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A review by justabean_reads
Tracing Ochre: Changing Perspectives on the Beothuk by
challenging
dark
informative
slow-paced
5.0
Another topic I didn't know a lot about. I sort of had the Canada: A People's History version of this, i.e. the Beothuk were the only indigenous people in Newfoundland, but the last one died by the 1820s and as a people they are now extinct. (This book is really cranky about Canada: A People's History.)
Reading fourteen essays by indigenous and settler authors, and skimming another two, I learned that the Beothuk were not the only indigenous people in Newfoundland, and that they probably didn't all die, but left and married into other groups. Most of the book was meta about ways of understanding history, and ways in which history is used by government to disenfranchise marginalised groups etc.
A few essays I particularly liked (though I enjoyed most of them):
"The Ones That Were Abused": Thinking about the Beothuk though Translation by Elizabeth Penashue and Elizabeth Yoeman: Discussing Innu perspectives on the Beothuk via language differences and difficulty translating the diaries of an Innu woman into English.
Beothuk and Mi'kmaq: An Interview with Chief Mi'sel Joe: Discussing Mi'kmaq oral histories and how they were supressed, and the relationship between the Mi'kmaq and the settler government of Newfoundland.
The Beothuk and the Myth of Prior Invasions by Patrick Brantlinger: Discussing the colonial need to blame killing everyone on other indigenous groups.
Towards a Beothuk Archaeology: Understanding Indigenous Agency in the Material Record by Lisa Rankin: Archaeology! Self-critical archaeology. Good stuff.
Unrecognised Peoples and Concepts of Extinction by Bonita Lawrence: Talking about the political value of saying a people is "extinct" including other Canadian examples in regards to the Indian Act. Worth quoting:
Reading fourteen essays by indigenous and settler authors, and skimming another two, I learned that the Beothuk were not the only indigenous people in Newfoundland, and that they probably didn't all die, but left and married into other groups. Most of the book was meta about ways of understanding history, and ways in which history is used by government to disenfranchise marginalised groups etc.
A few essays I particularly liked (though I enjoyed most of them):
"The Ones That Were Abused": Thinking about the Beothuk though Translation by Elizabeth Penashue and Elizabeth Yoeman: Discussing Innu perspectives on the Beothuk via language differences and difficulty translating the diaries of an Innu woman into English.
Beothuk and Mi'kmaq: An Interview with Chief Mi'sel Joe: Discussing Mi'kmaq oral histories and how they were supressed, and the relationship between the Mi'kmaq and the settler government of Newfoundland.
The Beothuk and the Myth of Prior Invasions by Patrick Brantlinger: Discussing the colonial need to blame killing everyone on other indigenous groups.
Towards a Beothuk Archaeology: Understanding Indigenous Agency in the Material Record by Lisa Rankin: Archaeology! Self-critical archaeology. Good stuff.
Unrecognised Peoples and Concepts of Extinction by Bonita Lawrence: Talking about the political value of saying a people is "extinct" including other Canadian examples in regards to the Indian Act. Worth quoting:
If Indigeneity signified savagery--being immersed in a pristine, static, primordial state of nature--then by definition Indigeneity was antithetical to survival in a modern world. Furthermore, such colonial definitions ensured that the struggles of Native peoples in the grip of colonial onslaught were read as examples of the disparate ways in which "Native culture" was lost. Those who managed to adapt to the new economic order were elevated to whiteness and those who were reeling and prey to alcoholism and violence were seen as sinking to utter degradation. Thus, when Native people responded to forced change by dying, they became extinct. However, when they responded to forced change by surviving, they were also seen as extinct because the act of survival and change rendered them "no longer Indian" under colonial definitions of Indigeneity.