What do you think?
Rate this book
Nishga
From Griffin Poetry Prize winner Jordan Abel comes a groundbreaking, deeply personal, and devastating autobiographical meditation that attempts to address the complicated legacies of Canada's residential school system and contemporary Indigenous existence.
As a Nisga'a writer, Jordan Abel often finds himself in a position where he is asked to explain his relationship to Nisga'a language, Nisga'a community, and Nisga'a cultural knowledge. However, as an intergenerational survivor of residential school--both of his grandparents attended the same residential school--his relationship to his own Indigenous identity is complicated to say the least.
NISHGA explores those complications and is invested in understanding how the colonial violence originating at the Coqualeetza Indian Residential School impacted his grandparents' generation, then his father's generation, and ultimately his own. The project is rooted in a desire to illuminate the realities of intergenerational survivors of residential school, but sheds light on Indigenous experiences that may not seem to be immediately (or inherently) Indigenous.
Drawing on autobiography and a series of interconnected documents (including pieces of memoir, transcriptions of talks, and photography), NISHGA is a book about confronting difficult truths and it is about how both Indigenous and non-Indigenous peoples engage with a history of colonial violence that is quite often rendered invisible.
As a Nisga'a writer, Jordan Abel often finds himself in a position where he is asked to explain his relationship to Nisga'a language, Nisga'a community, and Nisga'a cultural knowledge. However, as an intergenerational survivor of residential school--both of his grandparents attended the same residential school--his relationship to his own Indigenous identity is complicated to say the least.
NISHGA explores those complications and is invested in understanding how the colonial violence originating at the Coqualeetza Indian Residential School impacted his grandparents' generation, then his father's generation, and ultimately his own. The project is rooted in a desire to illuminate the realities of intergenerational survivors of residential school, but sheds light on Indigenous experiences that may not seem to be immediately (or inherently) Indigenous.
Drawing on autobiography and a series of interconnected documents (including pieces of memoir, transcriptions of talks, and photography), NISHGA is a book about confronting difficult truths and it is about how both Indigenous and non-Indigenous peoples engage with a history of colonial violence that is quite often rendered invisible.
288 pages, Hardcover
First published January 19, 2021
11 people are currently reading
1073 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 30 of 65 reviews
February 7, 2020
Teachers from high school through post-graduate studies, take note: this book belongs in the classroom.
What does it mean to be dislocated? What does it mean to only have access to your personal and familial history through fragments and scraps--some of which you aren't even aware are connected to you in the moment? These are some of the questions that Jordan Abel confronts in NISHGA.
While it's true that from the standpoint of commercially available biographies/mempirs, what Abel is doing here is novel. However, I think that it is important to acknowledge that for many Indigenous folks, it is a reality that they cannot conceptualize their personal histories in a non-linear manner.
This is an important book because it gives Indigenous and non-Indigenous people a concrete visual of what it is like to try to piece together a history, when a person and their people have been displaced and directly targeted by colonial genocide.
What does it mean to be dislocated? What does it mean to only have access to your personal and familial history through fragments and scraps--some of which you aren't even aware are connected to you in the moment? These are some of the questions that Jordan Abel confronts in NISHGA.
While it's true that from the standpoint of commercially available biographies/mempirs, what Abel is doing here is novel. However, I think that it is important to acknowledge that for many Indigenous folks, it is a reality that they cannot conceptualize their personal histories in a non-linear manner.
This is an important book because it gives Indigenous and non-Indigenous people a concrete visual of what it is like to try to piece together a history, when a person and their people have been displaced and directly targeted by colonial genocide.
Read
April 1, 2022This was a truly spectacular and deeply personal work about indigeneity, urban indigenous identity, and generational trauma from residential schools. I really enjoyed the nuanced, insightful, and introspective way Jordan Abel pieced together Nishga, including photographs, transcriptions, notes, his father’s artwork, excerpts from Empty Spaces, and even screenshots from websites. It is a purposeful and impactful way of exploring the main themes Abel discusses in the book: the exploration of what can and can’t be found on the page when writing about indigeneity, and how empty space or new forms can be a way to explore an identity fragmented by our country’s colonial history and the generational impact of residential schools.
