An Antane Kapesh’s works were originally published in both French and Innu in the 1970s. This retranslated and reprinted version is a window into Kapesh’s experiences with the onset of colonialism in her Innu territory and community and the intergenerational effects of this oppression. Kapesh speaks with the voice of an activist and notes early in the text that “in my book there is no White voice.” Her authenticity, truth telling, and strength to stand up for her community are embedded throughout. This book explores themes such as colonization, alcoholism, impacts of residential schools, and the justice system as a means to oppress Indigenous Peoples with the goal of obtaining Innu lands. This book could be used in a classroom or library as an example of Indigenous resistance and resilience despite continued efforts at erasure of Innu ways of life.

Caution: Violence.

316 pp., 5.25 × 8" • Bibliography

An Antane Kapesh (Innu)

Source: Association of Book Publishers of BC - Canadian Indigenous Books for Schools (2021-2022)

An Antane Kapesh (1926-2004) was an Innu writer and activist from Schefferville, Quebec. She was a chief at Schefferville (Matimekosh) from 1965-1967. Her 1976 autobiographical book Je suis une maudite sauvagesse was published in both French and Innu and dealt with topics such as loss of hunting territory, the residential school system and police brutality.

An Antane Kapesh's profile page

Sarah Henzi is a settler scholar and Assistant Professor of Indigenous Literatures in the Department of French and the Department of Indigenous Studies at Simon Fraser University, Vancouver. Her translation of An Antane Kapesh’s Je suis une maudite sauvagesse (1976) and Qu’as-tu fait de mon pays? (1979) was published in 2020 with Wilfrid Laurier University Press as I Am a Damn Savage; What Have You Done to My Country?

Sarah Henzi's profile page

• Winner, Quebec Writers' Federation Cole Foundation Prize for Translation (French to English)