Beyond the issue of her identity, she wasn’t the only person involved in the movie. What about the guy the documentary is based on? What about the people who worked on the movie for months? Just because she erroneously claimed Native heritage, it shouldn’t invalidate the work of the rest of the people involved in the…

(Hope this comment makes it through....Jezebel won’t approve this comment for some reason. Not sure why...)

Well, that’s some bullshit, because they don’t have the same benefits and opportunities afforded to any citizen of Canada. Heck, they’re still reeling from the sixties scoop - the last residential school was only shut down in the 90s. You’re ignoring generations of genocide, forced conversion and worse, by saying, oh,…

Agreed. I am very white. My family always told me and my siblings this long story about how we were Jews in Germany who escaped right before the Holocaust and changed our names. I’m professionally trained as a historian and an archivist, and I realized, after very very simple checking, that this story was very…

“Tribal membership is usually determined by practice of cultural traditions and crafts, rather than DNA testing. A person who grew up learning Native American traditions from their parents, and passed them on to their children, would qualify, but a person who has Native ancestry, but none of the traditions wouldn’t.”

two cents: the paradigm that you just qualified exposes the fullness of the racism in this story. When her (almost exclusively white) employers thought, “oooh she’s indian...and literate...and creative...and talented...” she was their darling. After they find out that she’s just white? Dumped. Not to remove the crime…

I find the idea of handing over my DNA to some corporation (from whom the government can and will obtain the information as they wish) rather terrifying, personally. I can understand why huge numbers of people won’t use those services, even if we are curious about what heritage may turn up.

Had a similar experience growing up. Great grandma on dad’s mom’s side was an orphan on the CO/WY border. Dark skin, jet black hair. Great grandpa on dad’s dad’s side was supposed to be a “melungeon.” So, pop did genetic testing and results were hilariously weird: evidence suggest great grandma was most likely WELSH,…

You need to go before the Tribunal of Mixed Asian Heritage and see what they say.

im french canadian and earlier this year i seen my brother on facebook claim he had native heritage (mikmaq specifically) and i was like wtf? just because we lived in the area and learned about them in school..im pretty sure you need a little more than that, ive never heard from any this anyone in the family   :/

Distant observer here. My understanding of this story is : Canadian person believed to have some indigenous ancestry. This small but personal connection shaped her identity, her interests and her acclaimed body of work. It so happens that this belief was based on misinformation about/from her grandfather. This is the…

Created an account just for this. First I have to say, Métis is not just a term she used. We are a nation, with our own language and kinship networks, and she most definately knew this. At some point it is easy to believe she just didn’t know/had a family story, but that would have stopped making sense many, many…

Are you referring to how tribal membership works or are you referring to the unspoken but obviously true fact that credit is lent to your work if you can claim the right identity? Seems like both apply here actually. The dumb part is that in her role on the doc she could have just identified as white and the work…

Oka was such a touchstone when I was growing up. The fucking military shot at women and children on behalf of a golf course! And that was in 1990!

I mean, sucks for her, I guess. If she genuinely grew up thinking she was native and didn’t know any better, that’s kinda sad. If she was faking it, that’s kinda bad. But the fact we’re testing people’s genealogy with literal blood quotas now is both sad AND bad. And morbidly funny!

The things we’ve done to our aboriginal population up here are genuinely terrifying and they’re a hell of a lot closer to the modern day than we’d like to admit. Say what you will about what America does to its various non-white ethnic groups, Canada literally tried to wipe our First Nations communities out by…

There are echoes of Elizabeth Warren’s situation here. Latimer has a French Canadian ancestor who lived near an Indigenous community and confused that with membership in that nation. Because Metis nations have French ancestors and most French Canadians can trace a single Indigenous ancestor from the 17th century, ther…

From Canada. Can confirm. Shitty story that could have been avoided with honesty and willingness to represent people without appropriation.

Just to be clear, the “creator” of The Inconvenient Indian is Thomas King, acclaimed indigenous writer and broadcaster, who wrote the book on which this documentary is based...

She has also resigned from Trickster.