I really enjoyed how all of the components of this book came together. I got to read and discover a very heartfelt, complex, and powerful outlook on how Abel navigated his own personal identity and history, how certain scholarship and literature have tremendously let down indigenous people, and how piecing together these fragments is a duty, a burden, a witnessing, and so much more.
I loved this, learned from this, and found it heartbreaking all at the same time. If you get the chance to read this, you should.
I really enjoyed how all of the components of this book came together. I got to read and discover a very heartfelt, complex, and powerful outlook on how Abel navigated his own personal identity and history, how certain scholarship and literature have tremendously let down indigenous people, and how piecing together these fragments is a duty, a burden, a witnessing, and so much more.
I loved this, learned from this, and found it heartbreaking all at the same time. If you get the chance to read this, you should.
November 16, 2021
Constructing this book had to be a painful experience for Abel. I cannot imagine. Reading this was truly an experience: we get photos, transcripts, documents, images, family history, personal experiences, poetry, police reports, etc. Themes: trauma, residential schools, colonization. Devastating, hard-hitting; a beautiful book.
November 25, 2021
Essentially a presentation of Abel’s identity, and struggle therein, this book uses a few different formats and structures to fully encapsulate everything he is saying. And it is honestly incredibly affecting and an amazing thing to consume; especially as it progresses and things become more clear.
There are transcripts of a lecture he has done, as well as, at the end, a really helpful transcript of his dissertation defence. But throughout it there are also mixed media set pieces displayed as you would see them at a gallery viewing. Beside them are “notes”, again as you would read them for context at such an event. Only they are his lived experience, very epistolary in nature.
And so you initially can’t make that much sense of the object beyond a unique aesthetic. (Or at least, I couldn’t). There is a graphic, clearly indigenous superimposed over text. Sometimes things appear redacted. Always there is never the full context. There is text in the background, or sometimes it fills the superimposed image. Though other times they’re filled with photographs, conforming to the image dimensions, against redacting the full context of the image.
As you consume it, you are told what the text is and why everything is the way it is. What this means, ultimately, and what Abel is expressing, is unique, unconventional, and, perhaps ironically, provides so much context for what he is trying to get across to the reader, I feel like “trying to get across” would be an understatement. I think you might have to intentionally misconstrue it, if you didn’t understand the breadth of what is on these pages. If only because of how much additional support there is than, say, a memoir or biography, or something conventional.
The transcripts go so far as to have time codes. At the time, I wasn’t sure why. But as you read, you actually fall into the time gaps and can feel the pulse of it, noting the seconds elapsed and the formatting that moves one paragraph onto the second line to denote the seconds passing. It’s surprisingly immersive. What’s more is it feels right. Abel isn’t simply producing the same theses, he is tailoring it to the form and function of the medium of the book; while subtly communicating the amount of time, in this case, years, he has been speaking about this and trying to come to grips with his identity. At least one lecture is years old.
The subject is a springboard into some of the most complex and difficult issues to unpack in Canada. And the people who have to sort it are the people impacted by it. Indigenous people like Abel were displaced from family and their culture. The irreparable harm residential schools have had is such that even people fully grown, and now scholars, are still grappling with it. And so Abel’s Nishga is about much larger things than himself.
It is crushing and in inexcusable that the marginalized and traumatized have to produce their pain to make people listen and engage with the issues. But it seems to be the only way white people ever speak about these things. This country and our systems and institutions are proud to embody the exact definition of insanity. Abel speaks about the cost of producing this artifact on his personhood. The least I think people could do is read it. As others have said: it should be required reading material. Here in Alberta, when I was a kid, residential schools weren’t mentioned at all.
There are transcripts of a lecture he has done, as well as, at the end, a really helpful transcript of his dissertation defence. But throughout it there are also mixed media set pieces displayed as you would see them at a gallery viewing. Beside them are “notes”, again as you would read them for context at such an event. Only they are his lived experience, very epistolary in nature.
