Shared on behalf of Josephine L. Savarese

Keynote Address

October 28, 2015 at 7 PM, Kinsella Auditorium

TITLE:

Mobilizing Collective Outrage from the West to the Atlantic:

Violence Against Indigenous Women in Canada

Dr. Julie Kaye

Website: http://julielynkaye.ca/

Overview of the Talk

From “sea to shining sea” violence against Indigenous women is a foundational narrative in the country settlers named Canada.   In recent years, awareness of missing and murdered Indigenous women and the disproportionate violence Indigenous women face has grown. What Indigenous women have been saying for over two centuries is finally being acknowledged. Yet many of the systems and structures of Canadian society continue to function from the premise in which they were conceived: the dispossession and erasure of Indigenous women. This discussion will consider what it means to honour the voices of Indigenous women – past and present – who have sought freedom and self-determination for their families, their communities, their children and themselves. The presentation will probe this important question: What does it mean to mobilize collective outrage in a context of ongoing violence?

Bio:

Dr. Julie Kaye is an Assistant Professor of Sociology and Director of Community Engaged Research at The King’s University. Inspired by anti-colonial, Indigenous feminist thought, her research and community engagement critically examines responses to violence in contexts of neo- and settler-colonialism. In part, her work critically considers how responses to violence against Indigenous women reproduce the power of the settler colonial state, reify the state as saviour, and undermine alternatives to state mechanisms of justice. Her current book project, Human Trafficking in Canada: Reproducing National, Racial, and Sexual Priorities, examines anti-trafficking responses in the context of settler colonialism. Findings from her work are also available in academic journals, such as Social Inclusion, the Canadian Journal of Criminology and Criminal Justice, and the Journal of Development Studies. Her critical writings on prostitution legislation, sex worker rights, violence against Indigenous women, and related social issues are also widely available in publications, such as the New York Times, Toronto Star, Edmonton Journal, Justice Report, LawNow, and the RCMP Gazette. Julie is a committed community organizer who works with a number of grassroots and non-profit organizations. She also serves as the Research Advisor for the Aboriginal Commission on Human Rights and Justice and represents an Alberta-based working group on the Legal Strategy Coalition on Violence Against Indigenous Women with the Women’s Legal Education and Action Fund.

Sponsored by:

Women’s Studies and Gender Studies, STU

Peace Studies, STU

In collaboration with the Women March of Women 2015

For more information, contact:

Josephine L. Savarese

Acting Chair, Women’s Studies and Gender Studies, STU

Associate Professor, DCCJ

savarese@stu.ca