Tansi Nîtôtemtik,
“The Daddies.” Acrylic on canvas 60” x 112.5” (2016). Image retrieved from: <www.kentmonkman.com/painting/2017/1/9/the-daddies>.
Today’s post discusses the work of Kent Monkman, a queer and Two-Spirit painter, filmmaker, and performance artist from the Fish River Cree Nation in northern Manitoba.[1] Monkman is internationally renown, with his work being showcased throughout Canada, the United States, and Europe.[2] His art depicts the intersections of his Indigenous, queer, and Two-Spirit identities.
Two-Spirit is a distinctly Indigenous identity that “reflects traditional [Indigenous] gender diversity, including the fluid nature of gender and sexual identity and its interconnectedness with spirituality and traditional worldviews.”[3] Albert McLeod first coined the term at the 1990 Inter-Tribal Native American/First Nations Gay and Lesbian conference held in Winnipeg. Two-Spirit is a translation of the Anishinaabemowin “niizh manidoowag.”[4] The use of Two-Spirit replaced the out-dated “berdache,” which is viewed as offensive and inappropriate.[5]
Two-Spirit often refers “specifically to the cultural roles of individuals who embody both female and male spirits.”[6] However, Two-Spirit is also sometimes used to describe Indigenous peoples who identify as LGBTQ+. Moreover, Indigenous peoples may use terms from their own languages to describe their sexual or gender-variant identities. Approximately two-thirds of Indigenous languages in North America include words that describe someone as being neither male nor female.[7] For example, the Mi’kmaq term “Geenumu Gessalagee” means “he loves men” and may be used to describe a gay Indigenous man.[8] The Lakota “winkt” and Dinéh (Navajo) “nàdleehé” both refer to men who perform traditionally feminine social roles in their community.[9]
While Two-Spirit is a pan-Indigenous term, its meaning varies from nation to nation. The roles associated with Two-Spirit individuals can include, inter alia, teachers, healers, caregivers, medicine peoples, hunters, or warriors.[10] It is important to note, “Two-Spirit people contributed alongside heterosexual, cisgender men and women in the maintenance of Indigenous legal, cultural and spiritual systems.”[11] Two-Spirit people were invaluable members of traditional Indigenous societies.
Canadian policies of assimilation imposed rigid gender roles and forced hetero-patriarchal marriage systems on Indigenous peoples. Adherence to these systems was required in order to gain rights and status.[12] Residential schools further enforced the European gender binary through the use of gendered clothing and hairstyles as well as the physical separation of boys and girls in different dorms.[13] This resulted in the erasure of Two-Spirit people and the suppression of their identity in Indigenous societies; but despite this oppression, Two-Spirit people continue to exist and enrich their communities today.
Although we need to resist the temptation to romanticize and idealize pre-colonial Indigenous societies as being “uniformly accepting of gender and sexual fluidity, research and oral histories reflect widespread respect and honour for Two-Spirit people.”[14] Furthermore, Two-Spirit folks are continuing to reclaim and assert their identities. These efforts are critically important for decolonization and creating strong and resilient Indigenous communities.[15]
Using humour and satire, Monkman flips the colonial narrative that has been historically thrust upon Indigenous peoples. Monkman argues that the Judeo-Christian beliefs of European settlers demonized homosexuality and gender variance in Indigenous communities. His art explicitly challenges these colonial assumptions.[16] He regularly performs as the character Miss Chief Share Eagle Testickle, a play on the words “mischief,” “Cher” (the American singer and actress), and “egotistical.” Monkman’s “glamorous gender fluid alter-ego ... appears in much of his work as a time travelling, shape shifting and supernatural being, who reverses the colonial gaze, upending received notions of history and Indigenous people.”[17] His Louis Vuitton loving, high heel wearing, flamboyant caricature lambasts colonial prudishness. At the same time, Monkman’s paintings often mimic the 19th Century Hudson River School art movement.[18] His surreal, bizarre, and sometimes erotic style critiques how Indigenous peoples are viewed in the colonial imagination and represented in Canadian history.
Much of Monkman’s work focuses on the history of colonialism and its effects on Indigenous peoples in Canada, especially as it is felt currently. Monkman maintains that the harmful and deadly colonialism of the past is alive and well today. In an interview with APTN, Monkman referred to the recent Supreme Court of Canada case, Mikisew Cree First Nation v Canada (Governor General in Council),[19] as yet “another example of the policies of colonial government used to deny, to remove, to dispossess [Indigenous peoples].”[20] By articulating his uniquely Indigenous perspective through the medium of art, Monkman aims to highlight issues such as Indigenous over-representation in prisons; the removal of children and their subsequent placement in foster care systems; life on reserves; and the loss of languages.[21] His paintings depicting the 60s Scoop and state violence against Indigenous women and protestors brings this out in painful and graphic detail.
Two-Spirit folks face unique challenges, including discrimination from members of their own community as well as homophobia, transphobia, and racism from Canadian society writ large.[22] Artists like Monkman inspire Two-Spirit empowerment, which is a vital part of reconciliation.
Until next time,
Team Reconcili-Action YEG
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[1] Russel Bingham, “Kent Monkman” (last updated 3 February 2017), online: The Canadian Encyclopedia <www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/kent-monkman>.
[2] Ibid.
[3] Sarah Hunt, “An Introduction to the Health of Two-Spirit People: Historical, Contemporary and Emergent Issues” (2016) at 7, online (pdf): National Collaborating Centre for Aboriginal Health <www.ccnsa-nccah.ca/docs/emerging/RPT-HealthTwoSpirit-Hunt-EN.pdf>.
[4] “Two-Spirit Community” (no date), online: Re:Searching for LGBTQ2S+ Health <lgbtqhealth.ca/community/two-spirit.php>.
[5] “Two Spirit 101” (no date), online: NativeOUT <web.archive.org/web/20141210110520/http://nativeout.com/twospirit-rc/two-spirit-101/>.
[6] Hunt, supra note 3 at 7.
[7] Ibid.
[8] “Two-Spirit Community”, supra note 4.
[9] Ibid.
[10] Maddalena Genovese & Davina D Roussell, “Safe and Caring Schools for Two Spirit Youth: A Guide for Teachers and Students” (2011) at 9, online (pdf): The Society for Safe & Caring Schools & Communities <www.safeandcaring.ca/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/Two-Spirited-Web-Booklet.pdf>.
[11] Hunt, supra note 3 at 7.
[12] Ibid at 9.
[13] Ibid.
[14] Ibid at 7.
[15] Ibid at 21.
[16] Bingham, supra note 1.
[17] “Biography” (no date), online: Kent Monkman <www.kentmonkman.com/biography/>.
[18] Bingham, supra note 1.
[19] 2018 SCC 40.
[20] Angel Moore, “Kent Monkman’s Painting of the Harsh Truths of Colonialism Finds a Home in Halifax”, APTN National News (21 October 2018), online: <aptnnews.ca/2018/10/21/kent-monkmans-painting-of-the-harsh-truth-of-colonialism-finds-a-home-in-halifax/>.
[21] Ibid.
[22] Hunt, supra note 3 at 12.
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