And so you initially can’t make that much sense of the object beyond a unique aesthetic. (Or at least, I couldn’t). There is a graphic, clearly indigenous superimposed over text. Sometimes things appear redacted. Always there is never the full context. There is text in the background, or sometimes it fills the superimposed image. Though other times they’re filled with photographs, conforming to the image dimensions, against redacting the full context of the image.
As you consume it, you are told what the text is and why everything is the way it is. What this means, ultimately, and what Abel is expressing, is unique, unconventional, and, perhaps ironically, provides so much context for what he is trying to get across to the reader, I feel like “trying to get across” would be an understatement. I think you might have to intentionally misconstrue it, if you didn’t understand the breadth of what is on these pages. If only because of how much additional support there is than, say, a memoir or biography, or something conventional.
The transcripts go so far as to have time codes. At the time, I wasn’t sure why. But as you read, you actually fall into the time gaps and can feel the pulse of it, noting the seconds elapsed and the formatting that moves one paragraph onto the second line to denote the seconds passing. It’s surprisingly immersive. What’s more is it feels right. Abel isn’t simply producing the same theses, he is tailoring it to the form and function of the medium of the book; while subtly communicating the amount of time, in this case, years, he has been speaking about this and trying to come to grips with his identity. At least one lecture is years old.
The subject is a springboard into some of the most complex and difficult issues to unpack in Canada. And the people who have to sort it are the people impacted by it. Indigenous people like Abel were displaced from family and their culture. The irreparable harm residential schools have had is such that even people fully grown, and now scholars, are still grappling with it. And so Abel’s Nishga is about much larger things than himself.
It is crushing and in inexcusable that the marginalized and traumatized have to produce their pain to make people listen and engage with the issues. But it seems to be the only way white people ever speak about these things. This country and our systems and institutions are proud to embody the exact definition of insanity. Abel speaks about the cost of producing this artifact on his personhood. The least I think people could do is read it. As others have said: it should be required reading material. Here in Alberta, when I was a kid, residential schools weren’t mentioned at all.
July 1, 2021
Today is Canada Day. Over the years how I feel and celebrate this day has changed a lot. With the recent recovering of childrens remains on former residential school locations across Canada I am more aware than ever of Canada's past and what our government and churches have done to the Indigenous communities in Canada. Much work needs to be done. Much listening to Indigenous peoples on what they need at this time needs to be done. Difficult conversations with our families and especially our children about Canada's horrific legacy need to be done.
Throughout June, which was Indigenous History Month, I read this brilliant, painful and groundbreaking memoir. This is not a book to be devoured but a book to slowly take in and reflect on. This book is essential in understanding the fallout of residential schools. Abel shares of what it was like growing up disconnected from his Nishga roots, of tracing his families history in residential schools and offering insight on being an intergenerational survivor, of his mental health struggles and his experience of Indigeneity. I was moved and brokenhearted as I read this. Such a powerful, and poetic piece. The way Abel blends photography, images, documents, transcripts and memoir was a very inovative way to share his story. Abel is from B.C. so much of this centers around locales near me which I found interesting. I am not an own voice reviewer for this book so I reccomend seeking out thoes reviews but I have hope this book helps Indigenous readers to feel seen, heard and helps them to heal in some way. Absolutely reccomended reading. I strongly think this book should be a part of the school curriculum too, it would be a great teaching tool for educating future generations.
•
For more of my book content check out instagram.com/bookalong
Throughout June, which was Indigenous History Month, I read this brilliant, painful and groundbreaking memoir. This is not a book to be devoured but a book to slowly take in and reflect on. This book is essential in understanding the fallout of residential schools. Abel shares of what it was like growing up disconnected from his Nishga roots, of tracing his families history in residential schools and offering insight on being an intergenerational survivor, of his mental health struggles and his experience of Indigeneity. I was moved and brokenhearted as I read this. Such a powerful, and poetic piece. The way Abel blends photography, images, documents, transcripts and memoir was a very inovative way to share his story. Abel is from B.C. so much of this centers around locales near me which I found interesting. I am not an own voice reviewer for this book so I reccomend seeking out thoes reviews but I have hope this book helps Indigenous readers to feel seen, heard and helps them to heal in some way. Absolutely reccomended reading. I strongly think this book should be a part of the school curriculum too, it would be a great teaching tool for educating future generations.
