Putting Indigenous historical thinking into the world

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This article was published 02/07/2018 (2124 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

National Indigenous Peoples Day on June 21 was a celebration of Indigenous Peoples’ culture and heritage. This year it was also the day to mark the birth of ShekonNeechie.ca, a new Indigenous history website.

ShekonNeechie.ca is a platform for Indigenous historians to gather as an online community and share their ideas or works-in-progress. The new platform is entirely Indigenous-conceived, created, and controlled. It includes features, podcasts and videos, and creation of a bibliography and links to other Indigenous scholars for educators and the general public.

The site was founded and directed by well-known and respected Indigenous historians in Canada, including Dr. Mary Jane Logan McCallum, history professor at the University of Winnipeg). Dr. Robert Innes, head of the Indigenous studies department, University of Saskatchewan, steered the project with his research assistant Noah Favel, a fourth-year undergraduate student in history and Indigenous studies at McGill University. Also involved and playing important roles are Kim Anderson (Guelph, Ont.), Susan Hill (University of Toronto), Brenda Macdougall (Ottawa), Alan Corbiere (Ph D student at York University) and Winona Wheeler (University of Saskatchewan). 

“We want to put Indigenous historical thinking out into the world — so that it can be digested, considered, and has a role in the framing of future research,” said McCallum, member of the Munsee Delaware Nation in southern Ontario, and inaugural UWinnipeg Indigenous Research Scholar Award recipient.

“There is a vast under-representation of Indigenous people doing historical research and teaching in Canada. This has inadvertently meant that authority in the area of producing and disseminating history is not sufficiently in the hands of Indigenous people,” McCallum continued.

For those with an interest in learning about the Indigenous past, the site will house a range of types of material from short to long essays, and a mix of stories and reviews, making the material accessible not only to a scholarly audience but to a much broader population. Non-Indigenous people are invited to approach in friendship and peruse to find Indigenous voice and opinion, and to spread the word.

“As a peer reviewer, I’m sometimes shocked by how authors consistently fail to read and address Indigenous scholars; this also affects the classroom, as few works by Indigenous scholars are being used in undergraduate and graduate courses in Canadian university. We hope that the work may get picked up by teachers, public historians, those who work in archives, museums and national and provincial parks, and others who it could directly or indirectly speak to,” explained McCallum.

McCallum and her colleagues are committed to mentoring, showcasing and encouraging Indigenous historical scholarship. They hope that the site will encourage writing and research by Indigenous historians.

Visit ShekonNeechie.ca to learn more and to read the story behind the name.

Janine LeGal
Wolseley community correspondent

Janine LeGal is a community correspondent for Wolseley, who previously wrote columns from St. Boniface and South Osborne.

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