Glen Coulthard is an associate professor in First Nations and Indigenous Studies and in the Department of Political Science. Glen has written and published numerous articles and chapters in the areas of contemporary political theory, Indigenous thought and politics, and radical social and political thought (marxism, anarchism, post-colonialism). He is a co-founder of Dechinta Centre for Research and Learning, a decolonial, Indigenous land-based post-secondary program operating on his traditional territories in Denendeh (Northwest Territories). He is Yellowknives Dene. Glen is our 2023-24 Distinguished Visiting Indigenous Faculty Fellow.
What are your main research interests?
My main interests are political theory and Indigenous politics. I mostly focus mostly on the intersections of radical social and political thought as adapted and applied by Indigenous activists in their struggles for self-determination.
What project are you working on at the JHI and why did you choose it?
I'm working on a book that looks at the ways that certain concepts within the global dissemination of Maoism where taken up by Indigenous communities and applied to their own land struggles here during the 60s and 70s. It's ultimately about the radical mutations that theory undergoes as it travels through time, space and different landscapes.
How has your JHI Fellowship experience been so far?
Honestly, I am looking forward to the time I've been afforded to sit with my ideas, and the brilliant people I get to chat with along the way.
Can you share something you read/watched/listened to recently that you enjoyed/were inspired by?
Yikes. Great question: as far as reading goes, I really enjoyed Michael Hardt's new book on the radically subversive movements of the 1970s (The Subversive Seventies). It opened a lot of pathways in my current project, which was great. It was especially cool to get to sit down with him after a recent book talk he did here at U of T.
What is a fun fact about you?
Currently I feel like political theorist trying to masquerade as a historian, and its not going smoothly.