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The IHRN is a collective of researchers and community partners in pursuit of a radically different vision of the game, wherein hockey is not only safer and more inclusive but expressive of Indigenous values and an incubator for anti-racism and decolonial change.
"I was striving for success in an outside world that was not meant for me.
For me to be in the public life, to be in white society, was very difficult."
~ Fred Sasakamoose ~
~ Fred Sasakamoose ~
IHRN: Current Projects
IHRN: Current Projects
Hockey occupies an ambivalent space in relation to Indigenous sovereignty and ongoing settler colonialism in Canada. Hockey has been used as a tool of social engineering and has been accessed as a tool for liberation; it has been a way of denying Indigenous rights and of asserting them; it has been employed as a means of whitewashing Indigenous histories and as a means of embodying Indigenous persistence.
Decolonizing Systems
Decolonizing Systems
Decolonizing Experiences
Decolonizing Experiences
Beyond the Rink: Behind the Images of Residential School Hockey
Beyond the Rink: Behind the Images of Residential School Hockey
Alexandra Giancarlo, Janice Forsyth, Braden Te Hiwi
In 1951, after winning the Thunder Bay district championship, the Sioux Lookout Black Hawks hockey team from Pelican Lake Indian Residential School embarked on a whirlwind promotional tour through Ottawa and Toronto. They were accompanied by a professional photographer from the National Film Board who documented the experience. The tour was intended to demonstrate the success of the residential school system and introduce the Black Hawks to “civilizing” activities and the “benefits” of assimilating into Canadian society. For some of the boys, it was the beginning of a lifelong love of hockey; for others, it was an escape from the brutal living conditions and abuse at the residential school.
In Beyond the Rink, Alexandra Giancarlo, Janice Forsyth, and Braden Te Hiwi collaborate with three surviving team members—Kelly Bull, Chris Cromarty, and David Wesley—to share the complex legacy behind the 1951 tour photos. This book reveals the complicated role of sports in residential school histories, commemorating the team’s stellar hockey record and athletic prowess while exposing important truths about “Canada’s Game” and how it shaped ideas about the nation. By considering their past, these Survivors imagine a better way forward not just for themselves, their families, and their communities, but for Canada as a whole.
Decolonizing Approaches
Decolonizing Approaches
What's Being Said
What's Being Said
"Our central goal is to change how hockey is played and understood on Turtle Island. We are a collective of researchers dedicated to uncovering and engaging with hockey’s Indigenous past, present, and future at both academic and community-engaged levels."
~ Janice Forsyth, October 2018 ~
"No matter what rink I played in, I faced the ugliness of racism… The sad part is that same systemic racism is so prevalent today."
~ Eugene Arcand, March 2019 ~
"Hockey plays a central role in First Nation communities, maybe even more than in other places. It connects isolated First Nations, showcases young local stars, and keeps kids busy and out of trouble."
~ Reggie Leach ~
From The Riverton Rifle
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