Big Ideas in Art and Culture Lecture Series: Susan M. Hill and Rick Monture
Sunday, November 27, 2:30PM
University of Waterloo - East Campus Hall Room 1219
ASL Interpretation provided
Can't make the talk in person? Register for the live stream on zoom HERE
Haudenosaunee scholars, Susan M. Hill and Rick Monture will discuss their research in relation to their seminal texts, The Clay We Are Made Of and We Share Our Matters. In The Clay We Are Made Of, Hill incorporates Indigenous theory, fourth world post-colonialism, and Amerindian auto history, along with Haudenosaunee languages, oral records, and wampum strings to provide a comprehensive account of the Haudenosaunee relationship to their land. Through We Share Our Matters, Monture offers a comprehensive portrait of how the Grand River Haudenosaunee have expressed their long struggle for sovereignty in Canada. Individual lectures by Monture and Hill will be followed by a panel discussion moderated by Courtney Skye.
This Big Ideas in Art and Culture Lecture is presented in partnership between Protect the Tract, Longhouse Labs, Contemporary Art Forum Kitchener + Area, Kitchener Waterloo Art Gallery, University of Waterloo Art Gallery and Musagetes.
Susan Hill is a Grand River Haudenosaunee citizen (Mohawk Nation, Wolf Clan); she and her family reside at Six Nations. Her academic training includes a PhD in Native Studies from Trent University, MA in American Studies from SUNY-Buffalo, BA in history from the University of Michigan and language immersion programs through Onkwawenna Kentyohkwa (Kanyen’keha/Mohawk) and Grand River Employment & Training (Gayagohono/Cayuga).
Her research interests include Haudenosaunee history, Indigenous research methodologies and ethics, and Indigenous territoriality, with themes that benefit Indigenous communities while expanding academic understandings of Indigenous thought and philosophy. She is particularly interested in Haudenosaunee knowledge and thought, seeking to make sense of contemporary lives through an examination of how people got to where they are now, both literally and figuratively. Her 2017 book, The Clay We Are Made Of: Haudenosaunee land tenure on the Grand River, published by the University of Manitoba Press, takes up these themes.
Rick Monture is a member of the Mohawk nation, Turtle Clan, from Six Nations of the Grand River Territory. He is also an Associate Professor in the Department of English & Cultural Studies and Indigenous Studies at McMaster University where he teaches classes on Haudenosaunee history and oral traditions, Indigenous literature, and Bob Dylan. He is also a Community Scholar with Six Nations Polytechnic and a former member of the Steering Committee that established the Deyohahage / Indigenous Knowledge Centre, based at Six Nations. Rick is an active community volunteer and is a board member with the Grand River Post Secondary Education Office, as well as a founding member of the Old Council House Restoration Committee that is now undertaking to restore and preserve the Six Nations Council House that was built by the Grand River Confederacy Chiefs in 1863. He currently holds a Social Science and Humanities Research Council of Canada award for a project that undertakes to examine the events that led to the overthrow of the traditional government, by Ottawa, to implement an elected council system in 1924. His book We Share our Matters: Two Centuries of Writing and Resistance at Six Nations of the Grand River, was published by the University of Manitoba Press in 2014 and is an examination of the Grand River Haudenosaunee’s assertions of sovereignty and social justice through letters, political activism, literature and film. Rick lives at Six Nations with his family.
Courtney Skye is Mohawk, Turtle Clan, from Six Nations of the Grand River Territory. She is a writer, Policy Analyst and Research Fellow at the Yellowhead Institute, Faculty of Arts, Ryerson University. Courtney has led policy development for the public sector at local, provincial, and national levels. They include a framework for youth development, a strategy co-developed with Indigenous partners to transform the governance, design, and delivery of child and family services, and a strategy to end violence against Indigenous women. Courtney strives to end all forms of colonial violence experienced by Indigenous peoples. Courtney is a co-director of Protect the Tract, an entity of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy Chiefs Council.
Longhouse Labs would like to acknowledge this Big Ideas in Art and Culture Lecture is supported by Waterloo Region Community Foundation - Community Fund - The Musagetes Fund.
