Gathering Places ─ Aboriginal and Fur Trade Histories

"The originality and scholarly depth of its chapters make Gathering Places: Aboriginal and Fur Trade Histories a fitting tribute to the scholar it honours and a likely future staple in the fields of Native studies and Native history."---J. R. Miller, Canada Research Chair in Native-Newcomer Relations, Department of History, University of Saskatchewan

British traders and Ojibwe hunters. Cree women and their metis daughters. Explorers and anthropologists and Aboriginal guides and informants. These people, their relationships, and their complex identities were not featured in histories until the 1970s, when scholars from multiple disciplines brought new perspectives and approaches to bear on the past.

Gathering Places presents some of the most innovative and interdisciplinary approaches to metis, fur trade, and First Nations history being practised today. Whether they are discussing dietary practices on the Plateau, the meanings of totemic signatures, or issues of representation in public history, the authors present novel explorations of evidence that extend beyond earlier histories centred on the archive. By drawing on archaeological, material, oral, and ethnographic evidence and by exploring personal approaches to history and scholarship, these essays mark a significant departure from the old paradigm of history writing and will serve as models for recovering Aboriginal and crosscultural experiences and perspectives.

Carolyn Podruchny teaches history at York University.
Laura Peers teaches and is a curator at the Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford.