MEDIA INDIGENA : Indigenous current affairs

On this week’s Indigenous roundtable: Taking control, taking stock. How a First Nation in Ontario decided the only way they’re going to find images of Indigenous people that don’t rely on stereotypes is to make their own catalogue of stock photography. Joining host/producer Rick Harp to discuss how literally owning your own depictions is key to cultural self-determination are Kim TallBear (University of Alberta associate professor of Native Studies) and Candis Callison (Associate Professor at UBC's Graduate School of Journalism). CREDITS: This episode of the podcast was edited by Anya Zoledziowski; hosted and produced by Rick Harp. Our theme is nesting by birocratic.

THIS WEEK: The Bureaucrats’ Burden. Could there be any job tougher than running Indian Affairs? Sources at Indian Affairs say “No!” According to a recent Global News story, senior officials at Indigenous Services Canada wish Canadians better understood all the great work they do, something they say has been "difficult" to communicate "effectively" thanks to obstacles like... Twitter bots? Joining host/producer Rick Harp this week to discuss this departmentaI dismay (and diagnosis) are Ken Williams, assistant professor with the University of Alberta’s department of drama, and Associate Professor of Indigenous Studies at York University Brock Pitawanakwat. CREDITS: Our theme is 'nesting' by birocratic; SFX: Robot;  Broken Telephone Circuit

This week: Bringing blood home. Over a half-century after their removal, a large cluster of blood samples from Indigenous islanders in Australia have been returned to whence they came. The result of direct negotiations with the affected community, the move has been held up as historic for the country. But if Australia’s on the bleeding edge of repatriation, what about the rest of the world? From skin to saliva, blood to bones, do we even know how much Indigenous material has been banked across the globe? And should we put repatriation under the banner of reconciliation? Joining host/producer Rick Harp to take the pulse of these and other questions are University of Alberta associate professor of Native Studies Kim TallBear, as well as Candis Callison, Associate Professor at UBC's Graduate School of Journalism. // Our theme is 'nesting' by birocratic.

“What was CBC North management thinking?” A question fresh on the mind of CBC audiences and CBC staff this week, shocked and dismayed at the decision to combine three territorial morning newscasts into one. A decision that proved short-lived, however: even before the ink was dry, CBC brass buckled under the backlash and reversed course. In this discussion, host/producer Rick Harp is joined by Ken Williams, assistant professor with the University of Alberta’s department of drama, as well as Candis Callison, Associate Professor at UBC's Graduate School of Journalism as they try to parse out the ‘logic’ behind the move, what it tells us about how well CBC gets the north, as well as what it would take—and who—to make things right going forward. // CREDITS: This episode was edited by Anya Zoledziowski; our theme is nesting by birocratic.

This week, class dismissed—or should we say class denied? A North Carolina advisory board has rejected a proposed Native charter school on the grounds its curriculum would be too radical. Of course, that’s all in the eyes of the beholder, but with funding all in the hands of the state, could this be a textbook case of education discrimination? And nearly a half century after the 1970s rallying cry “Indian Control of Indian Education,” how close is anyone to realizing that vision? Joining host/producer Rick Harp on the roundtable this week are Ken Williams, an assistant professor with the department of drama at the University of Alberta, and U of A associate professor of Native Studies Kim TallBear. // Our theme is 'nesting' by birocratic.

It’s a dilemma that confronts much of Indigenous media: with so much of our time spent working to counter, correct and contextualize mainstream misinformation, do we not risk becoming “This Week in Settler Colonialism”? Does routinely responding to routine violations of our lands and lives see us become all-consumed by what the State does and doesn’t do? How do we resist that pull of a Settler center of gravity, and stop merely critiquing, and start actually creating outside of its orbit? Questions on our minds a lot these days as we begin a conversation on where else we might invest our attention and intentions, to build on our original mission as an Indigenous reality check on the misrepresentations of Settler-oriented media. Joining host/producer Rick Harp this week are Candis Callison, Associate Professor at UBC's Graduate School of Journalism, and Brock Pitawanakwat, Associate Professor of Indigenous Studies at York University. CREDITS: This episode of the podcast was edited by Anya Zoledziowski; hosted and produced by Rick Harp. Our theme is nesting by birocratic.

This week, the back half of our post-Canadian-election post-mortem, featuring the Yellowhead Institute’s Hayden King and Vanessa Watts. In part one of our discussion, we compared the relative prominence of so-called Indigenous issues this election versus the one before. Here in part two, we more concretely explore the likely machinations of a minority Parliament and how Indigenous interests might shake out. We also go deeper into Indigenous electoral participation: be it as voters or vote-getters, is it worth the return on investment?   CREDITS // This episode was edited by Anya Zoledziowski; hosted and produced by Rick Harp. Our theme is 'nesting' by birocratic.

Barely 3 days after the Liberals' return to power -- only this time, as a minority government -- we wonder what that could mean for Indigenous peoples going forward. Did Indigenous issues make a difference this election? Did Indigenous voters? Joining us this week to tackle these questions and more are two members of the Yellowhead Institute, a First Nation-led research centre based in the Faculty of Arts at Ryerson University: Executive Director Hayden King as well as Research Fellow Vanessa Watts.  CREDITS: This episode was edited by Anya Zoledziowski; produced and hosted by Rick Harp. Special thanks to our friends at the Ryerson School of Journalism, whose support made this live event possible. Our theme is 'nesting' by birocratic.

It's been quite the week for the bottom-line of Canadian colonialism. First, a blunt assessment of what the lives of First Nations' kids are worth as the Liberals push to quash compensation for damage done by the child welfare system. Then, as part of an election scrum, a reporter casually suggests that covering the cost of access to safe, clean drinking water on-reserve amounts to writing a "blank cheque." So how is it that resolving a basic necessity and a fundamental inequity can both be framed as, if not implausible, at least impractical for a so-called developed economy? What do we make of a mainstream mindset that bristles at the cost of making either of these situations right? And under such a colonial calculus, is it any wonder who ultimately pays the price? Joining host/producer Rick Harp this week to crunch the numbers are Brock Pitawanakwat, Associate Professor of Indigenous Studies at York University, and Candis Callison, Associate Professor at UBC's Graduate School of Journalism. CREDITS // This episode was edited by Anya Zoledziowski; our theme is 'nesting' by birocratic.

This week, grousing over Greta. Even though millions recently took to the streets as part of world-wide Climate Strikes, the media still seems to reserve most of its spotlight for the teenage Swedish activist Greta Thunberg. And yet, not everyone’s a fan: from Maxime Bernier to Vladimir Putin, she seems to irk white cis male politicians in particular. But the idolatry of Thunberg has also received pushback from parts of Native Twitter, frustrated at how she seemingly gets all the accolades while Indigenous youth and youth of colour toil in relative obscurity. On this week's live-audience edition of MEDIA INDIGENA—recorded in Edmonton as part of LitFest's 'Author Pods' event series—we get into these Greta grumbles as a springboard into a larger discussion about allyship, white saviourism and the pros and cons of personifying and celebrifying a people’s movement. On stage with host/producer Rick Harp were Ken Williams, an assistant professor with the department of drama at the University of Alberta, and U of A associate professor of Native Studies, Kim TallBear. // Our theme is 'nesting' by birocratic.