Introduction to Indigenous Literature and Storytelling

Program Overview

This course explores Indigenous storytelling in Canada, examining written and oral forms from First Nations, Métis, and Inuit perspectives. It delves into historical contexts, cultural productions, and issues of colonialism, trauma, and resilience. Students engage with novels, short stories, poems, plays, and other media, analyzing the role of storytelling in shaping Indigenous identity and community.

Program Outline

Outline:

This course will examine a broad range of written and oral forms of storytelling by First Nations, Métis, and Inuit peoples, with a focus on Canadian writers, stories, and history. Beginning with the historical contexts of storying Indigenous lives and moving through to current time, students will engage with a variety of Indigenous cultural productions including novels, short fiction, poems, plays, orature, spoken word, podcasts, films, and critical theory. Issues of racialization and colonialism, trauma and shame, authenticity, relationship to the land, diaspora, and love and sexuality will be examined, always with an eye to the ways in which storytelling has been used as a means to share, support, and produce cultural and community resilience.