Library and Academic Services: Sexual Violence Awareness -- Education, Prevention and Supports: Black, Indigenous, and People of Colour

Introduction

Black, Indigenous, and
People of Colour

The following resources examine sexual assault and other forms of sexual violence, as experienced by Black, Indigenous, and People of Colour. These resources are included throughout the guide but have been consolidated here as well for ease of review.

Systemic oppression based on race and gender has meant that certain groups of women, including Indigenous and racialized women, disproportionately experience sexual assault and acts of sexual violence. It is important to understand these realities and risk factors in order to address underlying violence, plan successful preventative interventions, and to provide culturally-sensitive care.

Image source: Pixabay.com

Web-based Video Resources

Gender-Based Violence Through an Intersectional Lens

This presentation will provide a quick overview of pop culture and the media’s continuation and perpetuation of sexual violence, highlighting the interrelationship of anti-black racism, colorism, fatphobia and disability. Participants will leave having a better understanding of the erasure experienced by survivors from BIPOC communities and resources and tools to better show up as allies.

Why is violence against Indigenous women and girls everyone’s concern?

In 2015, Prime Minster Justin Trudeau called a National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls. And that came after 40 years of activism on the part of Indigenous women. Over that period, there were significant numbers of missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls across Canada. They are about four per cent of the population, but they make up about 15 to 20 per cent of the homicide cases in this country. ...

A 21st century Indigenous woman's experience | TED Talks
Carmen Yupe, a resilience builder, discusses the trauma experienced by women on reservations. In taking a risk to share her story, Carmen is able to bring to light her own brilliance and ingenuity while sharing how Indigenous people across the US are changing the world.
Black Girls and Sexual Violence | Déjà Lewis-Nwalipenja | TEDxDrewUniversity
Déjà Lewis-Nwalipenja (CLA ‘20) is a Drew student from Philadelphia, PA majoring in Political Science with a minor in Sociology. She is deeply passionate about the issues of young Black women concerning race, gender, class and the tensions between these identities. For Deja, being means having a deep connection with one's inner self and the world around them. It means understanding the true meaning of life and learning how each individual can make a difference.
Breaking Big | Roxane Gay
See how Gay, child of Haitian immigrants, transcended expectations to become a leading voice in the feminist movement with her essay collection "Bad Feminist." How did she convert a painful childhood into a career that helped women around the world?
I'm Taking My Body Back | Rupi Kaur | TEDxKC
Using a mix of poetry and narrative, Rupi Kaur weaves together a powerful and cathartic story – which in spite of great trauma, ends where it begins – by restoring the feeling of home within your body.

warning: this talk contains descriptions of sexual violence which may be triggering to survivors.
Indigenous Women and the Story of Canada | Sarah Robinson | Walrus Talks
Sarah Robinson is a proud citizen of the Fort Nelson First Nation and the Saulteau First Nation in Treaty Eight territory. She currently serves the Minister’s Advisory Council on Aboriginal Women, which advises the government on improving quality of life for Aboriginal women in British Columbia. She is the principal at Rainwatch Consulting and an Action Canada Fellow.
Peace River Rising: The link between violence against Indigenous women and violence against the land
Helen Knott, a Dane-Zaa/Nehiyaw social worker, poet and activist, explores the connection between violence against Indigenous women and violence against the land. Helen takes us through the dramatic changes she’s witnessed in her home territory. Woodlands she explored as a child have disappeared to make way for pipelines and housing developments to accommodate the influx of transient workers.
Roots and Resistance Webinar presented by Yamikani Msosa
Roots and Resistance is a webinar that explores in depth conversations about the connections between sexual violence, state violence, and healing from collective and individual sexual abuse and trauma for Black survivors.
We are more than murdered and missing. | Tamara Bernard | TEDxThunderBay
With a talk that encourages hope, love, empowerment, and igniting a new way of learning together as a nation, Tamara lays bare the world of violence impacting indigenous women. Wearing a high heel on one foot, and a moccasin on the other....we view things through her lens, where indigenous women are more than "murdered and missing". Much more.
Women of colour are often left out of conversations about violence — they shouldn't be
December 2019 marks 30 years since the Polytechnique massacre in Montreal. Since then, there have been countless movements and conversations about violence against women. And when it comes to physical and sexual abuse, all women are at risk despite their age, race or income level, according to the Canadian Women’s Foundation. However, there are added layers and barriers when that conversation looks at racialized women. In this episode of Living In Colour, we take a look at the violence against women of colour, and how cultural barriers, community stigmas and racial stereotypes can normalize abusive behaviour.

