The Inconvenient Indian: A Curious Account of Native People in North America by Thomas King

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Title: The Inconvenient Indian: A Curious Account of Native People in North America
Author: Thomas King
Published by: Doubleday Canada
Release Date: November 13, 2012
Format: ebook
Pages: 306
Genres: Historical, Non-fiction
Potential Triggers: View Spoiler »I mean, nothing super descriptive, but if you have triggers go with caution « Hide Spoiler
Source: Overdrive
Reading Challenges: Lenoreo's 2021 COYER Fall, Lenoreo's 2021 Diversity Reading Challenge
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My rating:

Blurb:

The Inconvenient Indian is at once a “history” and the complete subversion of a history—in short, a critical and personal meditation that the remarkable Thomas King has conducted over the past 50 years about what it means to be “Indian” in North America.

Rich with dark and light, pain and magic, this book distills the insights gleaned from that meditation, weaving the curiously circular tale of the relationship between non-Natives and Natives in the centuries since the two first encountered each other. In the process, King refashions old stories about historical events and figures, takes a sideways look at film and pop culture, relates his own complex experiences with activism, and articulates a deep and revolutionary understanding of the cumulative effects of ever-shifting laws and treaties on Native peoples and lands.

This is a book both timeless and timely, burnished with anger but tempered by wit, and ultimately a hard-won offering of hope -- a sometimes inconvenient, but nonetheless indispensable account for all of us, Indian and non-Indian alike, seeking to understand how we might tell a new story for the future.

My Review:

4 stars — Well, that was me stepping WAYYYYYY outside my comfort zone.  In multiple ways.  First, I am wholeheartedly NOT a non-fiction reader.  Like, I don’t gravitate towards it at all, and this might be the first voluntary non-fiction read of mine.  It helped that it was also full of humour and satire, so it was like easing me in.  And secondly, I avoid my own country’s history pretty vigorously.  Like, it’s so much easier to learn about things on the other side of the world, and not things in my own backyard.  So the discomfort was HIGH.  But I’m SOOOOO glad I finally got off my scaredy horse and jumped in, because it is never too late.  And with everything going on in Canada this year with First Nations, I guess I was just finally ready to hear some devastating truths.

Now, for those reasons, this was a bit of a tough read for me.  Partially because I tend to be a very empathetic person, so reading about all of these things that happened and are still happening was hella hard to take.  It was so much easier when I just used my white privilege to ignore it.  I just felt every blow.  I’m not sure if that will make sense to everyone, but it’s becoming increasingly hard to exist on this earth without being dismayed by humanity and the things we’re capable of as a collective.

And the other thing that made it very difficult was the sheer amount of information in it.  And, here’s the thing with me, I *hate* not knowing all the details.  So passing mentions of paintings and movies and events would have me wanting to pull my phone out and start Googling.  And I definitely did some of that.  But then I felt a bit bogged down.  It was good to have all that information there, but it was overwhelming too.

I felt like the tone was actually pretty solid.  You could definitely feel the author’s admittedly biased viewpoint, but I don’t feel like he was as biased as he could have been.  He readily acknowledged that there were mistakes made from the “Indians” side as well.  It felt more balanced than I was expecting I guess.

I think I’m going to be absorbing this book for quite awhile, and of course I now want more people to read it, just to get an additional perspective on things and open eyes to all that we never learned about in our history.  I also have this sense of wanting to do something and fix something, and I genuinely hope that that means I’ll pay more attention to these issues and try to lend my voice so systems can change.

COYER Scavenger Hunt #17: Read a nonfiction book.