Wîhtamawik/Tell Them: On a Life of Inspirationby Louise Bernice Halfe – Sky DancerPublished by University of Regina PressReview by Shelley A. Leedahl$27.95 ISBN 9781779400840 Award-winning Saskatchewan writer Louise Bernice Halfe – Sky Dancer is renowned for her candid, Cree-infused poetry and presentations. Her latest book, Wîhtamawik/Tell Them: On a Life of Inspiration, braids memoir, poetry and essays to reveal where the author’s found inspiration and, I would say, contentment, after a tumultuous early start. In the eloquent introduction by the author’s daughter, Omeasoo Wahpasiw, the latter writes: “My mom dances with both her bones and the bones of our people, and when they poke and punch her with their insistent rattling, she does us all a favour, as painful as it is, and leaves them naked in the wind.” Until age seven, Halfe lived with her family in a log cabin on the Saddle Lake Reserve and practiced traditional Cree ways of life. She doesn’t pretend that it was perfect. Her father drank and was emotionally volatile (“His heart was a cave of stalactites.”). Her parents “stooked hay, picked rocks/in white farmers’ fields”. Halfe “learned to hunt, skin, and butcher game through non-verbal methods. [She] also watched [her] grandparents work…

Blue thinks itself within meby Kim TrainorPublished by University of Regina PressReview by Shelley A. Leedahl$27.95 ISBN 9781779401205 I knew I was in for a different kind of book when I read the author’s dedication, which begins: “For the flying beings, the ones with sharp teeth,/the ones who swim, the fire stones, the trees, the rain.” By the end of prize-winning Vancouver writer Kim Trainor’s text, Blue thinks itself within me, I can affirm that her dedication tracks. Trainor sees, hears, experiences and questions with the intensity of a scientist and the detail of an artist as she draws readers both into the forest at the two-year Fairy Creek blockade near Vancouver Island’s Port Renfrew—where she joined other protestors to protect old growth logging—and through her elegiac and philosophical quandary re: how best to approach writing a long lyric poem about the oldgrowth specklebelly lichen (a rare and threatened species found on yellow cedar in ancient forests) in a kind of respectful co-making with this oldgrowth resident. Trainor describes artist Natasha Lavdovsky’s discovery of “over sixty trees draped in glittering specklebelly,” and explains that “The finding of such a large community of oldgrowth specklebelly was evidence of the age of…

Nēhiyawēwin: paskwāwi-pīkiskwēwin/Cree: Language of the Plainsby Jean L. OkimasisPublished by University of Regina PressReviewed by Madonna Hamel$24.95 ISBN 9780889778856 This new edition of Okimasis’ lab workbook is an indispensable companion to the recorded language labs available through the University of Regina Open Textbook program (https://www.uregina.ca/oer-publishing/). As an eager learner of the Cree language I appreciate how this workbook works as a clear visual map to bridge the rich aural world of the historic language of the plains, reinforcing the fact that Cree is indeed alive and integral to both people and place. You begin to speak Cree and Cree begins to speak you, a great teacher once said, and it is true. Using this workbook, I see how my inherited languages of English and French are constructed in a less storied and inter-connective manner than the nehiyawewin way. It gives me a door into the opportunity to be spoken “by” Cree. So much of a student’s ability to enter new territory lies in the efficacy and abilities of the teacher. Jean Okimasis is without a doubt the woman for the job of sharing this whole other world of Cree with the rest of us. Her books and CDs are used…

