Introduction: The Resurgence of Indigenous Women’s Knowledge and Resistance in Relation to Land and Territoriality: Transnational and Interdisciplinary Perspectives

Abstract

Indigenous women and Two-Spirit LGBTQI people have been involved in resistance, dissent, mobilization and resurgence since the very beginnings of colonial occupation. We have intervened on a host of issues – sovereignty, nationhood, self-determination, governance, politics, jurisdiction, citizenship, international diplomacy and the protection of Indigenous lands, to name just a few. The logics of colonialism, however, have consistently denied and obfuscated these interventions, attacking the power of Indigenous women and Two-Spirit LGBTQI people by framing these issues outside of the political sphere and placing them firmly in the place of perpetual victimhood. Too often, the “activism” of Indigenous women has been reduced in the academic literature to issues regarding identity, violence, and discrimination – in a context that removes these issues from their colonial roots and that undermines and erases Indigenous nationhood. This does a tremendous disservice to our collective work.