Charles Joseph Angus is a Canadian author, journalist, broadcaster, musician and politician. A member of the New Democratic Party (NDP), Angus has been the federal Member of Parliament for the riding of Timmins—James Bay since winning the 2004 election. He is the NDP critic for Ethics, Federal Economic Development, Initiative for Northern Ontario, Indigenous Youth, Income Inequality and Affordability, and Deputy Critic for Labour.
Kanesatake is a Mohawk settlement on the shore of the Lake of Two Mountains in southwestern Quebec, Canada, at the confluence of the Ottawa and Saint Lawrence rivers and about 48 kilometres (30 mi) west of Montreal. People who reside in Kanehsatà:ke are referred to as Mohawks of Kanesatake. As of 2022, the total registered population was 2,751, with a total of about 1,364 persons living on the territory. Both they and the Mohawk of Kahnawake, Quebec, a reserve located south of the river from Montreal, also control and have hunting and fishing rights to Doncaster 17 Indian Reserve.
The Listuguj Mi'gmaq First Nation is a Mi'gmaq First Nations band government with a registered population (2022) of 4,248 members, most of whom are of Mi'kmaq ancestry. The name Listuguj, is the origin for the name of the Restigouche River, as well as other nearby places also carrying the name Restigouche. Listuguj is also used as a name for one of the Míkmaq orthographies. Its southern border is adjacent to Pointe-à-la-Croix, Quebec.
Alanis Obomsawin, is an Abenaki American-Canadian filmmaker, singer, artist, and activist primarily known for her documentary films. Born in New Hampshire, United States and raised primarily in Quebec, Canada, she has written and directed many National Film Board of Canada documentaries on First Nations issues. Obomsawin is a member of Film Fatales independent women filmmakers.
The Attawapiskat First Nation is an isolated First Nation located in Kenora District in northern Ontario, Canada, at the mouth of the Attawapiskat River on James Bay. The traditional territory of the Attawapiskat First Nation extends beyond their reserve up the coast to Hudson Bay and hundreds of kilometres inland along river tributaries. The community is connected to other towns along the shore of James Bay by the seasonal ice road/winter road constructed each December, linking it to the towns of Kashechewan First Nation, Fort Albany, and Moosonee Attawapiskat, Fort Albany, and Kashechewan operate and manage the James Bay Winter Road through the jointly owned Kimesskanemenow Corporation, named after the Cree word for "our road" -kimesskanemenow. Attawapiskat is the most remote northerly link on the 310 km (190 mi) road to Moosonee. They control the reserves at Attawapiskat 91 and Attawapiskat 91A.
The Kashechewan First Nation is a Cree First Nation band government located near James Bay in Northern Ontario, Canada. The community is located on the northern shore of the Albany River. Kashechewan First Nation is one of two communities that were established from Old Fort Albany in the 1950s. The other community is Fort Albany First Nation, which is now located on the southern bank of the Albany River. The community is connected to other towns along the shore of James Bay by the seasonal ice road/winter road, linking it to the towns of Attawapiskat, Fort Albany, and Moosonee.
Attawapiskat 91A is the main reserve of the Attawapiskat First Nation, near the mouth of the Attawapiskat River in Kenora District, Ontario, Canada.
Constance Lake First Nation is an Oji-Cree First Nations band government located on the shores of Constance Lake near Hearst, Cochrane District in northeastern Ontario, Canada. It is directly north of the community of Calstock along a continuation of Ontario Highway 663. Constance Lake First Nation is home to close to 1605 members of Cree and Ojibway with approximately 820 living on reserve. The reserves, Constance Lake 92 and English River 66, total 7,686 acres (3,110 ha) in size.
The Victor Mine was the first Canadian diamond mine located in Ontario, and De Beers' second diamond mine in Canada. It is located in the Northern Ontario Ring of Fire, in the James Bay Lowlands 90 kilometres (56 mi) west of Attawapiskat in the remote northern part of the province. In June 2005, the Attawapiskat First Nation voted in favour (85.5%) of ratifying the Impact Benefit Agreement (IBA). Construction of the mine began in February 2006 which created 3200 positions; mining and operations will create around 400 permanent positions. The Victor Mine is an open-pit mine, with a processing plant, workshops, and an airstrip located on site. By 2013–2014 royalties collected from De Beers Victor Mine amounted to $226. At that time De Beers was continuing to pay off its "$1 billion investment to build the mine and from now until it closes, the company expects to pay tens of millions of dollars in royalties." The mine completed mining and processing in 2019 and has moved to a shut-down phase including demolition of infrastructure and rehabilitation of the site.
