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Up Ghost River: A Chief's Journey Through the Turbulent Waters of Native History
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About Up Ghost River: A Chief's Journey Through The
Product Description A powerful, raw and eloquent memoir about the abuse former First Nations chief Edmund Metatawabin endured in residential school in the 1960s, the resulting trauma, and the spirit he rediscovered within himself and his community through traditional spirituality and knowledge. After being separated from his family at age 7, Metatawabin was assigned a number and stripped of his Indigenous identity. At his residential school--one of the worst in Canada--he was physically and emotionally abused, and was sexually abused by one of the staff. Leaving high school, he turned to alcohol to forget the trauma. He later left behind his wife and family, and fled to Edmonton, where he joined a First Nations support group that helped him come to terms with his addiction and face his PTSD. By listening to elders' wisdom, he learned how to live an authentic First Nations life within a modern context, thereby restoring what had been taken from him years earlier. Metatawabin has worked tirelessly to bring traditional knowledge to the next generation of Indigenous youth and leaders, as a counsellor at the University of Alberta, Chief in his Fort Albany community, and today as a youth worker, First Nations spiritual leader and activist. His work championing Indigenous knowledge, sovereignty and rights spans several decades and has won him awards and national recognition. His story gives a personal face to the problems that beset First Nations communities and fresh solutions, and untangles the complex dynamics that sparked the Idle No More movement. Haunting and brave, Up Ghost River is a necessary step toward our collective healing. Review NATIONAL BESTSELLER Finalist for the Governor General’s Literary Award for Non-Fiction Winner of the CBC Bookie Award for Canadian Non-Fiction A CBC Best Book of the Year A Hill Times Best Book of the Year A Quill & Quire Book of the Year “Edmund Metatawabin’s voice is clear, brave and full of the grace of his Cree homeland. Up Ghost River is a powerful and unsettling read, full of heartbreaking truth-telling, resistance and Metatawabin’s uncompromising love of land, his people, his language and his culture. These stories are full of the real lived violence of colonialism and of the beautiful tiny moments that our Elders and storytellers wrap around our children to teach them, protect them and nurture them. Metatawabin is a gift to all who are lucky enough to read him, and the key to reading Metatawabin is a willingness to simply allow these stories to transform you.” —Leanne Betasamosake Simpson, author of Noopiming “A shocking, sadly revealing Canadian story. Cree elder Edmund Metatawabin has the courage to tell how ‘white learning’ stripped him of his name and systematically brutalized him—including strapping him into a school-built electric chair and electrocuting him—traumatizing him throughout his childhood, youth and adulthood, until he could finally let it all ‘pass through’ him and find himself as a human being. ‘We are still here,’ he asserts, and ‘our forefathers . . . are still here, all around us, guiding those who listen.’ Every Canadian needs to hear this story.” —Rudy Wiebe, author of The Temptations of Big Bear “Thanks to the efforts of survivors like Edmund the federal government can no longer hide the shocking truth behind this terrible chapter in history, and survivors of St. Anne’s and other residential schools may finally receive the justice they rightly deserve. Edmund’s effort to document this abuse is as courageous as his dedication to healing himself and others from their experiences.” —Nishnawbe Aski Nation (NAN) Deputy Grand Chief Alvin Fiddler, NationTalk “With unsparing honesty, humility and disarming humour, Edmund Metatawabin reveals the darkness at the heart of Canadian history. A painful yet engaging narrative of personal trauma and recovery, this inspiring book also heralds the cultural and spiritual redemption of a people.” —Gabor Maté, M.D., author
