When you read a book or learn about the literary canon or the nation-building canon of Canada and there are no Indigenous that pre-date 1980 -you are implicitly being told that they are being written out of history as not having existed at all, or being told that they’re this kind of character –as the representation of that character is imposed upon Indigenous peoples by a colonizing voice. If Indigenous forebearers are excluded from history, excluded from the canon -if their people are not existing, then what does that do psychologically?
How can they not exist? How can their forebears not exist pre-dating the 1980s or post-dating a specific era in literary canon when their people have existed both before and after that?
It seems as though Indigenous representation in both Canadian nation-building canon and the literary canon are dominated by two acts: an outright act of exclusion or non-Native writers who speak over and impose their colonizing representations upon Native peoples.
Native stereotypes are unsalvageable and there is no way to fix colonizing representation. Instead, we must listen to new stories and champion the voices of actual Indigenous writers over the colonizing and exclusive literary canon.

We must champion Indigenous stories told by Indigenous voices over the arguably harmful literary canon. Our team has chosen to pursue a dialogue which is focused on the historical necessity of an intervention strategy –where we impress upon “what does it do, psychologically, when entire groups of people do not see themselves represented in the literary canon and nation-building narrative of the place they call home?”

Works Cited:
Houska, Tara (November 2017). “The Standing Walk Resistance and our Fight for Indigenous Rights” [Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.ted.com/talks/tara_houska_the_standing_rock_resistance_and_our_fight_for_indigenous_rights.