•
For more of my book content check out instagram.com/bookalong
June 30, 2021
This is a book that likely needs to be read in a "real book" format to truly appreciate the blending of art and prose, Jordan's story and his complicated family story and the complexity of the generational trauma of residential schools.
It started as a thesis and is a bit of a stream of consciousness as the author deals with his family issues, residential schools, racism. He incorporates his dad's art into his own art despite their estrangement.
I hope that this book leads to reflection, appreciation and a strong future together as readers listen, learn and reflect on the words and the art!
"When someone tells us their story, that becomes a part of us"
It started as a thesis and is a bit of a stream of consciousness as the author deals with his family issues, residential schools, racism. He incorporates his dad's art into his own art despite their estrangement.
I hope that this book leads to reflection, appreciation and a strong future together as readers listen, learn and reflect on the words and the art!
"When someone tells us their story, that becomes a part of us"
September 30, 2022
Such a powerful collection of indigenous ways of knowing - AND how there is so much dispossession of those knowings through intergenerational traumas that have occurred, I am so grateful to have read this book on such an important day
August 30, 2021
It must have been very hard for Abel to bare all for the publication of Nishga. Sharing such an intimate look at his family history and his own life, masterfully, artfully articulated. I found so many passages were powerful with their honesty and their scrutiny of both large systems of colonization and racism and simultaneously the intimate experiences of one person.
This book handles the sensitive topic of disconnection from culture well. This gave me a sense of the loneliness and anxieties surrounding being mixed-race and being raised miles and miles away from ancestral land, family, and language. The concept of being not being "Nisga'a enough" for other Indigenous peoples, and facing racism from white settlers as well. Being caught between two cultures that should feel comfortable but instead aches like a dislocation.
This is coupled with beautiful art, family photos, poetry excerpts, etc. which enhance the reading experience. Definitely something in this memoir for everyone, I hope it reaches great success and wide audience.
Thank you to the author for choosing to share his story with us, I hope this helps other mixed-race people see themselves and make space for themselves in the world.
content warnings for: cultural loss, racist micro-aggressions, brief mentions of child sexual abuse, residential school, brief mentions of addiction, suicidal ideation.
This book handles the sensitive topic of disconnection from culture well. This gave me a sense of the loneliness and anxieties surrounding being mixed-race and being raised miles and miles away from ancestral land, family, and language. The concept of being not being "Nisga'a enough" for other Indigenous peoples, and facing racism from white settlers as well. Being caught between two cultures that should feel comfortable but instead aches like a dislocation.
This is coupled with beautiful art, family photos, poetry excerpts, etc. which enhance the reading experience. Definitely something in this memoir for everyone, I hope it reaches great success and wide audience.
Thank you to the author for choosing to share his story with us, I hope this helps other mixed-race people see themselves and make space for themselves in the world.
content warnings for: cultural loss, racist micro-aggressions, brief mentions of child sexual abuse, residential school, brief mentions of addiction, suicidal ideation.
August 16, 2021
I read this all in one sitting because sometimes you find a voice you just can’t bring yourself to stop listening to/reading. Moving. Heartbreaking. Beautiful. Abel invites us to witness as he works through his experience as an urban Indigenous man disconnected from the community and traditions of his father’s Nisga’a family, his difficult and ongoing reckoning with identity, Indigeneity, and intergenerational trauma from residential schools. Abel speaks to an experience - the experience of disconnection - that is not often part of Indigenous and non-Indigenous conceptions of Indigenous identity, even when so much of our colonial history (residential schools, 60s Scoop, children in care) has ensured that his is not an isolated experience. I’m not sure when I last read anything that felt so vulnerable and so open and I’m grateful that Abel chose to share this work.
The form is far from a conventional narrative - a creative work that includes layered images, notes, excerpts from interviews and lectures, and a subtexted poem that is visually interrupted or obscured until “read out” by the author at the end. It’s an incredibly imaginative, thoughtful and inspiring presentation that lets us in, layer by layer, and makes us want to come back for repeat reading/viewing.
