On this week’s collected, connected conversations, our three-part pile of political pontifications concludes its campaign—as does our Summer 2024 Series as a whole—with a comparison of activism versus access: in the pursuit of mainstream political influence, is it better to be in the room or out on the streets? Featured voices this podcast include (in order of appearance): • Brock Pitawanakwat, associate professor of Indigenous Studies at York University • Ken Williams, playwright and associate professor with the University of Alberta department of drama • Michael Redhead Champagne, a Winnipeg ..read more

On this week’s collected, connected conversations (the seventh in our eight-part summer series): the push and pull of performative politics, where we address the question of just how far Indigenous individuals can advance Indigenous interests in a settler-centric system. Featured voices this podcast include (in order of appearance): • Brock Pitawanakwat, associate professor of Indigenous Studies at York University • Ken Williams, playwright and associate professor with the University of Alberta’s Department of Drama • Nick Martin, senior editor with National Geographic • Ca ..read more

On this week’s collected, connected conversations (the fifth in our summer series): the conclusion to our five-part retrospective, Why Canada Needs Natives Needy, wherein we feature a few more settler-centric solutions to settler-made problems, as well as examples of what truly independent Indigenous initiatives look like. Featured voices this podcast include (in order of appearance): • Naiomi Metallic, associate professor of law at Dalhousie University, and Yellowhead Institute advisory board member • Tim Thompson, First Nations education advocate, and Yellowhead Research Fellow and advisory ..read more

On this week’s collected, connected conversations (the third in our summer series): our third installment of Why Canada Needs Natives Needy, in which we debunk diagnoses of Indigenous impoverishment peddled by settlers, often to their own benefit. And while some come off as almost comical, others appear downright disturbing.  Featured voices this podcast include (in order of appearance): • Q. Anthony Ali, freelance writer, commentator and podcaster • Ken Williams, playwright and associate professor with the University of Alberta department of drama • Dr. Jeffrey Ansloos, clinical psy ..read more

On this week’s collected, connected conversations (the second in our summer series): part two of Why Canada Needs Natives Needy, our comprehensive look at the systematic incapacitation of Indigenous peoples, and how Canada’s overt efforts at social disintegration have fostered generations of individual displacement and disconnection.  Featured voices this podcast include (in order of appearance): • Kim TallBear, professor in the Faculty of Native Studies at the University of Alberta and Canada Research Chair in Indigenous Peoples, Technoscience & Environment • Taté Walker, award ..read more

The MEDIA INDIGENA 2024 Summer Series—our classic compendia of collected, connected conversations drawn from our voluminous eight-year archive—begins with the first in a five-part compilation, 'Why Canada Needs Natives Needy,' a wide-ranging rundown of all the ways this country has produced and perpetuates Indigenous dependency. And here in round one, we review its roots, entanglements which stretch back to the country’s very creation. Featured voices this podcast include (in order of appearance): • Naiomi Metallic, associate professor of law at Dalhousie University, and Yellowhead Institute a ..read more

What is genomics? In what ways might Indigenous genomics differ from its mainstream counterpart? And why is it important they be Indigenous-led? Answers to those questions and more on this special edition of MEDIA INDIGENA, recorded live on location at the Global Indigenous Leadership in Genomics Symposium, hosted this past May at the University of British Columbia. Joining Rick Harp for the first half of this two-part conversation were MI regular (and SING Canada co-founder) Kim TallBear, as well as Warren Cardinal-McTeague, UBC Assistant Professor of Forest and Conservation Sciences and SING ..read more

In this back half of our longer-than-expected mini INDIGENA, host/producer Rick Harp picks up where he left off (drinking deeply of coffee, commodity fetishism and character actor Wallace Shawn) with Kim TallBear (University of Alberta professor in the Faculty of Native Studies and Canada Research Chair in Indigenous Peoples, Technoscience and Society) and Candis Callison (UBC Associate Professor in the Institute for Critical Indigenous Studies and the School for Public Policy and Global Affairs), as they discuss: Two men swapped at birth—one Indigenous, one not—receive apology from province ..read more

For our latest mini INDIGENA (the sweet + sour version of MEDIA INDIGENA), we yank on the global supply chain linking locals in Campbell River, B.C. to the opening of what’s only the second “Indigenous-operated, licensed Starbucks store” in Canada. And just like last time—when our MINI went long on what we meant to be just our opening topic—our content cup once again runneth over, as we eat up an entire episode exploring the ethics of commodity-based commerce as carried out by Indigenous participants at each end of the colossal coffee trade. Joining fairly-caffeinated host/producer Rick H ..read more

This week: building upon last episode's commanding talk by MI's own Kim TallBear, in which she highlighted the insatiable settler drive to consume all things Indigenous—including so-called ‘identity’ claims staked by individuals—host/producer Rick Harp discusses her insights with fellow roundtable regulars Ken Williams (associate professor with the University of Alberta’s department of drama) and Brock Pitawanakwat (associate professor of Indigenous Studies at York University), a conversation peppered with a rundown of just the latest litany of colonial cosplayers making headlines. CREDIT ..read more