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Reports, Papers and Articles

Basic and immediate sexual violence resources for Somali Canadians
A listing of resources for provinces with a high Somali population.
Canada: Discrimination and Violence against Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgender Women and Gender Diverse and Two Spirit People on the Basis of Sexual Orientation, Gender Identity and Gender Expression (Egale)
The State party should ensure that its public policies and legislation related to gender and sexual-based violence are explicitly attentive to the heightened risks lesbian, bisexual, and transgender (LBT) women, especially Indigenous women and women with multiple marginalized identities, as well as gender diverse and Two Spirit people face with regard to violence.
K Amanda Maranzan, Roseanna Hudson, Rosemary Scofich, Melody McGregor, & Rachel Seguin. (2018). “It’s a lot of work, and I’m still doing it”: Indigenous perceptions of help after sexual abuse and sexual violence. International Journal of Indigenous Health
This project used a sequential exploratory design to learn about what Canadian Indigenous people found helpful for dealing with the impacts of sexual abuse and sexual violence, as well as facilitators and barriers to service use. Participants resided in Thunder Bay, Ontario, Canada and identified primarily as Ojibway, Oji-Cree, Cree, and Métis. Talking Circles and individual interviews were integrated with quantitative survey data.
Preventing campus sexual assault isn’t just about sex. It’s also about race. (Washington Post)
Our goal was to generate insights that would help prevent sexual assaults. Men commit the vast majority of assaults, and such violence is frequently described as “gender-based.” But the way Carl navigated intimacy cannot be read through the lens of gender alone. It was inseparable from his experiences as a black man.
Victimization of Indigenous Women and Girls
While all women and girls in Canadian society face an unacceptable risk of violence, particularly at the hands of intimate partners, research shows that Indigenous women and girls self-report experiencing dramatically higher rates of violent victimization.

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Library Resources

Murdered and Missing Indigenous Women and Girls (Library guide)
"We will find the truth by gathering many stories from many people."
This guide is to assist you in locating resources about MMIWG in Canada. Here you will find links to books, ebooks, journals, databases, videos, websites and more about the women.
Ch.13 - Sexual violence and It's Impact on physical, Mental and Psychological Health (Northern and Indigenous Health and Health Care)
Sexual violence is defined as, “any sexual act, attempt to obtain a sexual act, unwanted sexual comments, or advances, or acts to traffic, or otherwise directed, against a person’s sexuality using coercion, by any person regardless of their relationship to the victim, in any setting, including but not limited to home and work” (Krug, Dahlberg, Mercy, Zwi, & Lozano, 2002, p. 149). Women are seven times likely to be victims of sexual violence compared to men (Statistics Canada, 2017). This chapter is devoted to a discussion related to sexual violence against women, its effects and ways to address it.
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Exner-Pirot, H., B. Norbye and L. Butler (eds.) (2018). Northern and Indigenous Health and Health Care. Saskatoon, Saskatchewan: University of Saskatchewan. (OER from UofS)

At the Dark End of the Street: Black Women, Rape, and Resistance--A New History of the Civil Rights Movement from Rosa Parks to the Rise of Black Power by Danielle L. McGuire
Publication Date: 2011
McGuire writes about the rape in 1944 of a twenty-four-year-old mother and sharecropper, Recy Taylor, who strolled toward home after an evening of singing and praying at the Rock Hill Holiness Church in Abbeville, Alabama. The president of the local NAACP branch office sent his best investigator and organizer--Rosa Parks--to Abbeville. In taking on this case, Parks launched a movement that exposed a ritualized history of sexual assault against Black women and added fire to the growing call for change.
This book is not available through OneSearch, but you can request it through our Inter-Library Loan service.
A mind spread out on the ground by Elliott, Alicia,
Location: E 78 .C2 E487 2019 (Located at NDC)
A Mind Spread Out on the Ground is a personal and critical meditation on trauma, legacy, oppression and racism in North America. In an urgent and visceral work that asks essential questions about Native people in North America while drawing on intimate details of her own life and experience with intergenerational trauma, Alicia Elliott offers indispensable insight and understanding to the ongoing legacy of colonialism. What are the links between depression, colonialism and loss of language--both figurative and literal? ...
In My Own Moccasins by Helen Knott
Location: ebook
Publication Date: 2020
An unflinching memoir of addiction, intergenerational trauma, and the wounds of sexual assault from a resilient, emerging Indigenous voice. Helen Knott, a highly accomplished Indigenous woman, seems to have it all. But in her memoir, she offers a different perspective. In My Own Moccasins is an unflinching account of addiction, intergenerational trauma, and the wounds brought on by sexual violence...
I Will Survive: The African-American Guide to Healing from Sexual Assault and Abuse by Lori S. Robinson
Publication Date: 2003
Robinson has created a valuable resource for African-American survivors of sexual assault (as well as their families, friends, and communities). Robinson walks readers through the ways survivors can achieve emotional, physical, sexual, and spiritual healing, reflecting her firsthand insight into the particular difficulties African-Americans face on their journey toward recovery. ...
This book is not available through OneSearch, but you can request it through our Inter-Library Loan service.
Seeking Mino-Pimatisiwin: an aboriginal approach to helping by Michael Hart
Location: E 98 .S46 H37 2002 (Located at NDC)
Publication Date: 2002
Historically, social work and psychology professions have pressured and coerced Aboriginal peoples to follow the euro-centric ways of society. The needs of Aboriginal peoples have not been successfully addressed by helping professioan due to a limited attempt to incorporate Aboriginal perspectives and practices of helping. Michael Hart briefly discusses colonization from an Aboriginal perspective, ontological imperialism, social work's role in colonial oppression, and the dynamic of resistance. ...
Decolonizing Trauma Work: Indigenous stories and strategies by Renee Linklater
Location: RC 451.5 .I5 L56 2014 (Located at NDC)
Publication Date: 2014
In Decolonizing Trauma Work, Renee Linklater explores healing and wellness in Indigenous communities on Turtle Island. Drawing on a decolonizing approach, which puts the "soul wound" of colonialism at the centre, Linklater engages ten Indigenous health care practitioners in a dialogue regarding Indigenous notions of wellness and wholistic health, critiques of psychiatry and psychiatric diagnoses, and Indigenous approaches to helping people through trauma, depression and experiences of parallel and multiple realities. ...
My Grandmother’s Hands: Racialized Trauma And The Pathway To Mending Our Hearts And Bodies by Resmaa Menakem
Publication Date: 2017
Therapist Resmaa Menakem examines the damage caused by racism in America from the perspective of trauma and body-centered psychology. The body is where our instincts reside and where we fight, flee, or freeze, and it endures the trauma inflicted by the ills that plague society. Menakem argues this destruction will continue until Americans learn to heal the generational anguish of white supremacy, which is deeply embedded in all our bodies. Our collective agony doesn't just affect African Americans. White Americans suffer their own secondary trauma as well. So do blue Americans—our police.
This book is not available through OneSearch, but you can request it through our Inter-Library Loan service.
Indigenous Healing Psychology: Honoring the Wisdom of the First Peoples by Richard Katz Ph.D
Publication Date: 2017
Wherever the first inhabitants of the world gathered together, they engaged in the human concerns of community building, interpersonal relations, and spiritual understanding. As such these earliest people became our “first psychologists.” Their wisdom lives on through the teachings of contemporary Indigenous elders and healers, offering unique insights and practices to help us revision the self-limiting approaches of modern psychology and enhance the processes of healing and social justice.
This book is not available through OneSearch, but you can request it through our Inter-Library Loan service.

