Malette, Sebastien
Associate Professor
- B.A., M.A. (Laval University), Ph.D. (University of Victoria), Postdoc (University of Melbourne)
- Email Malette, Sebastien
Dr. Malette is a scholar of M茅tis and French-Canadian heritage with ties and friendships within Aboriginal communities, including in Qu茅bec, Ontario, Manitoba and the Maritime. He is an expert in Aboriginal Law with a focus on access to justice, Indigenous legal traditions, relational politics and worldviews. Dr. Malette was a collaborator with the Canada Research Chair on M茅tis identity based in St-Boniface (Manitoba), and is currently a member of the 杏吧原创 University Institute on the Ethics of Research with Indigenous Peoples. Dr. Malette is interested in problematizing the relationships between Law and Indigeneity as both enabling and disrupting relations of domination affecting countries and communities with colonial histories. The work of Dr. Malette also centers around notion of governmentality and the analytic of power as developed by French thinker Michel Foucault. Part of his work also centers on ostracized M茅tis or 鈥渕ixed-Heritage鈥 Indigenous communities, their histories and resilience鈥攚ith a special focus on newly crafted exclusionary narratives, policing of Indigenous identities and the problem of lateral violence.
Dr. Malette has co-written a book published in 2016 on the forgotten history of the M茅tis peoples across the United States, with a particular focus on M茅tis communities in the state of Oregon, entitled Songs Upon the River. The Forgotten History of the Northwest Pacific Me虂tis (Baraka, 2016, 442 pages). This book makes the groundbreaking argument that Me虂tis ethnogenesis has to be understood using a rhizomatous model whereby nodes of identity would emerge linked by networks covering thousands of miles and tied together by a shared culture (that is without a unique centre). It suggests the existence of a Me虂tis culture connected continentally through different regional expressions, made visible primarily through the historical presence of Indigenous and French me虂tissage in the context of the fur trade and ongoing colonial conflicts. Songs Upon the Rivers also addresses the danger of current neo-nationalist Me虂tis ideology conflating a single ethno-nationalist discourse on the historical origin of the 鈥淢e虂tis nation,鈥 with the condition of the possibility of Me虂tis ethnogenesis elsewhere in Canada. Songs Upon the Rivers was the top-ranked book on Canada鈥檚 History Top Ten Bestsellers list for over two months. A revised second edition is currently being produced.