Waaseyaa’sin Christine Sy

photo of a woman with long hair and rectangular glasses. She is standing by a tree with a big winter jacket on

Waaseyaa’sin Christine Sy (2014–2015) is Ojibway Anishinaabe of mixed ancestry from Bawatig (Sault Ste. Marie, ON). Her mother is from Obishkikaang (Lac Seul First Nation), Northwestern Ontario and her father, from Bell Island, Newfoundland. Her PhD thesis, “Following the Trees Home: anishinaabe’ikawewag yaawaag ishkigamiziganing (Anishinaabe Women at the Boiling Place), elucidates Anishinaabe sovereignty, nationhood, governance through an examination of the historicity of women’s relationship with the sugar bush, particularly during the time of harvesting sap and producing maple sugar. Grounded in Anishinaabeg narratives, which reveals the primacy of women in the relationship with the sugar bush, documentary, photographic evidence, and oral evidence is theorized at various historical periods through a lens of Anishinaabeg knowledges including relationship with land and water and relationship with windigo—settler colonialism, capitalism, and heteropatriarchy. Land and water rematriation through the will of the Anishinabeg Nation is envisioned for the future. Christine is a mother, poet, language and land-based learner and educator. She has recently accepted a position as Assistant Professor in Gender Studies at University of Victoria (British Columbia, Canada) to commence summer 2016.