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Recommended Websites

2SLGBTQQIA Fact Sheet (NWAC)
A breakdown of terminology
BIPOC Mental Health Worker List
A Winnipeg resource for Black, Indigenous, and Persons of Colour identifying counsellors, therapists, and peer workers! Many intersecting identities of professionals, varying or no cost, and city-wide locations available. The list has been compiled by Central Neighbourhoods (Central Park, Centennial, and West Alexander.)
Black Survivors and Sexual Trauma (Time's up)
Black women are subjected to both racism and sexism — a double bind that puts black women at higher risk for sexual violence. Research shows that As many as six in 10 black women report being subjected to coercive sexual contact by age 18; and Black women report experiencing sexual harassment at work at three times the rate of white women.
Black women and sexual assault (Ujima)
A statistics infographic on black women and sexual assault.
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Launched in 2016, Ujima, Inc.: The National Center on Violence Against Women in the Black Community serves as a national, culturally-specific services issue resource center to provide support to and be a voice for the Black Community in response to domestic, sexual and community violence. Ujima was founded in response to a need for an active approach to ending domestic, sexual and community violence in the Black community.
Elders-in-Residence
Our Elders-in-Residence are here to support education through Indigenous ways of teaching, learning and leading. They play an important role in student and staff health, wellness, and cultural and spiritual development. They are here to support all students and staff at Red River College. Located in the Indigenous Student Support Centres at the Notre Dame and Exchange District Campuses, Elders-in-Residence offer cultural teaching sessions, one-on-one appointments, classroom visits and lead ceremonies.
Ka Ni Kanichihk – Heart Medicine Lodge
Ka Ni Kanichihk is a trusted heart of Winnipeg’s Indigenous community. Our vision is to lead our people back home to a place where we are self-determining, healthy, happy, and respected for our cultural and spiritual strengths and ways of being.
Self-Care for the Aboriginal Professional - Culture, Spiritual Health and Balance (AFOA)
These slides offer perspective for self-care for the Indigenous professional
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AFOA Canada was founded as a not-for-profit association in 1999 to help Indigenous people better manage and govern their communities and organizations through a focus on enhancing management, finance and governance practices and skills. AFOA Canada’s premise is that one of the keys to successful self-determination, creating a better life for Canada’s Indigenous people and a better future for the next generation lies in improving the management skills of those responsible for the stewardship of Indigenous resources.
Two-Spirit People - Indigenous Health & Well-Being (Library guide)
Here you can find resources specific to Two-spirit people as part of the larger Indigenous Health & Well-Being Guide
We, As Ourselves
Black survivors have been a key part of defining moments to call out sexual violence. Yet, as movements to address sexual violence have emerged, Black survivors’ experiences and stories have gone underexamined—and worse, Black survivors have been silenced or received backlash when they speak out.

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Sexual Violence Awareness -- Education, Prevention and Supports

On this page

Indigenous Peoples

Introduction

Black, Indigenous, and
People of Colour

Web-based Video Resources

Gender-Based Violence Through an Intersectional Lens

Why is violence against Indigenous women and girls everyone’s concern?

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Reports, Papers and Articles

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Library Resources

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Recommended Websites

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Provide Feedback