Irreconcilable : Indigeneity and the Violence of Colonial Erasure in Contemporary Canada

Since the early 2000s, the Canadian government has attempted reconciliation with Indigenous nations through varied efforts: treaty processes, government commissions, rebranding campaigns for settler-owned businesses, workshops for state and local officials, school curriculum changes, and a recently christened national holiday However, as Joseph Weiss argues, these state-driven initiatives reinforce Indigenous subordination to the settler state.This incisive study of the varied responses from both Indigenous Nations and individuals to reconciliation illuminates how it is implicated in ongoing colonial erasure. Critically engaging with a variety of fields, including Indigenous studies, anthropology, history, political theory, semiotics, and museum studies, Weiss captures the multiple scales at which these contested dynamics unfold and explores their underlying technologies of erasure.Irreconcilable unpacks how reconciliation offers amends for anti-Indigenous violence while disavowing res