The land wants me around : power, authority and their negations in traditional hunting knowledge at Wemindji (James Bay, Québec)

• Main Author: Nasr, Wren.
• Format: Thesis
• Language: English
• Published: McGill University 2007
• Subjects: Cree Indians > Québec (Province) > Wemindji; Cree Indians > Hunting; Cree Indians > Québec (Province) > Government relations; Wemindji; Cree indians; James Bay
• Online Access: http://digitool.Library.McGill.CA:80/R/?func=dbin-jump-full&object_id=112508

This study investigates the importance of traditional hunting knowledge to Cree identity and experience. My fieldwork was conducted in Wemindji, James Bay, Quebec, with Cree trappers and on the interactions of scientific researchers and Cree trappers. I explore the connections between these interactions and wider relationships of the Crees with histories of extractive development and the State. The misrecognition or negation of Cree authority in development discourse and outcomes has contributed to subsistence practices and traditional hunting knowledge becoming politically and emotionally charged signifiers. I argue that subsistence practices and traditional hunting knowledge have come to encode cultural difference and the assertion of authority in relation to struggles for recognition of Cree authority over their traditional territories.