The Ecological Buffalo: On the Trail of a Keystone Speciesby Wes Olson and Johane Janelle
Published by University of Regina Press
Review by Madonna Hamel$39.95 ISBN 9780889778719 As a child Wes Olson knew he would dedicate his life to learning everything he could about the buffalo and as an adult there is no bison-related question you can throw at him to stump him. I’ve tried. He carries his childhood glee for his subject into every project he approaches, and never is that more evident than in The Ecological Buffalo: On The Trail of a Keystone Species. As he writes in the introduction: “For more than thirty years, Johane and I have been captivated by all things buffalo.” The Ecological Buffalo is a look at the animals and species with whom the bison share their space and time. The term “keystone” refers to the integral role bison play in keeping others species alive. Take for example, bison poop. Once bison digest grass they deposit buffalo chips that contain insects and those insects feed a variety of birds like woodpeckers who in turn create cavities in trees for creatures like squirrels who create dung for beetles and so on. This book not only celebrates…

Something for the Darkby Randy LundyPublished by University of Regina PressReview by Shelley A. Leedahl$19.95 ISBN 9781779400888 I’ve reviewed four of Randy Lundy’s transcendent poetry collections, and each time I’ve come away thinking surely this is as good as he gets. Then a new title’s released … and the ceiling rises again. Something for the Dark, Lundy’s latest, follows Field Notes for the Self (2020) and Blackbird Song (2018) in a trilogy of meditative books that address the whole of it: life and meaning; connections with people and place (he’s often “on the back deck” with cigarettes and coffee, and his poems surreptitiously venerate the prairies he long resided on); seasons; his beloved creatures (particularly dogs and birds); nothingness and silence; and writing poetry (“These lines are getting the/discussion nowhere”). I built a fire in the woodstove, lifted the old dog up onto the couch, and, in silence and solitude, let the words nourish me. Lundy possesses the artist’s gift of seeing, certainly, but he also exhibits the rare ability to render images and experiences into something other, something that borders on the holy—a crow feasting on the rib of a “road-killed deer” holds “a strip of meat/in its beak,…

We are the Stars: Colonizing and Decolonizing the Oceti Sakowin Literary Traditionby Sarah HernandezPublished by University of Regina PressReview by Shelley A. Leedahl$39.95 ISBN 9780889779181 In We are the Stars: Colonizing and Decolonizing the Oceti Sakowin Literary Tradition, American academic Sarah Hernandez (Sicangu Lakota) examines the colonial dismantling of Dakota, Nakota and Lakota intellectual traditions, including “star knowledge through oral storytelling.” She writes that when missionaries arrived in the early nineteenth century, the “linguistic [colonization]” began. Hernandez teaches Native American literature and is the director for the Institute for American Indian Research at the University of New Mexico. She states that “missionary translations of the Dakota language set a dangerous precedent that denigrated Oceti Sakowin star knowledge and supplanted [their] tribal land narratives with new settler-colonial land narratives that ensured that many of our people converted to Christianity and assimilated to the American nation.” Missionaries learned the Dakota language and printed bilingual Dakota-English newspapers which contained “misinterpretation[s] of Dakota origin narratives” and essentially “delegitimize[d] the Oceti Sakowin’s intellectual traditions”—and Christians replaced them with their own. These settler-colonials subsequently “stripped the Dakota nation of 35 million acres of land” and forced them onto a “ten-mile-wide reservation” in Minnesota. Hernandez frequently makes…

Walking Together: The Future of Indigenous Child Welfare on the PrairiesEdited by Jason Albert, Dorothy Badry, Don Fuchs, et al.Published by University of Regina PressReview by Toby A. Welch  $39.95 ISBN 9780889778900 This fascinating book touches on so many topics. Walking Together begins by diving into why it is such a struggle for so many families to access services for their children. We then get right into Bill C-92, the connection between FASD (Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder) and colonization, and the overrepresentation of Indigenous children in care. We learn about the importance of supporting Indigenous child welfare workers as well as how Indigenous people are making changes in the welfare systems for their children.  As I went through the chapters, I loved the constant reinforcement that one of the ways forward for Indigenous children is with culture and a sense of belonging through Indigenous stories and traditions. We need to remember the past while we look toward the future.  I value books that don’t steer away from tough issues. Life blows sometimes and reality can be harsh. So even though it was uncomfortable, I appreciated reading about topics such as the forced sterilization of Indigenous girls and women. As we dove into the…

