Literary fiction with fantastical elements. The author is from Argentina and the book was translated from Spanish. A girl in a poor neighbourhood of Buenos Aires responds to her mother’s death by compulsively eating dirt. As she gets older, it becomes clear that when she eats earth associated with someone who has been murdered or …
Month: January 2021
Scholarly. Anthropology, Indigenous studies. The book emerges from ethnographic research conducted among Mohawk people from Kahnawà:ke, and the author herself is Mohawk and from Kahnawà:ke. Unlike a lot of anthropological research, the book takes up questions of key concern to the community itself – things like membership, belonging, and borders – in the context of …
Thanks to Shana and Ra’anaa of Black Lives Matter – Sudbury for the interview just now about the struggle for Black lives and racial justice in northern Ontario. Listen for it on Talking RadicalRadio in February!
YA fantasy. Towards the “high fantasy” end of the genre. Set in Orisha, a nation based loosely on Nigeria. It is a kingdom in which magic had suddenly ceased to work and all adults who had been able to use it were killed by the king’s soldiers about a decade before the start of the …
Nick Driedger lives in northern Alberta and has been involved in organizing workers for almost 20 years. He has been part of a number of different unions, including the Candian Union of Postal Workers and the Industrial Workers of the World, and he currently works for the Alberta Union of Provincial Employees. He is also …
Theory. Thinks about research from an Indigenous, and specifically Maori, perspective. A classic. I first read the book about 15 years ago and wrote an extensive review at that time. I re-read it now for work purposes, and I’ll keep this brief. The work is divided into two broad parts, one providing an overview of …
Thanks to Samir Shaheen-Hussain — physician, long-time activist, and author of *Fighting for a Hand to Hold: Confronting Medical Colonialism against Indigenous Children in Canada* — for the interview just now about the book, about medical colonialism, and about the struggle against it. Listen for it on Talking Radical Radio in February!
Literary fiction. Short stories. I don’t generally orient my reading via prizes, but the fact that this collection won the latest Giller Prize is probably why it was prominent enough in my awareness that, after my partner borrowed it from a colleague, I spontaneously picked it up and read it as well. Stories of everyday …
Claire Bodkin and Sara Alavian are both physicians in Hamilton, Ontario. They are also part of an ad hoc group of health workers from different parts of Canada with an interest in prison abolitionist politics. Scott Neigh interviews them about what it means to think about prison abolition in the context of health care, and …
Thank-you to Sarah of Nuance and pihêsiw of The Native Youth Sexual Health Network for the interview just now about sexual and reproductive health and rights centering Black and Indigenous youth, and SRH Week 2021! Listen for it on Talking Radical Radio in the coming weeks.