The form is far from a conventional narrative - a creative work that includes layered images, notes, excerpts from interviews and lectures, and a subtexted poem that is visually interrupted or obscured until “read out” by the author at the end. It’s an incredibly imaginative, thoughtful and inspiring presentation that lets us in, layer by layer, and makes us want to come back for repeat reading/viewing.
October 24, 2025
I really enjoyed this even though it is absolutely not the type of book I usually read — I don’t really read poetry and don’t really know how to do it, but I thought it was really interested that Abel included transcripts of talks he did about his work, I’ve never seen that done before and it made the work a lot more accessible to me especially as a non-Indigenous Person. It is beautifully written and the artworks throughout the book are as well. Very interesting, very emotional, and very well constructed overall.
Read
October 7, 2021Jordan was a classmate of mine, and whatever teenybopper caca poems I was writing at the time had nothing on the expanse of his mind, the way he saw language laterally, physically. I didn’t get it then; I think I’m closer to getting it now. This book is lovely and sad and tough and beautiful. Has elements of Noopiming and My Art Is Killing Me, both books I also really enjoyed. Obviously well worth a read, for its sheer and glorious undefineability and its tender extended hand.
July 6, 2021
Research-creation is a new term for me thanks to this stunning, brief book. As others have said - get the physical copy, the e-reader wouldn't do it justice. It's a tactile experience, lots of arresting juxtaposition, negative space that speaks volumes.
There are ideas around identity and belonging that are all new to me here
I will be thinking of this one for a long time.
There are ideas around identity and belonging that are all new to me here
I will be thinking of this one for a long time.
October 29, 2021
Hits hard
June 14, 2022
A short but a very unique and well thought out book. It is hard to describe, in a good way - it should be a mandatory read for high school students.
January 3, 2023
A very moving memoir told through excerpts of court documents, presentations, notes, and art, bringing me a new perspective of the Indigenous experience that I hadn't considered before.
January 20, 2023
Gorgeous research collection and memoir.
March 11, 2023
it feels weird to rate something like this, that's so deeply personal, but when an author puts that much heart and honesty from cover to cover, 5 stars is an inevitable rating.
March 12, 2024
09:10:50
09:10:53
I am blown away.
09:10:53
I am blown away.
October 30, 2024
So honoured/privileged/grateful to know and learn from Jordan Abel <3 what an amazing book.
December 30, 2022
For anyone who has been disconnected from their culture. Who has been displaced from land. For anyone with complicated beginnings and is constantly exploring who they are relative to their connections. All of this.
At the forefront this is lived experience molded by impact of Canadian history and the story of this land.
At the forefront this is lived experience molded by impact of Canadian history and the story of this land.
September 4, 2021
I don't feel I have any words to do this book justice, really. I just want to sit with it for a while.
I cannot imagine how difficult and painful it was for Abel to create this, and while I know I am not the audience he wrote it for, I am immeasurably grateful to have the opportunity to read it anyway.
I cannot imagine how difficult and painful it was for Abel to create this, and while I know I am not the audience he wrote it for, I am immeasurably grateful to have the opportunity to read it anyway.
June 13, 2024
A work of art
June 11, 2021
I had no idea how to describe this, until Abel does so himself (p167) in talking about his PhD (which this basically is): a ‘research creation’... creative non-fiction, found archival documentation, photography, concrete poetry, and academic inquiry… all wrapped up in one. Yes there is lots to chew on here as he wrestles with trying to write his way home, to finding what it means to be Nishg’a…
Fundamentally, this is an exploration of his own indigeneity... Along the way he wonders who has a right to claim to be indigenous; explores inter-generational trauma… and the ways in which it has impacted him, even though he never knew his indigenous family; muses on how the f/act of being a witness to someone’s story means that you carry a part of them with you; and wonders what reconciliation looks like, and how exactly do we de-colonise?
All important stuff, and generally quite powerful, but… for me I struggled with the format, - even though I totally get that ‘form and function’ are intimately connected in this telling… that the gaps in the narrative (the white space, the blanks on the page), the disjointed inclusions of little bits from all manner or sources (books, court documents, moms little notebooks, family court judgements, police reports, TRC documents and more), the ‘fuzzy’ images (which become clear when the connection is made to the residential school his grandparents attended), and more, are critically important parts of the story-telling.
