Narrating Aboriginality On-Line: Digital Storytelling, Identity and Healing

• Published in: The Journal of Community Informatics
• Main Authors: Adelson, Naomi, Olding, Michelle
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: University of Waterloo Library 2012
• Subjects: Access; Community Information; Social Cohesion; Digital Storytelling; First Nations; Youth; Canada
• Online Access: https://openjournals.uwaterloo.ca/index.php/JoCI/article/view/3167; https://doi.org/10.15353/joci.v9i2.3167

Digital story-telling is a counter-narrative of healing for many indigenous youth in Canada today. As much as e-health technologies are valuable and empowering an interventionist presumption limits the potential value of digital communication as a healing resource. With examples from three digital story-telling sites, we explore the internet as both a social space and therapeutic tool where indigenous youth are constructing and negotiating Aboriginality through online story sharing. Those digital stories, like other narrative forms, are part of a larger complex of contemporary forms of healing.