A Slight Detour or How to Deal with Reader’s Block
June 30, 2009
In preparation for my specialization exams, which are in less than a month (!), I have been reading at a ridiculous rate. Since the semester ended in May, I drew up a schedule for myself in order to make sure I made it through the list, while at the same time taking enough notes to make sure I didn’t simply forget everything – in one eye and out the other. The list is about 90 books long; granted I had already completed or started a good number of them. Until recently, I have managed to stay relatively on top of the list, but hit a wall last week – reader’s block. I allowed myself to take a few days off, thinking maybe my brain just needed a rest, maybe it was full. But when I tried to get back to it, I would be able to read for a bit, but not with the same attention or speed. So, as a strategy to get back to the reading, I told myself that any kind of reading counted, and it didn’t have to be a lot. I started with the Acknowledgment sections, a section I had generally skipped or skimmed over. And the strategy worked. I would read the Acknowledgments and somehow it would get me motivated to read the book. Here’s an example that I loved from a book called Seeing Like A State: How Certain Schemes to Improve the Human Condition Have Failed :
After thanking several people and institutions who aided in the development of the book, James C. Scott ends the “Acknowledgments” section with this paragraph:
“I’d like to kick the habit of writing books, at least for a while. If there were a detox unit or an analog to the nicotine patch for serial offenders, I think I would sign up for treatment. My habit has already cost me more precious time than I care to admit. The problem with book writing and other addictions is that the resolve to quit is greatest during withdrawal, but as the painful symptoms recede, the craving is apt to return. Louise and our children, Mia, Aaron, and Noah, would, I know, be only too happy to have me committed until I was “clean.” I’m trying. God knows I’m trying” (xiv).
I mean, doesn’t that make you want to read the book? It worked for me.
(The image above is by artist, Filippo Minelli. I stumbled upon his work perusing a friend’s blog (www.thoughtpatterns.ca) – another fun pastime when suffering from reader’s block.)
Recently Read: Magic Weapons
June 21, 2009
In Magic Weapons: Aboriginal Writers Remaking Community After Residential School, Sam McKegney makes an important contribution to discourses that explore the role of literature in representing marginalized and/or contested histories. His focus on the work of authors including Basil H. Johnston (who also contributes an excellent foreword), Rita Joe, Louise Halfe, and Anthony Thrasher among others, brings much-needed attention to the ways in which the lens of trauma and psychoanalytic explorations of residential school experiences only tell part of the story. McKegney rightly highlights that calls for more awareness of these experiences should be accompanied by new visions for the future. He cautions against an orientation that privileges the past as the sole site of community-making and defining.
He elaborates:
“Perceived over the past two decades as the principal vehicle for engaging the residential school issue, historicization (alone) dangerously orients our thinking away from the present and the future, binding us in a reactive manner to the power of the past. And, with compensatory and restructuring funds finally being freed from government coffers by virtue of the Reconciliation and Compensation Agreement (November 2005), imaginative visions for plausible futures of First Nations are essential. This is where the understudied resource of Native literature becomes so valuable” (6)
In exploring the history of the schools and the way in which individuals and communities have dealt with their legacy, McKegney asks, “What does literature do that history doesn’t?” (32) His book is an engaging, well-reasoned response to this question.
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McKegney, Sam. Magic Weapons: Aboriginal Writers Remaking Community after Residential School. Winnipeg: University of Manitoba Press, 2007.
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Also, a friend of mine recently informed me that today is National Aboriginal Day in Canada. For more information on the day, click here.
Update: The New Commission
June 10, 2009
As mentioned in a previous post, rumors have been circulating about the new Indian Residential School Truth and Reconciliation Commission. Just after the one-year anniversary of its establishment, and on the eve of the anniversary of the official apology by Prime Minister Harper, the TRC confirmed that the new commission will be comprised of Justice Murray Sinclair of Manitoba, Marie Wilson, a former journalist and CBC North regional director from Yellowknife, and Wilton Littlechild, Alberta regional chief of the Assembly of First Nations. The mandate has been extended by one-year in order to make up for the time lost due to the resignations of the former commission. To read more visit: cbc.ca or the TRC website.
Given the setbacks of the first year, it may be helpful to re-visit some of the complicated issues that face the commission. Ovide Mercredi’s lecture on TVO’s Big Ideas last year could provide a good start, as could the article entitled “A Just Society? Canada’s Adventure in Truth and Reconciliation” published in Dissent by Feisal G. Mohamed. Both Mercredi and Mohamed raise questions and concerns about what kind of justice is pursued through these national commissions. In the Canadian case, these issues include how testimonies will be collected, how the commission envisions the concepts of “truth” and “reconciliation,” and the ways in which the commission may obscure other issues facing Aboriginal communities. It will be interesting to watch the coming weeks and months as the commission regroups and begins this process with renewed focus.
In the Nation’s Capital: Residential School Exhibit
June 7, 2009
I was recently in Ottawa for the annual Canadian Communication Association’s (CCA) Conference where I presented a short paper entitled: Before Truth: Contextualizing History, Memory and Nation in the Age of Truth and Reconciliation. In the paper, I briefly explored the international context of Truth and Reconciliation Commissions (TRCs) and drew comparisons between the fledgling Canadian Commission and the completed South African TRC. Given the challenges the Canadian Commission has faced in its first year, one of my main arguments in the paper was to highlight the need for multiple, local approaches to reconciliation.
While in Ottawa, I had the pleasure of visiting the National Archives where they are currently showing an exhibit entitled “‘We were so far away…’ The Inuit Experience of Residential Schools.” The small exhibit focuses on the recollections of eight Inuit students who attended various residential schools. Organized by the Legacy of Hope Foundation, the exhibit includes photographs, video, sound, and large-scale posters in English, French and Inuktitut.
The exhibit displays old photos provided by the students through a slide projector. Connected to a motion sensor, the slides automatically start to change as one steps towards the exhibit. The soft clicking of the changing slides creates a rhythmic melody for the images. Largely in black and white, the photographs projected onto the white walls of the exhibition space are beautiful in their ability to capture the everyday experiences at the schools. The images of students at their desks, in uniform, in some cases smiling into the camera both conceal and reveal the difficult experiences of the students, which are elaborated in the surrounding posters. The exhibit is on at the National Archives in Ottawa until September 7th, 2009.
An anniversary and a fresh start?
June 3, 2009
UPDATE: JUNE 10th, 2009 – The IRS TRC has confirmed the appointment of the new comission. To read their official statement, see my recent post or visit the TRC website.
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We have just passed the one year anniversary of the establishment of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in Canada. Although the TRC has not put out an official statement, the Globe and Mail is reporting that decisions have been made regarding the new commission. (All three original commissioners had stepped down by January 2009, and the search for the new commission has been ongoing since that time.) Mr. Justice Murray Sinclair, a respected aboriginal judge from Manitoba’s Court of Queen’s Bench, will serve as the chair. The other two commissioners will be Wilton Littlechild, the Alberta regional chief for the Assembly of First Nations and Marie Wilson, a former regional director of CBC North.
The disputes that led to Justice Harry LaForme’s resignation last fall, particularly regarding the structure of power within the commission, have reportedly been resolved. To read more see the full article at the Globe and Mail. Hopefully, the TRC will soon confirm these appointments, and this new beginning will signal a significant step towards commencement of the five year mandate.
To read the statement from the outgoing commissioners, Jane Morely and Claudette Dumont-Smith, visit the TRC website.
