Afterword: Beyond Gestural Politics

In recent years, a growing number of academic institutions have been more proactive about “decolonizing” and “indigenizing” the academy in the interest of being more inclusive of Indigenous knowledges and topics. Such shifts in stated institutional priorities or raised consciousness among settler sc...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Eighteenth-Century Fiction
Main Author: Richardson, Robbie
Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
Language:English
Published: University of Toronto Press Inc. (UTPress) 2020
Subjects:
Online Access:http://dx.doi.org/10.3138/ecf.33.2.227
https://utpjournals.press/doi/pdf/10.3138/ecf.33.2.227
Description
Summary:In recent years, a growing number of academic institutions have been more proactive about “decolonizing” and “indigenizing” the academy in the interest of being more inclusive of Indigenous knowledges and topics. Such shifts in stated institutional priorities or raised consciousness among settler scholars have not corresponded, however, to significant changes in the material conditions in which First Nations people live; in fact, we are in some cases witnessing an intensification of state and settler violence against First Nations’ efforts to uphold treaty rights, many first negotiated in the eighteenth century, and to protect sovereign lands. More radical change than superficial acknowledgments and openness to new epistemologies is needed if academia is to contribute meaningfully to Indigenous survivance.