Métis: a Global Indigenous People

我们在这里提出的研究项目涉及到拨款呼吁中两个相互关联的方面：社区和公民话语以及代际正义，但它也有一些重要主题的分支，如历史（自我）代表的挑战，对土著主权理解的流动性的重要性，以及土著民族的全球关系。在这个例子中，我们的重点是姆萨梅蒂斯人——我们的第一合作伙伴克里斯·安德森教授的祖国——一个历史上高度流动的民族，其民族身份是在北部平原的水牛经济时代形成的——像美洲各地的土著民族一样，通过立法、土地分配和流行叙事逐渐被编纂成一个与特定（通常是农村）地区联系在一起的民族。虽然与地方的关系是姆姆萨梅斯的政治和文化身份不可或缺的一部分，但这种定位往往忽视了广泛的运动，包括城市和全球运动，对姆萨梅斯社会的成长和发展至关重要。该项目将重点关注姆萨提斯在三个欧洲城市的旅行和存在——伦敦、爱丁堡和巴黎；我们将这些地点称为“节点”，或在更广泛的msamims关系网络中具有多样性、连接性和过渡性的地点。在揭示和阐明姆萨梅斯在这些地方存在的悠久历史的过程中，我们将扩大目前对毛皮贸易交换的狭隘关注，包括那些为了外交、活动家、教育、军事、就业和旅游目的而旅行的姆萨梅斯人物，向姆萨梅斯和欧洲、学术和社区的观众开放这段丰富的历史，并记录他们从传统/以游客为中心的城市历史中被抹去的过程，作为社会正义的指标。这样做为在不同的地理和时间地点归还姆姆萨梅斯的知识（遗产和历史运动）提供了潜在的机会，审查其作为正在进行的促进姆萨梅斯集体福利工作的一个因素的作用。了解msamutis文化史的这一方面，将追踪人和物品的运动，将涉及两种方法干预，侧重于土著自决，以及档案研究。其中第一个是在艾伯塔省的访问会议，由安德森教授主持，将探讨一个混合年龄群体的msamims焦点小组如何理解msamims运动的历史，特别强调跨大西洋旅行。深入了解社区对这段历史的理解，将为研究团队构建项目重点叙述的方式提供信息。它还将指导我们考虑将这一历史和文化知识以及关于姆姆萨梅斯历史的知识归还给社区成员的最佳途径。第二部分涉及这两个方面，将由安徒生和马镫教授在伦敦、爱丁堡和巴黎领导步行和讨论会议。由居住在英国和法国的土著侨民陪同（由英国的LeAndra Nephin （UmoNhoN）和法国的Aaron Carr （Navajo）协调），这些会议将探索与msamutis存在相关的遗址，询问它们对今天土著游客的意义，并形成徒步旅行的基础，通过具体的接触和对这些遗址和历史的共同理解而产生。该项目的产出将包括这些徒步旅行本身——以应用程序和可下载的形式制作——旨在进一步鼓励、吸引和引导msamims旅行者前往这些城市。我们的研究结果还将为扩展的数字故事地图提供基础，类似的设计将这些空间和知识开放给那些不能亲自旅行的人（为那些不容易获得技术的人提供硬拷贝格式）。

The research project we propose here relates to the to two interlinked strands in the grant call: community and civic discourse and intergenerational justice, but it also has ramifications for important themes not specifically named here--such as the challenge of historical (self-)representation, the import of mobility to understandings of Indigenous sovereignty, and the global relationality of an Indigenous nation. In this instance, our focus is on the Métis--the home nation of our Co-I, professor Chris Andersen--an historically highly mobile nation whose peoplehood was forged in the era of the buffalo economy of the northern plains--have, like Indigenous peoples throughout the Americas, gradually become codified through legislation, land allocation, and popular narrative as a people tied to a specific (usually rural) locale. While relationship to place is integral to Métis political and cultural identity, such locatedness tends to overlook the ways in which expansive movement, including urban and global movement, has been central to the growth and unfolding of Métis society.This project will focus on Métis travel to and presence in three European cities--London, Edinburgh, and Paris; locations that we identify as "nodes" or sites of multiplicity, connection and transition, in the wider Métis networks of relation. In uncovering, and illuminating, the long history of Métis presence in these locations, we will broaden the currently narrow focus on fur trade exchange to include Métis figures who have traveled for diplomatic, activist, educational, military, employment, and tourist purposes, opening up this rich history to both Métis and European, scholarly and community audiences and documenting their erasure from conventional/tourist-focused urban histories as an index of social (in)justice. doing so opens potential opportunities for the repatriation of Métis knowledge (of heritage and historical movement) in diverse geographical and temporal sites, scrutinizing its role as a factor in ongoing work for collective Métis wellbeing. Understanding this aspect of Métis cultural history, which will trace the movement of both people and objects, will involve two methodological interventions focused on Indigenous self determination, alongside archival research. The first of these, visiting sessions in Alberta led by Prof. Andersen, will explore the ways a mixed-age group Métis focus group understand the history of Métis movement, with a particular emphasis on transatlantic travel. Drilling in to community-level understanding of this history will inform the way the research team frames the narratives the project highlights. It will also direct us as we consider the best vehicles for repatriating this historical and cultural knowledge, and knowledge of Métis history, to community members. The second, which addresses both of those aspects, will involve the leading of walking and discussion sessions by profs Andersen and Stirrup in London, Edinburgh, and Paris. Accompanied by Indigenous expatriates resident in the UK and France (coordinated by LeAndra Nephin (UmoNhoN) in the UK and Aaron Carr (Navajo) in France) these sessions will explore sites associated with Métis presence, interrogate their significance to Indigenous visitors today, and form the basis of walking tours produced through embodied encounter with and through shared apprehension of those sites and histories explored. The outputs for this project will include those walking tours themselves--produced in both app-based and downloadable formats--designed to further encourage, engage, and orientate Métis travelers to these cities. Our findings will also provide the basis for expansive digital story maps similarly designed to open up these spaces and knowledges to those who cannot travel in person (with hard copy formats made available for those without easy access to technology).