From the use of social media during the Idle No More movement to the growth of on-line magazines and educational platforms, Canada's First Peoples are increasingly using the internet as a space of resistance, community development, and as a platform for sharing and preserving language and tradition. The essay collection Decolonizing the Digital: First Peoples' On-Line Presence will merge Digital Humanities with Indigenous Studies in order to explore how First Peoples are mobilizing various on-line formats in the service of cultural protection and dissemination.

  •  Possible essay topics could include:
  •  Language apps
  • Social media and protest/resistance
  • Interactive website, such as Pearson Education's The Ruptured Sky: The War of 1812
  • Online graphic novels
  • The role of podcasts
  • Bias in digital archiving
  • Storytelling/orature websites, such as the Skins Workshops on Aboriginal Storytelling and Video Game Development
  • The role of Youtube in cultural sharing
  • The use of digital resources in the classroom

Please forward your essay or essay proposal to Jesse Archibald-Barber, Associate Professor, First Nations University of Canada (jbarber@fnuniv.ca) and to Jessica Langston, Adjunct Professor, Concordia University (jessica.langston@concordia.ca).

 Essay proposals 500-1000 words; Essays 2000-8000 words

Deadline for proposals: Feb. 15, 2015

Deadline for essays: May 15, 2015