Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Thesis Format

Integrated Article

Degree

Doctor of Philosophy

Program

Theory and Criticism

Supervisor

Regna Darnell

2nd Supervisor

Helen Fielding

3rd Supervisor

Janice Forsyth

Abstract

The Truth and Reconciliation Commission underscores the need to incorporate narrative accounts of Indigenous students’ experiences as part of wide-scale de-colonizing efforts. This dissertation asks; how do Indigenous students experience their identities at Western University? What is at stake for phenomenology, feminist methods, and Indigenous theory, in the post Truth and Reconciliation era?

There is a gap between theories centering on reflective cognition in philosophy and the embodiment of land, prevalent across Indigenous cultures. However, phenomenology can provide a method to facilitate dialogues with discourses outside Eurocentric domains that empathize with marginalized communities’ struggles, through an understanding of location-based knowledge. I will explore how Indigenous learners’ experiences inform concepts in phenomenology, Haudenosaunee, Cree, and Anishinaabe thinking, before they become marked literary categories.

I undertake a ‘two-eyed seeing’ approach, from Eurocentric and Indigenous perspectives, to connect non-hierarchal epistemologies across nation-specific expressions. In chapter two, I discuss relational, land-based methods, through Dolleen Manning’s Anishinaabe ‘mnidoo’ concept, Merleau-Pontian phenomenology, and feminist epistemologies, in terms of dialogues with Indigenous students and Elders. In our discussions, I explore concepts about community, home, health, and belonging, in relation to lived theories of embodiment, places, and beings, within an interpretive circle. Chapter three discusses the impacts of language, reflexivity, emotion, oppression, environmental repossession, and experience, within feminist research methods and Indigenous paradigms, through anthropology’s ontological turn. Chapter four discusses how experiences influence Indigenous artists, in their efforts to create work that is emergent from, and reflexive of culture and identity. Chapter five surveys concepts that include, citizenship, human rights, and freedom, through Indigenous scholars’ episodes of wellbeing and theories about emergent governance. I conclude, by offering Indigenous students’ reflections about education, ally-ship, and reconciliation.

Indigenous subjectivities are unique, not homogenously categorized. This project’s interviews bring forth information missing from research involving community-based wellness services, without statistical representation in government and university strategic plan reports. Hearing individuals articulate desires to instigate healing in their communities is a powerful gesture and offers teachable moments, for the listener. I hope that when interviewees speak their gifts and insights, in our interactions, it inspires continued activist incentives that foster community-wide changes.

Summary for Lay Audience

The Truth and Reconciliation Commission underscores the need to incorporate narrative accounts of Indigenous students’ experiences as part of wide-scale de-colonizing efforts. This dissertation asks: how do Indigenous students experience their identities at Western University?

I undertake a ‘two-eyed seeing’ approach, from Eurocentric and Indigenous perspectives, to connect ways of knowing across nation-specific expressions. In discussions with Indigenous students, I explore concepts about community, home, health, and belonging in relation to lived theories of land-based knowledge, within an interpretive circle. It is clear through dialogues with Indigenous students and Elders how the interpretive flow of interviews can mirror affective medicine wheel components, holistic embodiments of health, and relationships with living beings.

Chapter three discusses the impacts of language, reflexivity, emotion, oppression, environmental repossession, and experience within feminist research methods and Indigenous paradigms, through anthropology’s ontological turn. Chapter four discusses how experiences influence Indigenous artists in their efforts to create work that is emergent from and reflexive of culture and identity. Art forms can be a process of healing for many Indigenous students. I discuss Indigenous artwork as resisting, speaking back to objectification within institutional structures.

Chapter five surveys concepts that include: citizenship, human rights, and freedom, through Indigenous scholars’ episodes of wellbeing and theories about emergent governance. Resisting top-down institutions, through non-hierarchal government structures among Indigenous nations contradicts state measures for control. I conclude, by offering Indigenous students’ reflections about education, ally-ship, and reconciliation. Indigenous voices can influence change.

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