Reclaiming Indigenous Voice and Vision

Marilyn Mardiros is an associate professor of health sciences at the
University of Ottawa.

This multi-authored book is the outcome of meetings at the University of
Saskatchewan in 1996. Essays focus on colonization and the systemic
nature of oppression of Indigenous peoples worldwide. The majority of
contributors are Indigenous university academics, primarily from Canada.
Analysis of Eurocentrism and colonization are, therefore, from
Aboriginal perspectives. Most material is new, although some is
reprinted from other sources. Overall, the essays are written for an
academic audience interested in colonization.

Globalization—global economic and political ideology—serves as a
focal point in the book. Indigenous people must work within existing
power structures and the dominant orthodoxies of modernity. Drawing on
critical social theory, the contributors juxtapose dominant Eurocentric
worldviews with Aboriginal worldviews. These contrasting perspectives
serve as the basis of culture clashes, and the oppression and
discrimination of the latter by the former. In contrast to Eurocentric
worldviews, the strength of language, myth, and Indigenous spirituality
are identified.

The main limitation throughout many chapters may be the presentation of
Aboriginal cultures as monolithic, stagnant, and speaking with one
voice. Peppered throughout many chapters are comments about the discord
between Aboriginal and Eurocentric worldviews, and how it represents a
conflict between natural (Indigenous) and artificial