Introducing the Indigenous Futurisms Fan Blog

For my doctoral dissertation, I chose to study Indigenous futurisms.  I enjoy reading about Indigenous people encountering and overcoming various challenges, like zombies and aliens. It feels good to see Indigenous people succeed in these stories. The stories are safe spaces to play with sometimes risky ideas. I have spent enough time with these stories that they have become part of my collection of internal wellness resources and I can call on them when I need inspiration or courage. Early on in my studies, I made a collage of many of the book covers and printed poster sized copies to hang in my home and office. When I look at the posters, I feel happy to see non-stereotypical images of Indigenous people, and it makes me feel like I can be whatever I want to be in life. When I look at the posters and think about the stories, I feel a sense of freedom that I wish I could feel in every area of my life. 

My love of Indigenous science fiction probably comes in part from my late maternal grandmother. She loved to tell stories and some of her stories involved shapeshifting, time travel, aliens, and dimensional travel. 

It has been almost a year since I defended my PhD. For awhile, I have been thinking about blogging about my dissertation. I wanted to present some of my work in a format other than the traditional five chapter dissertation (introduction, literature review, methodology, results/findings, conclusion). I also wanted to make the work more practical and accessible. I wanted to share my enthusiasm for these stories and talk about the ways that they have enriched my life. I thought about making a series of posts on my main blog, but the more I thought about it, the more I felt like this topic deserved its own infrastructure. So I decided to create this blog. 

Today I was puttering around my house and I felt inspired to do a visioning session for this blog. I used the medicine wheel as my visioning strategy. Many people in my life have encouraged me to use the medicine wheel as a wellness strategy. I don't actually know whether or not it is Tsilhqot'in. I know the colours are important to Tsilhqot'ins and reflect a staff that my grandma used to talk about. My late uncle talked to me about the medicine wheel, but I don't remember exactly what he said. There are variations of the medicine wheel. When I made the colours for this, I originally used Bob Joseph's placement of colours. But while creating my visual, I also revisited some of the ideas in The Sacred Tree, which is a book that has been influential in my life. 

In an era where we are constantly asking, "is that AI?" I hope that the sheer chaos of this semi-freehand circle will provide you with assurance that this is not AI. 

I sort of just meditated on this for awhile, and asked myself questions like:

• where might different genres fit in this wheel?
• how can Indigenous science fiction help us?
• what do I want to do with Indigenous science fiction on this blog?

And this is what I came up with. It might be the case that someone else might sit down and do the same activity and come up with a totally different set of answers/placements. And that's cool. This graphic is not a representation of objective and universal truths. It's a reflection of what is in my heart. 

If you want, dear reader, you could do the same activity now. Create a medicine wheel, read up on it from a reputable source such as the Sacred Tree, and then jot down some thoughts in each of the quadrants about what your goals are when learning about Indigenous futurisms. 

Here is an explanation of my quadrants. 

North - Winter - Intellect  

• Share scholarship, theory, approaches to interpreting Indigenous futurisms
• Share/develop key concepts of Indigenous futurisms 
• In Bob Joseph's medicine wheel, North represents death. So, North is a place to explore colonialism and its attempts to eradicate Indigenous people. The North is also the place to explore decolonization, which seeks to eradicate colonialism and ensure the vitality of Indigenous people far into the future. 
• Genres/themes which fit nicely into the north include post-apocalypse, zombies, and dystopia. 
• The North is also a place where sometimes things feel frozen in time, and so it can be a place to rest in stillness. 
• In terms of pedagogy, the North can represent an end product, capstone, closing, or summative evaluation. 
• The North to me also is a place to address regrets, misgivings, and thoughts about "if I could do it over I would..." 

East - Spring - Emotion

• Hawaiin scholar Poka Laenui says that dreams are "the flooring for the creation of a new social order." Indigenous futurisms are the product of Indigenous creatives engaging in decolonial dreaming, and their dreaming has the potential to contribute to a collective imagining of what a decolonial world might look like. 
• Indigenous futurisms stories often include stories of rebuilding or setting goals for rebuilding. 
• Genres/themes which fit in this quadrant include synths, cyborgs, new technologies, experimentalization, cloning, and immortality. 
• In terms of pedagogy, this quadrant represents skill acquisition, skill development, foundational knowledge, and front end loading. 

South - Summer - Spirit 

• The summer is a time of flourishing. It involves suvivance, or collective continuance. 
• For me, summer makes me think of traditional technology such as dipnets and gives me gratitude for those who passed on teachings. 
• Summer is a time of gatherings, and in this blog I will host metaphorical gatherings by sharing book summaries, lists, and resources. 
• Summer is a time of long daylight and high mobility. 
• In summer, often our physical needs are easier to attend to, and so it gives us time to think about things like, "what does it all mean, what is our life purpose, what is our relationality, what makes us feel good?"
• Genres/themes that fit into summer include: time travel, dimensions, portals, aliens, stories where we humans are the aliens, utopias, and alternate histories. 

West- Fall - Body 

• Fall is the time to prepare for winter. 
• In the fall, we remember our limits. 
• The body is a quadrant where we test our abilities. 
• In the fall of our lives, we gain a greater appreciation of ancient knowledge, and sometimes begin to question the direction of society. 
• In the fall, we are reminded that we are viscerally human. 
• Fall is a time to think about future generations and legacy.
• Fall is also a time to understand how people have prepared you so that you are ready for what is to come. 
• Pedagogically, this quadrant is good for reflection. 
• Genres/themes that fit into fall include: ghosts, premonition, abilities, health technology, paranormal, eco-crises, and creatures. 

So, that's what I hope to accomplish with this blog. This blog has no real end. I think that it will probably be one of my winter projects. I welcome guest posts, although, I am taking an editing course so fair warning that I might practice providing editorial feedback prior to posting. 

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This is a sister blog to https://twinkleshappyplace.blogspot.com/