(Unpublished) Northern Indigenous Scholars and Artists Come Together in Of the Land and Water Event Series

From January 31 to February 2, Dechinta Centre for Research and Learning hosted the event series Of the Land and Water in Whitehorse, three days of events that celebrated Indigenous sexualities, genders and ways of being. The series was keynoted by guest Dr. Kim Tallbear, Sisseton-Wahpeton Oyate academic and scholar of Indigenous sexualities and technoscience and society. 

The keynote event was structured thus. Dr. Tallbear opened with the first “part” of their talk, which was narrated in the voice of this figure Iz (a stand-in for the discipline of Indigenous Studies and its struggles in the larger systems of academic institutions). Lianne Charlie, core organizer of the events, then read a short story; Jeneen Frei Njtooli then performed a sound art / performance art piece. Dr. Tallbear took the podium once more to continue their narrative of Iz’s various flings and attempts to connect with other more traditional disciplines, such as science. Mx. Wolverine (Tanchay Redvers) then performed a drag number. The final section of Dr. Tallbear’s talk then commenced, culminating in the telling of an experience at a conference in California, where elation and optimism in technology and solidarity and possibility were promptly undercut by 3 old white men keynote speakers. 

The Juice Dispatch interviewed both Lianne Charlie and Dr. Tallbear about the event series. 

The event series came together "in the way a lot of Dechinta programming comes to be," Charlie says, "And that is through relationship and just being present in the community, relating with folks, and hearing what interests are, what sorts of things are missing or desired, and then trying to fill in those gaps." 

"It just seemed right to just put [Dr. Tallbear's] work in dialogue with what was already happening here," Charlie says, and reached out to Ames Val, local Dene drag and gender performance artist. "It started to have a gravitational pull of its own." 

Through the local drag and performance art scene, "There's a lot of thinking about revitalizing our collective ways of being," Charlie says. "And that's exactly what Kim's talking about." 

Tallbear says, "It seemed like Whitehorse was a really great place for community to come together from across the territory, and also Indigenous people from other territories and provinces."  

"We did not speak about the specific pieces beforehand," Tallbear says about the keynote event. "So I was happy and maybe a little surprised how well it all came together."