The Politics of the Canoe

"An engaging study of where the canoe finds itself in post Truth and Reconciliation Commission Canada. From being co-opted and used by settlers as a symbol of Canadian nationalism, this collection of essays from academics, activists, and community leaders demonstrates how the canoe has been reclaimed by Indigenous people and is being used as a powerful tool for to build Indigenous sovereignty and heal communities." Dale Barbour

"Many of the essays’ authors read Colonialist meanings in the traditional Canadian discourse regarding canoes and argue for a new canoe discourse with First Nations at its center ... the theme of “the political canoe” is addressed through varied, even eccentric, approaches, making for mostly diverse and engaging reading." Bob Holtzman, Indigenous Boats

"The book’s ten chapters dismantle the idea of the canoe as a national symbol of Canada and identify it instead as a vehicle for decolonization, reconnection with the land, Indigenous cultural resurgence, and reconciliation between settler Canadians and Indigenous peoples." Robert Olajos, H-Environment

“By complicating an iconic symbol of Canada, the collection is challenging people to think about the canoe’s connection to colonization, how contemporary visions reinforce that colonialism, and how to engage in decolonizing the canoe. [The essays] call on us to remember that the canoe is alive and has the potential to help steer all of us towards reconciliation.” Karl Hele, Anishinabek News

“The Politics of the Canoe, like the books that inspired it, advocates a new, progressive politics of the canoe: one that rejects the old nation-building icon in favour of an ancient, multiform watercraft that speaks to Indigenous accomplishment and Native history."

David Massell, American Review of Canadian Studies

"Each of the essays in this volume helps to sustain campfire conversation around the meaning and significance of the canoe." Jamie Benidickson, Prairie History

“This book is poised to create positive ripples among its readers. It simultaneously appeals to lovers of the canoe and challenges them to examine their assumptions about canoeing as an activity that happens somewhere out there, in “nature,” which many of the contributors remind us is a Euro-colonial construct. Politics of the Canoe is an invitation to learn, and I suggest the editors have accomplished a difficult task: speaking to the non-converted, creating critical conversations, and promoting deeper learning about the canoe and the ways it is tied to our colonial histories.”

Leigh Potvin, BC Studies

“Religion scholars—especially those with an eye toward conceptions and practices of law—will appreciate the consideration of the canoe as a vessel of sovereignty, notably through alternative modes of sociality and ontology, such as that described by the Algonquin concept of ginawaydaganuc, 'the interrelatedness of all life'." Spencer Dew, Religious Studies Review