Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-t7fkt Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-28T12:40:22.879Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Insights on First Nations Humanities

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 July 2015

James (Sákéj) Youngblood Henderson*
Affiliation:
Native Law Centre of Canada, University of Saskatchewan, 101 Diefenbaker Place, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, S7N 5B8, Canada
Get access

Abstract

The question of what is humanity and how it is expressed has endless and dynamic answers. My paper is an attempt to construct and explain the answer based on the insights Indigenous humanity expressed in the continent called North America. The four fundamental insights are organised around the concept of creation as ecology, the insights of embodied spirits, the implicate order, and transformation. These complementary insights inform the depth of Indigenous worldview. These insights are replicated and revealed in structure and meaning of Indigenous languages, ceremonies and stories. These cognitive insights suggest a starting point for reflecting about whatever is most significant in Indigenous humanities in curriculum.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2005

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Battiste, M. (1986). Míkmaq literacyand cognitive assimilation. In Barman, J., Hébert, Y. & McCaskill, D. (Eds.), Indian education in Canada: The legacy (vol. 1)(pp. 2320). Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press.Google Scholar
Battiste, M. (1997). Nikanikinútmaqn In Henderson, J.Y. (Ed.), The Míkmaw concordat (pp. 1320). Halifax, NS: Fernwood PublishingGoogle Scholar
Cardinal, H., & Hildebrand, W. (2000). Treaty elders of Saskatchewan: Our dreamis that our peoples will one day be clearly recognized as nations. Calgary, AB: University of Calgary Press.Google Scholar
Ermine, W.J. (1995). Aboriginal epistemology In Battiste, M. & Barman, J. (Eds.), First Nations education in Canada: The circle unfolds (pp. 101112). Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press.Google Scholar
Fanon, F. (1965). A dying colonialism (Chevaliar, F.,Trans.). New York: Grove Press.Google Scholar
Findlay, L.M. (2000). Always Indigenize!: The radical humanities in the postcolonial Canadian university. Ariel, 31, 307326.Google Scholar
Findlay, I. (2003). Working for postcolonial legal studies: Working with the Indigenous humanities. Law, Social Justice and Global Development Journal (LCD), 1. Retrieved 8 February, 2006, from http://elj.warwick.ac.uk/global/issue/03-1/findlay.html.Google Scholar
Henderson, J.Y. (2004). Constitutional right of an enriched livelihood. journal of Aboriginal Education,4(1), 43.Google Scholar
Western Canadian Protocol forCollaboration in Basic Education. (2000). The common curriculum framework for Aboriginal language and culture programs kindergarten to grade 12. Retrieved 8 February, 2006, from http://www.edu.gov.mb.ca/abJanguages/.Google Scholar