I think, in part, my struggles with reading this are an artefact of having read it on an e-reader. I think that the reading experience is likely quite different on the printed page. I look forward to an opportunity to be able to get my hands on a hard copy of this, and spend more time with it.
3.5
Fundamentally, this is an exploration of his own indigeneity... Along the way he wonders who has a right to claim to be indigenous; explores inter-generational trauma… and the ways in which it has impacted him, even though he never knew his indigenous family; muses on how the f/act of being a witness to someone’s story means that you carry a part of them with you; and wonders what reconciliation looks like, and how exactly do we de-colonise?
All important stuff, and generally quite powerful, but… for me I struggled with the format, - even though I totally get that ‘form and function’ are intimately connected in this telling… that the gaps in the narrative (the white space, the blanks on the page), the disjointed inclusions of little bits from all manner or sources (books, court documents, moms little notebooks, family court judgements, police reports, TRC documents and more), the ‘fuzzy’ images (which become clear when the connection is made to the residential school his grandparents attended), and more, are critically important parts of the story-telling.
I think, in part, my struggles with reading this are an artefact of having read it on an e-reader. I think that the reading experience is likely quite different on the printed page. I look forward to an opportunity to be able to get my hands on a hard copy of this, and spend more time with it.
3.5
June 26, 2021
This “research creation”, as Abel describes it, is brilliant, painful, beautifully artistic, and practical in a way that is really astonishing. The reader needs to sit back and “witness” this book. Let it wash over. It’s not a mining expedition, it is an experience. Abel layers his own poetry and his father’s Nisga’a artwork and family photos over each other. He includes archival government documents and personal legal documents. He transcribes interviews and weaves amongst them notes of personal reflection.
He explores questions that are often misunderstood or not asked in what, to me, amounts to a meditation on identity. What does it mean to be an urban Indigenous survivor of intergenerational trauma caused by Residential Schools? What does it mean to be an Indigenous person who grows up separated from both one’s traditional lands and community? How does one deal with the ignorant (unintentionally or otherwise) questions from white people? What does it mean to give testimony? To witness testimony? In what ways might Residential Schools underpin and underpaint most (all?) Indigenous literature?
All of this is woven together in a way that questions narrative and poetic forms. It forces the reader to accept a format and style that is new and unfamiliar in a way that makes me think of being adrift - akin, perhaps, to the way many Indigenous people speak of being set adrift after leaving residential school- not quite “fitting in” with traditional or mainstream worlds. In a way, it seems, that Abel feels likewise disconnected from his indigeneity.
Leave your preconceptions behind and just try to witness this important work. This one will stay with me.
He explores questions that are often misunderstood or not asked in what, to me, amounts to a meditation on identity. What does it mean to be an urban Indigenous survivor of intergenerational trauma caused by Residential Schools? What does it mean to be an Indigenous person who grows up separated from both one’s traditional lands and community? How does one deal with the ignorant (unintentionally or otherwise) questions from white people? What does it mean to give testimony? To witness testimony? In what ways might Residential Schools underpin and underpaint most (all?) Indigenous literature?
All of this is woven together in a way that questions narrative and poetic forms. It forces the reader to accept a format and style that is new and unfamiliar in a way that makes me think of being adrift - akin, perhaps, to the way many Indigenous people speak of being set adrift after leaving residential school- not quite “fitting in” with traditional or mainstream worlds. In a way, it seems, that Abel feels likewise disconnected from his indigeneity.
Leave your preconceptions behind and just try to witness this important work. This one will stay with me.
July 25, 2021
This was probably one of the more unique and undefinable non-fiction books I've read in a while.
Jordan Abel, towards the end of the text, calls it a "research-creation", which 'combines elements of creative-nonfiction, found archival documentation, photography, concrete poetry, and academic inquiry.'
Throughout the book, Abel discusses the personal and broader impacts of intergenerational trauma from the residential school system in Canada and the complexity of Indigenous identity as a result. He especially focuses on the experiences of people who have, like him, have been stripped of/dispossessed of their community and history, and also identify as urban Indigenous. He also discusses the argument/fact that residential schools are always present in Indigenous art and literature, even in their explicit absence, and that was a really important and impactful moment of realization for me (and I hope other readers).
