The supposed extinction of the Indigenous Beothuk people of Newfoundland in the early nineteenth century is a foundational moment in Canadian history. Increasingly under scrutiny, non-Indigenous perceptions of the Beothuk have had especially dire and far-reaching ramifications for contemporary Indigenous people in Newfoundland and Labrador.
Tracing Ochre reassesses popular beliefs about the Beothuk. Placing the group in global context, Fiona Polack and a diverse collection of contributors juxtapose the history of the Beothuk with the experiences of other Indigenous peoples outside of Canada, including those living in former British colonies as diverse as Tasmania, South Africa, and the islands of the Caribbean. Featuring contributions of Indigenous and non-Indigenous thinkers from a wide range of scholarly and community backgrounds, Tracing Ochre aims to definitively shift established perceptions of a people who were among the first to confront European colonialism in North America.
Author(s): Fiona Polack
Publisher: University of Toronto Press
Year: 2018
Language: English
Pages: 400
City: Toronto
Tags: Beothuk Indians -- Newfoundland and Labrador -- History
List of Illustrations
Preface
Maps
Introduction: De-islanding the Beothuk
FIONA POLACK
Part One: Land, Language, and Memory
1 Good and Bad Indians: Romanticizing the Beothuk and Denigrating the Mi’kmaq
MAURA HANRAHAN
2 When the Beothuk (Won’t) Speak: Michael Crummey’s River Thieves and Bernice Morgan’s Cloud of Bone
CYNTHIA SUGARS
3 “The Ones That Were Abused”: Thinking about the Beothuk through Translation
ELIZABETH PENASHUE AND ELIZABETH YEOMAN
4 A Clearing with a View to the Lake, the Bones of a Caribou, and the Sound of Snow Falling on Dead Leaves: Sensing the Presence of the Past in the Wilds of Newfoundland
JOHN HARRIES
Part Two: Mercenaries, Myths, and DNA
5 Beothuk and Mi’kmaq: An Interview with Chief Mi’sel Joe
CHRISTOPHER AYLWARD AND CHIEF MI’SEL JOE
6 The Beothuk and the Myth of Prior Invasions
PATRICK BRANTLINGER
7 Bioarchaeology, Bioethics, and the Beothuk
DARYL PULLMAN
Part Three: Ways of Knowing
8 Towards a Beothuk Archaeology: Understanding Indigenous Agency in the Material Record
LISA RANKIN
9 Historical Sources and the Beothuk: Questioning Settler Interpretations
LIANNE C. LEDDY
10 Historical Narrative Perspective in Howley and Speck
CHRISTOPHER AYLWARD
Part Four: Travelling Tales
11 Santu Toney, a Transnational Beothuk Woman
BEVERLEY DIAMOND
12 Routes of Colonial Racism: Travelling Narratives of European Progress and Indigenous Extinction in Pre-Confederation Newfoundland
JOCELYN THORPE
13 Unrecognized Peoples and Concepts of Extinction
BONITA LAWRENCE
14 Shanawdithit and Truganini: Converging and Diverging Histories
FIONA POLACK
Coda: The Recovery of Indigenous Identity
J. EDWARD CHAMBERLIN
Contributors
Index
