Ruprai • Gregory Scofield • Aruna Srivastava.

4:00 p.m. – 5:30 p.m. Plenary on Applied Humanities Work with Indigenous Youth (Senate Room, Hotel Alma) This session, introduced by Deanna Reder and Kristina Bidwell, will honour and carry on the work of the late Jo-Ann Episkenew who had been scheduled to give a keynote address at this year’s ILSA gathering. The session will involve Associates of the Indigenous Peoples Health Research Centre in Regina, Saskatchewan, and may include a workshop component. Featuring:

• Dustin Brass • Erin Goodpipe

5:30 p.m. – 5:45 p.m. Closing Ceremony (Senate Room, Hotel Alma)