Kinship and Indigenous Anti-Commodities

Bibliographic Data

ID20074576
AuthorsArtemis Caine, Megan Kuster (0000-0003-0985-6705)
Year2025
Pages147-160
Publication date2025-10-09
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeCHAPTER
VenueCommodities and Literature (SOURCE_BOOK)
PublisherCambridge University Press (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1017/9781009432344.009
OpenAlexW4415178054
ISBN9781009432344
LanguageEN
References cited10

Examining the entangled relations between commodities and kin in Indigenous literature, this chapter presents an Indigenous/non-Indigenous research collaboration in the form of dialogue. The first part of the chapter analyses how two Indigenous memoirs, Maria Campbell’s Halfbreed (1973) and Jesse Thistle’s From the Ashes (2019), critique western commodification by elaborating on concepts of relationality and responsibility. The second part of the chapter analyses the processes of commodification of Indigenous lives for western consumption in the context of climate change, drawing on Cherie Dimaline’s novel The Marrow Thieves (2017) and Robin Wall Kimmerer’s essay collection titled Braiding Sweetgrass (2013). The chapter’s broader contention is that the genre of Indigenous memoir, which often represents Indigenous bodies as ‘anti-commodity’, adds to conceptualisations that aim to redefine relationships of respect and reciprocity between humans and more-than-human beings

Commodification · Context (archaeology) · Indigenous · Kinship · Reciprocity (cultural anthropology) · Anthropological Studies and Insights

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