The mix of personal 'notes', interviews and transcripts of presentations/talks, photography, and poetry really strengthened the thesis of the book and made it an engaging, and emotional read.
I particularly appreciated the overlaying of Indigenous art (notably Indigenous art from the West coast) where in the art is overlays a photograph. The use of white space in the art and text was also really effective in supporting his ideas and experiences, and appears multiple times throughout the book.
There's a lot of really great ideas captured in his book and I want to tab/annotate my own copy one day.
Content/trigger warning: The book includes printouts of websites discussing suicide and self-harm. Mentions of residential schools don't go into detail, but are a topic discussed throughout the text.
Jordan Abel, towards the end of the text, calls it a "research-creation", which 'combines elements of creative-nonfiction, found archival documentation, photography, concrete poetry, and academic inquiry.'
Throughout the book, Abel discusses the personal and broader impacts of intergenerational trauma from the residential school system in Canada and the complexity of Indigenous identity as a result. He especially focuses on the experiences of people who have, like him, have been stripped of/dispossessed of their community and history, and also identify as urban Indigenous. He also discusses the argument/fact that residential schools are always present in Indigenous art and literature, even in their explicit absence, and that was a really important and impactful moment of realization for me (and I hope other readers).
The mix of personal 'notes', interviews and transcripts of presentations/talks, photography, and poetry really strengthened the thesis of the book and made it an engaging, and emotional read.
I particularly appreciated the overlaying of Indigenous art (notably Indigenous art from the West coast) where in the art is overlays a photograph. The use of white space in the art and text was also really effective in supporting his ideas and experiences, and appears multiple times throughout the book.
There's a lot of really great ideas captured in his book and I want to tab/annotate my own copy one day.
Content/trigger warning: The book includes printouts of websites discussing suicide and self-harm. Mentions of residential schools don't go into detail, but are a topic discussed throughout the text.
January 7, 2022
Nishga is sort of a multimedia scrapbook of one man’s journey through his own inter generational trauma, and the holes and loneliness it has caused.
There are scraps of memories, bits of fiction, transcripts from academic lectures, photographs…I’m probably missing some but you get the idea. So it’s quite a unique book, because through all that shifting of gears, Abel maintains a laser focus on his subject matter. He is a brilliant and calm and realistic thinker, traits which shine the most in the academic pieces. His use of his own father’s art as a tableau is quite striking. And his photo journey (not sure what else to call it- I’ve never seen anything quite like it) is confusing at first but then it takes your breath away when you realize where he’s brought us.
Nishga is at once delicate and subtle, and also extremely powerful. The depth to which Abel travels to find some sense or some conclusion to his circumstance is staggering, only to learn that there isn’t really a tidy resolution to be had. There’s an abiding solidity to the problem that he can’t crack or conquer. And yet he presents so many facets of the problem on so many delicate little leaflets of thought and image that, while we don’t crack it, we see that he’s fully gotten inside of it.
For anyone who is a skeptic about inter generational trauma, this book provides a delicate and nuanced way think about and see the earth-shattering affects of the residential schools and other forms of erasure. It’s a complex horror that isn’t going anywhere anytime soon, so the more we can learn about it and face it with courage and honesty the better off everyone will be. This book is an important opportunity for exactly that.
There are scraps of memories, bits of fiction, transcripts from academic lectures, photographs…I’m probably missing some but you get the idea. So it’s quite a unique book, because through all that shifting of gears, Abel maintains a laser focus on his subject matter. He is a brilliant and calm and realistic thinker, traits which shine the most in the academic pieces. His use of his own father’s art as a tableau is quite striking. And his photo journey (not sure what else to call it- I’ve never seen anything quite like it) is confusing at first but then it takes your breath away when you realize where he’s brought us.
Nishga is at once delicate and subtle, and also extremely powerful. The depth to which Abel travels to find some sense or some conclusion to his circumstance is staggering, only to learn that there isn’t really a tidy resolution to be had. There’s an abiding solidity to the problem that he can’t crack or conquer. And yet he presents so many facets of the problem on so many delicate little leaflets of thought and image that, while we don’t crack it, we see that he’s fully gotten inside of it.
