Conference on anti-colonial solidarities: Navigating literary coresistance
Université Laval, Québec
Organization: Solidarités Anticoloniales
Conference on anti-colonial solidarities:
Navigating literary coresistance
CALL FOR PAPERS
Université Laval, Kepek/Québec, 2 & 3 october 2025
« Solidarity is an uneasy, reserved, and unsettled matter that neither reconciles present grievances nor forecloses future conflict. »
(Tuck et Yang 2012: 3)
As Eve Tuck and K. Wayne Yang (2012) emphasize, solidarity in a colonial context is deeply complex, requiring both an exploration of its potential and an awareness of its limitations. This conference seeks to foster a collective reflection on the relationships that sustain active resistance to colonial structures. How do literary practices create spaces for coresistance and solidarity?
Indigenous coresistance
In The Inconvenient Indian: A Curious Account of Native People in North America, Cherokee writer Thomas King humorously addresses the implications of subsuming all First Nations under a single term - “Indian”, which could also be “Indigenous” or “Native” (2012: 71). In response to this erasure of diverse identities, some scholars emphasize the need for deep engagement with the distinct knowledge systems of specific nations within literary criticism (Womack 1999). Chadwick Allen, scholar of Chickasaw ancestry, proposes a trans-Indigenous methodology that can complement the study of particular traditions and contexts (Allen 2012: 14). How can we examine relations between Indigenous peoples through their cultural productions without imposing a homogenizing perspective of indigeneity?
Although globalization has contributed to the erosion of diversity, it has simultaneously enabled the emergence of global social movements that challenge colonial politics (Burdette 2019). Drawing on the work of Nishnaabeg author Leanne Betasamosake Simpson (2017), we might consider how diplomacy and international relations have long been integral of Indigenous cultural practices. Examining the creation of anthologies of Indigenous literatures organized by genre or language, such as Mots de neige, de sable et d’océan (2008), leads us to ask: how can we understand the contemporaneity of these coresistance networks without obscuring the historical interrelations among different Indigenous nations?
Engaging in trans-Indigenous dialogues and collaborations requires an attentiveness to linguistic plurality. The act of translation “from one colonial language to another” (Moyes 2018), but also among indigenous languages, and particularly in collaborative translation projects, can play a crucial role in fostering relationships between Indigenous peoples. However, given “the colonial and extractivist editorial structures” (Des Rochers 2023: 21, our translation) and the dangers of ethnocentric translation (Berman 1984), we must ask: is it truly possible to conceive an ethical and rigorous translation practice when settler colonialism shapes the very framework of our relationships?
International coresistance
Theoretical borrowings and intertextual practices enable a dialogue between different decolonial struggles, thus creating a global network of coresistance and relations, a Tout-Monde (Glissant 1997). One might consider the role of Martinican psychiatrist Frantz Fanon in the Algerian independence movement and his undeniable contributions to decolonial thought. Later, Dene scholar Glen Sean Coulthard (2021) drew on Fanon, Karl Marx and négritude theories to critique the politics of recognition and reconciliation pursued by the Canadian colonial state.
In the literary field, one might consider Bleuets et abricots (2016), a collection of poetry by Innu author Natasha Kanapé Fontaine, which weaves together multiple networks of anticolonial resistance. Anishnaabe poet David Groulx, in From Turtle Island to Gaza (2019), locates his work within a broader solidarity network, which resonates with the most recent poetry collection by Ktunaxa trans and two-spirit author Smokii Sumac, Born Sacred: Poems for Palestine (2025). How does the use of borrowing, quotation and rewriting—whether to signal distance or commonalities between different colonial realities—enable authors to reflect on their own circumstances and positionalities? How can we read the relationships and implications of Indigenous literary resurgences in our current social struggles?
Intersectional coresistance
Writers and scholars have long examined the gendered aspects of racism, as well as the racialized aspects of sexism, homophobia and transphobia. These colonial and Western categories profoundly affect women, two-spirit and indigiqueers individuals (McMullin 2013, Chacaby 2016, Whitehead 2022), as well as men. Connections can be made between the works of non-Indigenous scholar Sam McKegney and Smokii Sumac on Indigenous masculinities, and those of Ronald L. Jackson II (2006) and Mark Anthony Neal (2005) on black masculinities. African American feminist Tiffany Lethabo King (2019, 2021) offers critical frameworks for examining the liminal spaces where Black, Indigenous and Queer realities converge, challenging the hegemony of Western epistemologies.
The potential of coresistance among Black and Indigenous communities is explored by Leanne Betasamosake Simpson and Robyn Maynard (2022). In parallel, queer scholars Sarah Hunt and Cindy Holmes—Kwakwaka’wakw and non-Indigenous, respectively—propose a “methodology of allyship [that] centers relational knowledge production, conversation, dialogue, and personal storytelling” (2015: 156). Additionally, non-Indigenous scholars Sarah de Leeuw and Emilie Cameron, alongside Cree scholar Margo Greenwood (2012) examine intercultural friendship as a space for critical anticolonial thought. What are the possibilities and limitations of intersectional friendships? What relational and literary methodologies can emerge from these friendships?
