This week: Oil and gaslighting. They say an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. Guess which one the Canadian government funds way more than the other for First Nations emergencies like floods and fires? Karen Hogan knows the answer: in fact, the Auditor-General dedicated a whole chapter to it in her latest report, much like her predecessor did nine years prior. Since then, it’s been the usual flood of excuses and the burning through of budgets as Canada perpetually reacts after-the-fact to disasters it arguably helped enable through its seemingly unmitigated support for oil and gas extraction.

Joining host/producer Rick Harp to run through the report, the response to it from Ottawa, and how Canada's rhetoric on curbing carbon compares to its actions in exactly the opposite direction are MI regulars Kim TallBear, professor in the Faculty of Native Studies at the University of Alberta and Canada Research Chair in Indigenous Peoples, Technoscience and Society, plus Candis Callison, Associate Professor in the Institute for Critical Indigenous Studies and the Graduate School of Journalism at UBC.

// CREDITS: Our theme is 'nesting' by birocratic.

THIS WEEK: Our second-ever 'TalkBack' edition of MEDIA INDIGENA, where monthly supporters of the podcast on Patreon get a chance to share their feedback live via Discord about our latest deep dive conversation. This time around, it's a debrief on our discussion of Alberta’s new Sovereignty Act.

Back to dialogue directly with patrons are Associate Professor of Indigenous Studies at York University Brock Pitawanakwat, as well as Ken Williams, assistant professor with the University of Alberta’s department of drama.

// CREDITS: 'Guitarista' by Mr Smith (CC BY 4.0); 'Free Guitar Walking Blues (F 015)' by Lobo Loco (CC BY-SA 4.0).

This week: Alberta sovereignty. Sovereign over what and whom, you may ask? Great questions, ones that finally got an answer last week when, on November 29, Premier Danielle Smith introduced her first bill, the Alberta Sovereignty within a United Canada Act.

Or did they? Already it seems, Smith has done a western walk-back of some of the bill’s more controversial aspects—indeed, days after we recorded our discussion about it on December 2—making it a bit of a moving target. In any case, it never hurts to be Indigenously nervous when provincial premiers flirt with secession, especially when it could come at our expense. 

Joining host/producer Rick Harp at the roundtable once again to walk through the Act (such as it was at the time), and what Indigenous peoples there have to say about it, are Associate Professor of Indigenous Studies at York University Brock Pitawanakwat and assistant professor with the University of Alberta’s department of drama Ken Williams.

// CREDITS: “The Thought of You,” by Squire Tuck; our intro/xtro theme is ‘nesting’ by birocratic.

This week: 'Nation to nation,' or funder to client? When it comes to describing the financial relationship between the Assembly of First Nations and the Canadian government which signs its cheques, critics are anything but kind. Through their jaded eyes, the department of Indian Affairs’ purse strings serve more like a leash on AFN, tightened whenever someone 'misbehaves.'

And if this Chiefs’ lobby group can’t much function without so-called Canadian taxpayers’ money—which, to be fair, is more like First Nations' resources effectively given back to them—is this oddball offshoot of perennial paternalism the best we can do in this era of Reconciliaction? A long-standing question recently renewed by just-unearthed documents appearing to show federal bureaucrats committed to keeping the Assembly from coloring outside the lines.

This week, Brett Forester, the CBC Indigenous reporter (and one-time host of Nation-to-Nation on APTN National News) who captured this story joins host/producer Rick Harp and roundtable regular Trina Roache, the Rogers Chair in Journalism at the University of King’s College to discuss the light these internal ISC memos may shed on the relationship between the two entities.

// CREDITS: 'The Thought Of You' by Squire Tuck (CC BY 4.0). Our theme is 'nesting' by birocratic.