Decolonizing Wilderness Adventure Narratives

For some outdoor enthusiasts, the word “wilderness” means “free of people”. This book shows that many beloved stories of outdoor adventure forget that people have lived in and with the natural spaces of North America since long before Europeans arrived. When we read Western narratives in partnership with Indigenous authored narratives, a new paradigm of human-nature relations begins to emerge.

Divided into three sections, the book creates a conversation between texts by non-Indigenous and Indigenous writers. Nature adventure stories by non-Indigenous writers can re-colonize space and perceptions of space whereas narratives from Indigenous writers demonstrate that “nature” (or land) is neither empty nor ownable—not an object but rather a relation. The first section, “Growing,” delves into literature for children and young adults about adventures in outdoor spaces. “Moving” explores the joy and struggle of outdoor athleticism, and “Dwelling,” examines stories of “being in place” to seek out how relationship with land is defined.

As Cree writer Harold Johnson has pointed out, stories define our inner worlds and then also come to define the outer world around us. This book brings together two very different approaches to nature writing to initiate a dialogue between Western and Indigenous literary responses to experiencing land. Ultimately, Decolonizing Wilderness Adventure Narratives aims to reorient the stories of the land (including its peoples) from one of ownership to one of respectful relationship.

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