Proposals may address, but are not limited to, the following areas:
? Trans-Indigenous and anticolonial literary networks
? Co-writing and collaborative research in literature
? Literary and essay rewritings
? Intertextuality as a relational practice
? Anthologies and literary correspondences
? Translation as rewriting or cowriting
? Collaborative translation
? Coresistance constellations (Simpson 2017) and archipelagic thought (Glissant 1997) as relation theories
? Anticolonial literary friendships
? Queer and gender intersectional studies
? The role of critiques in solidarity networks
We invite proposals for research papers, research-creation papers, essays, performances, creative process presentations and round-table discussions. We also encourage researchers to reflect on the format and context of their research, considering how these factors either facilitate or hinder exchange and solidarity. Proposals (300 words), in English or French, must be accompanied by a short bio-bibliography (100 words) and sent no later than July 15, 2025, to solidarites.anticoloniales@gmail.com.
The organizing team
Ana Kancepolsky Teichmann (she/her), Maude-Lanui Baillargeon (she/her), Maxime Poirier-Lemelin (they/them)
Bibliography
Allen, Chadwick. Trans-Indigenous: Methodologies for Global Native Literary Studies, Minneapolis, University of Minnesota Press, 2012.
Berman, Antoine. L’épreuve de l’étranger. Culture et traduction dans l’Allemagne romantique, Paris, Gallimard, 1984.
Burdette, Hannah. Revealing Rebellion in Abiayala: The Insurgent Poetics of Contemporary Indigenous Literature, Tucson, University of Arizona Press, 2019.
Chacaby, Ma-Nee. A Two-Spirit Journey: The Autobiography of a Lesbian Ojibwa-Cree Elder, Winnipeg, University of Manitoba Press, 2016.
Coulthard, Glen Sean. Red Skin, White Masks: Rejecting the Colonial Politics of Recognition, Minneapolis, University of Minnesota Press, 2014.
Fanon, Frantz. Les damnés de la terre, Paris, Maspero, 1961.
Gatti, Maurizio. Mots de neige, de sable et d’oce?an : littératures autochtones, Wendake, E?ditions du CDFM, 2008.
Glissant, Édouard. Traité du Tout-Monde, Paris, Gallimard, 1997.
Groulx, David. From Turtle Island to Gaza, Edmonton, AU Press, Athabasca University, 2019.
Hunt, Sarah, et Cindy Holmes. « Everyday Decolonization: Living a Decolonizing Queer Politics », Journal of Lesbian Studies, vol. 19, no. 2 (2015), 154?172.
Jackson II, Ronald L. Scripting the Black Masculine Body: Identity, Discourse, and Racial Politics in Popular Media, Albany, State University of New York Press, 2006.
Kanapé Fontaine, Natasha. Bleuets et abricots, Montréal, Mémoire d’encrier, 2016.
King, Thomas. The Inconvenient Indian: A Curious Account of Native People in North America, Toronto, Doubleday Canada, 2012.
King, Tiffany Lethabo. « Some Black feminist notes on Native feminisms and the flesh », Environment and Planning D: Society and Space, vol. 39, no. 1 (2021), 9-15.
King, Tiffany Lethabo. The Black Shoals: Offshore Formations of Black and Native Studies, Durham, Duke University Press, 2019.
de Leeuw, Sarah, Emilie S. Cameron et Margo L. Greenwood. « Participatory and community-based research, Indigenous geographies, and the spaces of friendship: A critical engagement », The Canadian Geographer, vol. 56, no. 2 (2012), 180-194.
Maynard, Robyn, et Leanne Betasamosake Simpson. Rehearsals for Living, Toronto, Knopf Canada, 2022.
McKegney, Sam. « Strategies for Ethical Engagement: An Open Letter Concerning Non-Native Scholars of Native Literatures », Studies in American Indian Literatures, vol. 20, no. 4 (hiver 2008), 56-67.
McMullin, Dan Taulapapa. Coconut Milk, Tucson, University of Arizona Press, 2013.
Neal, Mark Anthony. New Black Man: Rethinking Black Masculinity, Londres, Routledge, 2015.
Simpson, Leanne Betasamosake. As We Have Always Done: Indigenous Freedom through Radical Resistance, Minneapolis, University of Minnesota Press, 2017.
Sumac, Smokii. Born Sacred: Poems for Palestine, Halifax, Roseway Publishing, 2025.
Tuck, Eve, et K. Wayne Yang. « Decolonization is not a metaphor », Decolonization: Indigeneity, Education & Society, vol. 1, no. 1 (2012), 1?40.
Whitehead, Joshua. Making Love with the Land, Minneapolis, University of Minnesota Press, 2022.
Womack, Craig S. Red on Red: Native American Literary Separatism, Minneapolis, University of Minnesota Press, 1999.
solidarites.anticoloniales@gmail.com
Solidarités Anticoloniales