“Nakón-wico’i’e né uspénic’iciyac/Practising Nakoda: A Thematic Dictionary”by Vincent Collette, Tom Shawl and Wilma KennedyPublished by University of Regina PressReview by Shelley A. Leedahl$27.95 ISBN 9781779400185 Language and cultural identity are intrinsically connected, and for the Nakoda people, who believe that “language is a gift of the Creator,” the Nakoda language is, “through prayers and songs, the means by which important cultural values and spiritual knowledge are transmitted from generations to generations.” This is the first tenet I learned in the tri-authored book, Nakón-wico’i’e né uspénic’iciyac/Practising Nakoda: A Thematic Dictionary, published by University of Regina Press. In Canada, Nakoda (aka Stoney or Assiniboine) is spoken by an estimated 50-150 people … and they’re aging. Understanding the import of language to one’s culture, Vincent Collette—professor of linguistics at the Université du Québec à Chicoutimi—teamed with Montana’s Tom Shawl (former Nakoda culture and language instructor at the Aannii Nakoda College) and activist Wilma Kennedy (d. 2020), who lived on the Carry the Kettle Nakoda First Nation in Saskatchewan and had previously worked with Collette on two other Nakoda books (including a concise dictionary), to create a “thematic” dictionary for Nakoda-learners. The thematic dictionary makes learning Nakoda easier as Nakoda’s a “polysynthetic language where…

Uncut: A Cultural Analysis of the Foreskinby Johnathan A. AllanPublished by University of Regina PressReview by Shelley A. Leedahl$32.95 ISBN 97817794003307 Uncut: A Cultural Analysis of the Foreskin is a well-researched interdisciplinary book by Manitoba professor Jonathan A. Allan, and though it’s structured like most academic books I’ve read—with an introduction, an appendix, an impressive bibliography and index, and conclusions at the end of each chapter—the subject matter is completely unique, and perhaps not one my aunt will be discussing in her book club. Uncut gets up close and personal with foreskins. It includes the age-old debates concerning circumcision; aesthetics; the penis in art; the topic of cut/uncut sexuality; foreskin restoration; and it speaks of “the ongoing fear of the foreskin, since the foreskin is so absent from American culture.” Allan’s no stranger to sensitive topics. The Canada Research Chair in Men and Masculinities at Brandon University previously authored Reading from Behind: A Cultural Analysis of the Anus. I was curious to learn why he writes about “really rather odd topics”—like the pros and cons of foreskins—and found my answer in his introduction: “While it may be tempting to dismiss the foreskin as an irrelevant object ofstudy, I argue the…

“#BlackInSchool”by Habiba Cooper DialloPublished by University of Regina PressReview by Shelley A. Leedahl$20.95 ISBN 9780889778184 Young Halifax writer Habiba Cooper Diallo has much to say about being a Black student at a Halifax high school that prides itself on being the “most diverse school east of Montreal”. #BlackInSchool is her non-fiction account of the International Baccalaureate student’s frequent experience with racism, and it clearly airs her frustrations with the “complete absence of cultural competency on the part of staff/administrators and many students,” and with the school’s curriculum itself. The writer decries the “graphic whitewashing of school through posters;” says “Africa, the hashtag, [is] inserted like a punctuation mark wherever empathy is needed;” and disparages “the Eurocentric approach to learning”. She writes letters to politicians and administrators, and creates a petition re: equity for Black students at Dalhousie University. Interestingly, this unsettling story’s told via journal entries Cooper Diallo wrote in Grades 11 and 12 (2011-2014). The author’s articulate and mature, but some of her activities (ie: “chatting for hours in the mall’s food court” with friends) are also youthful, and she adopts the Twitter-world’s # (hashtag) in her title—a symbol rarely used in formal writing—and throughout the book to reiterate…