Notice Board

**This event has been cancelled**

“Distorted Descent”
by Dr. Daryl Leroux

Dr. Leroux will explore the origins of the contemporary “Eastern Métis” movement through a detailed assessment of its genealogical and historical claims. Relying on a small set of ancestors — usually born before 1650 and with millions of living descendants today — the movement has succeeded in gaining sympathy by promoting a pan-Indigenous identity devoid of living kin or community. After discussing the specific “practices of descent” that are used by individuals and organizations throughout Ontario, Québec, and the Maritimes, he turns to the continued impacts of this social phenomenon. What happens when white people claiming to be Indigenous end up being the only “Indigenous” people in your workplace or at your school? 

Bio: Darryl Leroux is an associate professor in the Department of Social Justice and Community Studies at Saint Mary’s University. A few months before the pandemic, he published Distorted Descent: White Claims to Indigenous Identity (University of Manitoba Press). Since that time, he has worked with a number of First Nation, Inuit, and Métis governments seeking to challenge the rise of self-indigenization in their respective territories. 

Friday, March 18, 2022

3:00 pm

Registration required:  https://bit.ly/DistortedDescent

Brought to you by:
The Institute for Child and Youth Studies
Centre for Oral History and Tradition
Department of Women and Gender Studies
Department of Sociology