Impossible escape from capture: a journey toward an indigenous political entity
Date
2003
Authors
Leslie, Bruce Lloyd Heimbecker
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Abstract
This thesis examines the circumstances and options of indigenous individuals dispossessed of their connection to the cultural and political institutions of indigenous communities. Addressed specifically is the question of alternatives to political assimilation into the dominant society. A secondary research question addresses the process by which an indigenous political identity could be realized to counter political dispossession and assimilation. This study provides a critical examination of four theories of indigenous identity formation: emergent behaviours/properties, life stages, self definition/Recognition of Being, and self-conscious traditionalism. The analysis adopts an aspectival perspective and employs an aboriginal canoe methodology. This thesis argues for a move away from definitional and essentialist approaches to indigenous identity and toward deliberate political identity formation along the trajectories of agency, alliance, and identity. A theoretical model is proposed that links an individual pedagogical approach to practical political alliances with indigenous political and cultural communities for self-determination, survival, and resistance.