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A Troubling Presence: Indigeneity in English-Language Canadian Sociology

Indigenous elders participating in a ceremony

A Troubling Presence: Indigeneity in English-Language Canadian Sociology

Over the past decade Canadian sociology has engaged in spirited debates on the sociology of sociological research, but it has barely begun to address its relation to Indigenous theorizing, scholarship and politics. How does the discipline deal with the settler colonial history and current realities of Indigenous social lives? And where is the place in our field for Indigenous voices and perspectives?

Drawing on Coulthard’s politics of recognition and Tuck’s damage-centered research, we present here the first systematic empirical analysis of the place of Indigeneity in the Canadian Review of Sociology and the Canadian Journal of Sociology.

We situate the presence of Indigeneity in Canadian sociology journals in the sociopolitical context of the time and examine how imperialism, statism and damage are oriented within the two journals. Most importantly, we challenge the silence in the discipline’s intellectual frames and research programs with respect to Indigenous theorizing about the social world. 

Researchers

Gregory Hooks headshot image

Gregory Hooks

PhD

Professor, Sociology

Neil McLaughlin headshot image

Neil McLaughlin

PhD

Professor, Sociology
Professor, Social Psychology

Vanessa Watts headshot image

Vanessa Watts

PhD

Associate Professor, Sociology
Associate Professor, Indigenous Studies

Paul R. Mac
Pherson Chair in Indigenous Studies
Member, McMaster Indigenous Research Institute (MIRI)

Citation

Watts, V., Hooks, G. and McLaughlin, N. (2020), A Troubling Presence: Indigeneity in English-Language Canadian Sociology. Canadian Review of Sociology/Revue canadienne de sociologie, 57: 7-33. Available online here