For anyone who is a skeptic about inter generational trauma, this book provides a delicate and nuanced way think about and see the earth-shattering affects of the residential schools and other forms of erasure. It’s a complex horror that isn’t going anywhere anytime soon, so the more we can learn about it and face it with courage and honesty the better off everyone will be. This book is an important opportunity for exactly that.
February 19, 2025
Alicia Elliot offers the most cogent description of Nishga: “Jordan Abel has reinvented the memoir, incorporating personal anecdotes, archival footage, legal documentation, photos, and concrete poetry to create an unforgettable portrait of an Indigenous artist trying to find his place in a world that insists Indigeneity can only ever be the things that he is not.”
It is unlike anything I’ve ever read, or seen — as one of the most chilling and impactful sequences has very few words. It is a compelling and intimate work that offers both a fierce and vulnerable writer the opportunity to tell his personal story through the ways he’s tried to connect to his ancestry and cultural history: photographs, google searches, his father’s art, and even the divorce proceedings of his parents. This is a book my Grade 11 students will explore next year to consider memoir and the idea of “research-creation”, a term Abel uses in the latter part of the book to explain his project at his thesis examination in 2019. He quotes Chapman and Sawchuck, saying that research-creation “may act as an innovative form of cultural analysis that troubles the book, the written essay, or the thesis, as the only valid means to express ideas [and] concepts," and that is can be read as a form of intervention into the 'regime of truth' of university-based research."
This book is a must read and it will be amazing to see how my students explore and respond to it.
It is unlike anything I’ve ever read, or seen — as one of the most chilling and impactful sequences has very few words. It is a compelling and intimate work that offers both a fierce and vulnerable writer the opportunity to tell his personal story through the ways he’s tried to connect to his ancestry and cultural history: photographs, google searches, his father’s art, and even the divorce proceedings of his parents. This is a book my Grade 11 students will explore next year to consider memoir and the idea of “research-creation”, a term Abel uses in the latter part of the book to explain his project at his thesis examination in 2019. He quotes Chapman and Sawchuck, saying that research-creation “may act as an innovative form of cultural analysis that troubles the book, the written essay, or the thesis, as the only valid means to express ideas [and] concepts," and that is can be read as a form of intervention into the 'regime of truth' of university-based research."
This book is a must read and it will be amazing to see how my students explore and respond to it.
August 21, 2021
It took me a while to get into this book, it is definitely a new style of storytelling, at least for me, and it demands a lot of reflection, thought, consideration on the part of the reader. To me it felt like a mystery where the reader “discovers” the story from the clues Jordan Abel provides (because I’m too used to more linear storytelling or a more “colonial” storytelling style). At first, it was a bit strange to me, but as I delved deeper into it, the story seemed to unfold, along with the complex emotions, conflicts, anguish in it. The unique form seems to work well for telling this story of dispossession, intergenerational trauma, the difficulty in finding connection and identity, questions of indigenous identity, and much more. Abel says more through the omissions than the inclusions. I feel like I will need to revisit this book again in the future and that I will probably see more layers with further readings.
November 24, 2021
This was a powerful book. Written as a generational survivor of Residential Schools in Canada, Abel's work is an eye-opening exploration of the obvious and nuanced impacts of Canada's systemic genocide of Indigenous peoples. By including glimpse of his own experience with parental abuse, suicidal ideation, racism, and so much more, Abel gave life to voices that are often silenced in the day-to-day life of Western society.
As a white Canadian, this was a humbling read that forced me to confront a lot of assumptions I might have made about Residential Schools and their impact. It was a challenging "conversation" that I'm glad I had with myself, and I would recommend this memoir to anyone looking to go deeper in this ongoing, important conversation.
As a white Canadian, this was a humbling read that forced me to confront a lot of assumptions I might have made about Residential Schools and their impact. It was a challenging "conversation" that I'm glad I had with myself, and I would recommend this memoir to anyone looking to go deeper in this ongoing, important conversation.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 65 reviews