![Sample our Social Sciences journals, sign in here to start your FREE access for 14 days]({"type":"image" , "src" : "/sda/110822/TOC-Subject-Sample-2021-Social-Sciences.jpg"})
ABSTRACT
Indigenous post-secondary students in Canada have long been battling for equity. The Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s report demanded that universities move to decolonize and seek reconciliation. Despite this movement, within Indigenous student communities, difficult and emotional struggles continue in the form of lateral violence - violence derived from extensive historical colonization and oppression. Drawing on twenty-seven open-ended interviews with Indigenous students at three Ontario universities this project investigates what role lateral violence is playing within these post-secondary institutions. How are students seeking and securing community, power and resources within the post-secondary environment? And how do these experiences vary by gender, class and other intersecting social categories? The data demonstrates that lateral violence is a serious concern for Indigenous students and the colonized university environment continues to exacerbate the problem. However, Indigenous students are developing awareness and strategies that enable them to move beyond the lateral violence and find success.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.
Notes
1 Within this paper, the terms “internalized oppression” and “internalized colonialism” are being used concurrently, as in the context of Indigenous peoples in Canada they are inextricably linked.
2 Allostatic Load – “the accumulating physiological wear and tear that results from repeated or chronic stress” (Bombay, Matheson, and Anisman Citation2014, 2)
3 Two years after this interview was completed, the university in question did construct a wigwam as an addition to their cultural gathering spaces.