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First Nations

Nîcisânak on the river’s edge

A memoir of queer healing in Cumberland House Cree Nation

Russell McAuley

Photo by Tim Bish It’s a Wednesday between classes just before the 2025 winter break and the hallway at Nisto Awasisak Memorial School is a rush of hoodies, backpack zippers, and winter boots squeaking on tile. “Iye, real gay,” one of the high school boys says, loud enough to cut through the noise. Iye—Cree slang […] More »

7Estez I am Tattooing

Jacqueline Merritt

Incorporating mountains, water, and moon cycles, this tattoo tells a visual story of home, ancestral lineage, and seasonal rhythm through a contemporary cultural lens. Photo: Robert Burns (2022). I come from a place where the mountains kiss the sky and the rivers run crisp and clear, known as Xeni Gwet’in or, in English terms, Nemiah […] More »

Interrogating the Indian Act

Why the Act is still around, and what needs to change

Evelyn Ullyott Hayes

Murray Sinclair during the opening keynote of the Shingwauk 2015 Gathering. (Archkris via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0) Governing everything from band leadership to land management, the Indian Act continues to shape daily life for many Indigenous people 150 years after it was enacted. For many Indigenous leaders and scholars, its enduring framework remains a […] More »

Here for the long term

Documentary follows First Nations’ 70-year fight to restore water to the Nechako River

Hayley Munro

Image courtesy of the National Film Board of Canada, Lantern Films, and Experimental Forest Films. For the First Nations communities who coexist with the Nechako River, there’s a deep understanding that they will persist. Nechako: It Will Be a Big River Again, a documentary directed by Lyana Patrick and co-produced by the National Film Board […] More »
September-October 2017

How to provide a safe haven for those struggling with mental health challenges

Inside Percy Sacobie's Take a Break Lodge

Maverick Canterville@mavjaycee

“You have to stay here with me ’cause I don’t want you to be responsible for me,” insists a visitor to Percy Sacobie’s cabin in the woods behind his mother’s house. “You’re responsible for what you do to yourself,” Sacobie replies. He stops by the cabin every morning and every evening, but beyond that, its […] More »
July-August 2017

Why are First Nations men overrepresented in the Yukon’s penal system?

No formal Gladue report system currently exists in the territory, which could help reduce recidivism among Indigenous offenders

Rhiannon Russell@rhrussell

This year, Canada celebrates its 150th birthday. Ours is a country of rich history—but not all Canadian stories are told equally. In this special report, This tackles 13 issues—one per province and territory—that have yet to be addressed and resolved by our country in a century and a half In 2015, the auditor general of […] More »
November-December 2016

REVIEW: New picture book revives old First Nations poetry

Sandra Butt revisits E. Pauline Johnson's The Two Sisters

Jessica Rose@NotMyTypewriter

The Two Sisters Written by E. Pauline Johnson, illustrated by Sandra Butt Waterlea Books, $19.95 Poet and performer E. Pauline Johnson (Tekahionwake) died more than a century ago. But B.C.-based illustrator Sandra Butt revived one of Johnson’s iconic poems—“The Two Sisters”—in her picture book of the same name. This retelling of a First Nations’ legend […] More »
September-October 2016

Meet the woman helping the homeless rebuild their lives in Canada

Lia Grimanis's Up With Women focuses on the effects of poverty on homeless and at-risk women

Talia Wooldridge@TaliaWooldridge

Alexandra Shimo, left, and Lia Grimanis. Photo courtesy of Lia Grimanis Uncommon rain and no wind in April 2014 in the mountains of Pokhara, Nepal, nearly halted Lia Grimanis’ elaborate wedding proposal to award-winning author, Alexandra Shimo. After planning the para-hawking proposal (a combination of paragliding and falconry) for three-and-a-half years, Grimanis couldn’t back out […] More »
November-December 2011

How Grassy Narrows’ lawsuit could change aboriginal-government relations across Canada

Carmelle Wolfson@TeamCarmelle

On a cold December day nine years ago, a group of young people from the Grassy Narrows First Nation lay down in front of a line of logging trucks on a snow-covered road. Chrissy Swain, now 32, recalls that day at Slant Lake, about an hour north of Kenora, Ontario, which set off what has […] More »
March-April 2011

Photo Essay: Fort Chipewyan lives in the shadow of Alberta’s oil sands

Ian WillmsWebsite

The residents of Fort Chipewyan, Alberta, live downstream from the most destructive industrial project on earth. A portrait of a community in peril Canada’s oil sands are the largest and most environmentally destructive industrial project in the world. So far, oil sands development has eliminated 602 square kilometers of Boreal forest and emits 29.5 million […] More »
September-October 2011

Repeal the Indian Act and abolish the department of Indian Affairs

Daniel Wilson

The path forward, if the futures of First Nations and the rest of Canada are to reconcile, begins with two steps. Repeal the Indian Act, and abolish the department that delivers it. Bluntly put, the legislation that governs how status Indians are treated—and defines who holds that status—was racist and wrong in its conception 135 […] More »