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  • Countering Displacements: The Creativity and Resilience of Indigenous and Refugee-ed Peoples ed. by Daniel Coleman, Erin Goheen Glanville, Wafaa Hasan, and Agnes Kramer-Hamstra
  • Renate Eigenbrod (bio)
Daniel Coleman, Erin Goheen Glanville, Wafaa Hasan, and Agnes Kramer-Hamstra, eds. Countering Displacements: The Creativity and Resilience of Indigenous and Refugee-ed Peoples. University of Alberta Press. xlviii, 282. $34.95

There is no doubt that this collection of essays opens up a very important debate insofar as it brings together refugee and Indigenous studies, which [End Page 482] “more often than not … have been disconnected,” as the introduction to the book states. In addition, with its cultural studies approach highlighting creativity and agency – seen by the editors as the most important aim of this volume – it adds an important layer to the discussion about peoples who are often primarily seen as victims, bereft of agency. The book takes us to different localities of displacements: Alberta’s oil sands, Palestine, Manipur, West Bengal, and the Haudenosaunee society. A short review can hardly do justice to such a wide scope and the equally wide thematic range, from challenges to migrant illegality and discussions of working with traumatized refugees to the analysis of representations of countering displacement in film and literature. There are some themes that connect the diverse contexts, not only the different forms of “countering” – that is, resistance through, for example, creative performances and assertive acts of citizenship, often carried out by women – but also the similarity of the struggles of Indigenous peoples in North America, “post”-colonial India, and Palestine. Nonetheless, while I see the connections, I think each setting and theory comes with its own contexts and, first of all, has to be understood on its own terms. In some cases, the essay contributions are on slippery ground as they aim at fitting into the overall thematic scope and therefore marginalize complexities. I am thinking here in particular of two related themes discussed in this book: the Israel-Palestine question and the connections between Indigenous and refugee-ed peoples. The footnote in Mazen Masri’s article that his “chapter adopts an approach that views the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as a conflict between a settler society (Jewish Israelis … ) and an indigenous population (Palestinians)” inappropriately simplifies in just a few words “the complicated reality” of “the tensions” between “the indigenous right of land and the refugee right of migration,” which are emphasized in the introduction. I would have liked to see at least a brief discussion of other approaches and an unpacking of the settler terminology, which is bound to be different from the settler discourse in North America, for example. This article stands out for me also because the subsequent one, by Catherine Graham, continues the same political approach (but with a focus on the transformative potential of theatre), thus reinforcing a “single story” discourse.

As my comment on the Jewish-Palestinian theme is certainly shaped by my German background, my view on Indigenous/refugee-ed connections stems from my professional connection with Native studies and my scholarship on Indigenous literature and work with Indigenous communities (a statement on positionality I miss in most of the articles in the book, although Graham problematizes the “expert opinion”). The colonial and post-colonial contexts in India touch on issues in Canada: the squatter settlements in West Bengal are reminiscent of the Metis’ road-allowance history, and the discussion of “alienage” of refugee-ed people echoes Indigenous people’s often expressed sentiment that they feel like strangers [End Page 483] in their own country. However, in the discussion about Canada I would have liked to see colonialism constructed as the foundational narrative out of which all other exclusionary and racist politics and policies emerge – similar to Pavithra Narayanan’s exploration of the colonial origins of the conflict in Manipur. A focus on the genesis of our country can serve as a reminder that the original peoples of this land should be seen as the primary hosts for newcomers and should have a strong voice in immigration policies. Although the emphasis on creativity and agency is a very important theme in this book, the decolonizing and inclusive intent of this volume could...

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