Library Spotlight: Posts

Jason's Book Pick: National Indigenous History Month

For National Indigenous History Month, Humber Libraries is collaborating with Indigenous Education & Engagement to highlight new and diverse Indigenous voices, histories and experiences across Turtle Island. Each Friday in June, a member of the IE&E community will recommend a book that has influenced, moved or inspired them. In turn, the library will share a recommended reading list that complements their selection of the week. 

Jason's Pick: Call Me Indian: From the Trauma of Residential School to Becoming the NHL's First Treaty Indigenous Player by Fred Sasakamoose

"I have not read this book but so desperately want to read it. I met Freddy Saskakamoose and he was always someone I looked up to and admired. He is from my home province, and I knew about his story but wanted to hear it from himself and now I have the opportunity."

Jason is of Cree and Dene ancestry and is originally from Treaty 6 territory and Homelands of the Metis. His original communities, those of his mother, father and grandparents, are Ile a la Crosse and Buffalo Narrows where they are located in Treaty 10 area. Jason is the Dean of Indigenous Education and Engagement at Humber.

If you liked this week's pick, why not check out these new related titles available at Humber Libraries? 

     Indian Horse: a novel by Richard Wagamese

Saul Indian Horse is in trouble, and there seems to be only one way out. As he journeys his way back through his life as a northern Ojibway, from the horrors of residential school to his triumphs on the hockey rink, he must question everything he knows. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

     Journeyman: the story of NHL right winger Jamie Leach by Ana Rosner

Journeyman is a first-person biography of Ojibwe right winger Jamie Leach, son of the legendary NHL superstar Reggie Leach. Follow the fascinating hockey trajectory from his childhood years watching his father play for the Philadelphia Flyers, to Jamie's first goal in the NHL... Written in close consultation with Jamie and his mother, readers will learn about the struggles Jamie conquered, including his father's alcoholism and his own crippling self-doubt. A story of determination, heartbreak and perseverance.

     

 

 

 

 

     The Creator's Game: Lacrosse, identity, and indigenous nationhood by Alan Downey

A gift from the Creator – that is where it all began. The game of lacrosse has been a central element of many Indigenous cultures for centuries, but once non-Indigenous players entered the sport, it became a site of appropriation – then reclamation – of Indigenous identities. Focusing on the history of lacrosse in Indigenous communities from the 1860s to the 1990s, The Creator’s Game explores Indigenous-non-Indigenous relations and Indigenous identity formation. While the game was being stripped of its cultural and ceremonial significance and being appropriated to construct a new identity for the nation-state of Canada, it was also being used by Indigenous peoples for multiple ends: to resist residential school experiences; initiate pan-Indigenous 

political mobilization; and articulate Indigenous sovereignty and nationhood on the world stage. 

 

 

     Reclaiming Tom Longboat: indigenous self-determination in Canadian Sport by Janice Forsyth

Reclaiming Tom Longboat recounts the history of Indigenous sport in Canada through the lens of the prestigious Tom Longboat Awards, shedding light on a significant yet overlooked aspect of Canadian policy and Crown-Indigenous relations. Drawing on a rich and varied set of oral and textual sources, including interviews with award recipients and Jan Eisenhardt, the creator of the Awards himself, Janice Forsyth critically assesses the state's role in policing Indigenous bodies and identities through sport, from the assimilationist sporting regulations of residential schools to the present-day exclusion of Indigenous activities from mainstream sports. 

 

 

 

 

     Indigenous Feminist Gikendaasowin (Knowledge) : Decolonization Through Physical Activity   

by Tricia McGuire-Adams 

This book presents knowledge from Indigenous women who enact decolonization and wellbeing through physical activity. In sport, physical activity, and health disciplines, there is a significant need for Indigenous women's theoretical and methodological perspectives. While much research is published from a Western perspective on Indigenous peoples' health, sport, and physical activity, less is known from Indigenous feminist and community perspectives. The chapters therefore inform the broader sociology of sport and Indigenous feminist fields on Indigenous cultural perspectives of physical activity.