Tracey Penelope Tekahentakwa Deer is a Canadian screenwriter, film director and newspaper publisher based in Kahnawake, Quebec. She has written and directed several award-winning documentaries for Rezolution Pictures, an Aboriginal-run film and television production company. In 2008, she was the first Mohawk woman to win a Gemini Award, for her documentary Club Native. Her TV series Mohawk Girls had five seasons from 2014 to 2017. She also founded her own production company for independent short work.
Cindy Blackstock is a Canadian Gitxsan activist for child welfare and executive director of the First Nations Child and Family Caring Society of Canada. She is also a professor for the School of Social Work at McGill University.
Idle No More is an ongoing protest movement, founded in December 2012 by four women: three First Nations women and one non-Native ally. It is a grassroots movement among the Indigenous peoples in Canada comprising the First Nations, Métis and Inuit peoples and their non-Indigenous supporters in Canada, and to a lesser extent, internationally. It has consisted of a number of political actions worldwide, inspired in part by the liquid diet hunger strike of Attawapiskat Chief Theresa Spence and further coordinated via social media. A reaction to alleged legislative abuses of Indigenous treaty rights by then Prime Minister Stephen Harper and the Conservative federal government, the movement takes particular issue with the omnibus bill Bill C-45. The popular movement has included round dances in public places and blockades of rail lines.
Theresa Spence is a former chief of the Attawapiskat First Nation in Canada. She was a prominent figure in the Attawapiskat housing and infrastructure crisis, Idle No More, and other First Nations issues. Prior to serving as chief, she was the deputy chief of Attawapiskat.
The People of the Kattawapiskak River is a 2012 documentary film by Alanis Obomsawin exploring conditions inside the Attawapiskat First Nation, which in October 2011 declared a state of emergency due to health and safety concerns over a lack of housing and infrastructure, and remained in the public spotlight during the Idle No More protests.
Hi-Ho Mistahey! is a 2013 National Film Board of Canada feature documentary film by Alanis Obomsawin that profiles Shannen's Dream, an activist campaign first launched by Shannen Koostachin, a Cree teenager from Attawapiskat, to lobby for improved educational opportunities for First Nations youth.
Trick or Treaty? is a 2014 Canadian documentary feature film by Alanis Obomsawin about Treaty 9, a 1905 agreement in which First Nations peoples in northern Ontario surrendered their sovereign rights. The film is the first by an indigenous filmmaker to be selected to the Masters program at the Toronto International Film Festival, and is the 43rd film by Obomsawin for the National Film Board of Canada.
Richard Cardinal: Cry from a Diary of a Métis Child is a 1986 National Film Board of Canada documentary film by Alanis Obomsawin, about the suicide of Métis youth Richard Stanley Cardinal, who killed himself in 1984 at the age of 17. Cardinal, who had been placed in 28 different homes during his 14 years in Alberta's child welfare system, hanged himself from a cross bar he had nailed between two trees near his last foster home, northwest of Edmonton.
We Can't Make the Same Mistake Twice is a 2016 Canadian documentary film by Alanis Obomsawin about the First Nations activist Cindy Blackstock and her court case against the federal government of Canada for underfunding social services to children living on First Nations reserves.
Bones of Crows is a 2022 Canadian drama film, written, produced, and directed by Marie Clements. The film stars Grace Dove as Aline Spears, a Cree woman who survives the Indian residential school system to become a code talker for the Canadian Air Force during World War II.
When All the Leaves Are Gone is a Canadian short drama film, directed by Alanis Obomsawin and released in 2010. One of just two narrative fiction films, alongside Sigwan, that Obomsawin made in a career otherwise devoted entirely to documentary films, the film dramatizes Obomsawin's childhood experiences through the story of Wato, a young girl experiencing anti-indigenous prejudice as the only First Nations student in an otherwise all-white school in the 1940s, who finds comfort and strength in the magical world of her dreams.
