Un tributo a la tierra

by Joe Sacco

En su esperado regreso, Joe Sacco nos ofrece una obra maestra del periodismo gráfico sobre los pueblos indígenas de Norteamérica, la explotación de recursos naturales y nuestra deuda con la tierra

Los denes han vivido en el valle del río Mackenzie desde tiempos inmemoriales. La tierra es el elemento central de su modo de vida y creen, como muchas otras culturas nativas, que son ellos los que pertenecen a la tierra y no al revés.

Pero los territorios del noroeste de Canadá también albergan importantes recursos minerales: petróleo, gas y diamantes. Con la minería llegaron las inversiones y el trabajo, pero también la tala de bosques, el fracking, los vertidos tóxicos y los oleoductos. Todo ello afectó al paisaje, así como también los modos de vida tradicional fueron deformados por un sistema educativo pernicioso, por un gobierno que se arrogó la propiedad de la tierra, por los estragos del alcohol y las deudas bancarias.

Ambientado en un escenario natural tan vasto y sublime que empequeñece la escala humana, Un tributo a la tierra da voz a una galería inédita de personajes: tramperos, jefes indígenas, activistas, sacerdotes... para narrar una historia fascinante sobre el dinero, su dependencia, la extinción de una cultura y la lucha por la supervivencia.

Genres: Graphic Novels, Nonfiction, Comics, History, Canada, Indigenous, Politics

272 pages, Hardcover

First published July 7, 2020

About the author

Joe Sacco was born in Malta on October 2, 1960. At the age of one, he moved with his family to Australia, where he spent his childhood until 1972, when they moved to Los Angeles. He began his journalism career working on the Sunset High School newspaper in Beaverton, Oregon. While journalism was his primary focus, this was also the period of time in which he developed his penchant for humor and satire. He graduated from Sunset High in 1978.

Sacco earned his B.A. in journalism from the University of Oregon in 1981 in three years. He was greatly frustrated with the journalist work that he found at the time, later saying, "[I couldn't find] a job writing very hard-hitting, interesting pieces that would really make some sort of difference." After being briefly employed by the journal of the National Notary Association, a job which he found "exceedingly, exceedingly boring," and several factories, he returned to Malta, his journalist hopes forgotten. "...I sort of decided to forget it and just go the other route, which was basically take my hobby, which has been cartooning, and see if I could make a living out of that," he later told the BBC.

He began working for a local publisher writing guidebooks. Returning to his fondness for comics, he wrote a Maltese romance comic named Imħabba Vera ("True Love"), one of the first art-comics in the Maltese language. "Because Malta has no history of comics, comics weren't considered something for kids," he told Village Voice. "In one case, for example, the girl got pregnant and she went to Holland for an abortion. Malta is a Catholic country where not even divorce is allowed. It was unusual, but it's not like anyone raised a stink about it, because they had no way of judging whether this was appropriate material for comics or not."

Eventually returning to the United States, by 1985 Sacco had founded a satirical, alternative comics magazine called Portland Permanent Press in Portland, Oregon. When the magazine folded fifteen months later, he took a job at The Comics Journal as the staff news writer. This job provided the opportunity for him to create another satire: the comic Centrifugal Bumble-Puppy, a name he took from an overly-complicated children's toy in Aldous Huxley's Brave New World.

But Sacco was more interested in travelling. In 1988, he left the U.S. again to travel across Europe, a trip which he chronicled in his autobiographical comic Yahoo. The trip lead him towards the ongoing Gulf War (his obsession with which he talks about in Yahoo #2), and in 1991 he found himself nearby to research the work he would eventually publish as Palestine.

The Gulf War segment of Yahoo drew Sacco into a study of Middle Eastern politics, and he traveled to Israel and the Palestinian territories to research his first long work. Palestine was a collection of short and long pieces, some depicting Sacco's travels and encounters with Palestinians (and several Israelis), and some dramatizing the stories he was told. It was serialized as a comic book from 1993 to 2001 and then published in several collections, the first of which won an American Book Award in 1996.

Sacco next travelled to Sarajevo and Goražde near the end of the Bosnian War, and produced a series of reports in the same style as Palestine: the comics Safe Area Goražde, The Fixer, and the stories collected in War's End; the financing for which was aided by his winning of the Guggenheim Fellowship in April 2001. Safe Area Goražde won the Eisner Award for Best Original Graphic Novel in 2001.

He has also contributed short pieces of graphic reportage to a variety of magazines, on subjects ranging from war crimes to blues, and is a frequent illustrator of Harvey Pekar's American Splendor. Sacco currently lives in Portland.

Reviews

[Fran · Rating 5 out of 5]

"When Charles II handed what is now the Northwest Territories over to the Hudson Bay Company, no one thought to tell the Metis and the Dene...the Dominion extended its control...through treaties...required the Dene and Metis to recede, release, surrender and yield...their rights, title, privileges...for $5 a year, for some bullets and fish nets...cloaked in verbal assurances...the Dene [had] given up all their land...that would guarantee their livelihood based upon fishing, trapping...[but in the Dene viewpoint] the Land does not belong to us, we belong to the Land."

Through the medium of comics journalism, Joe Sacco humbly draws himself into the background of this graphic novel as "the curious questioner" who amasses first-hand testimonies of Dene willing to share their stories. "Without the land we cannot be Dene. Without the land, we are weak people. Ownership is not how we look at the land". Dene elders state that land needs to be revered, treated gently...pray to the land and pay the land...gift the land." As nomads, the Dene hunted "by the season, by the moon" to determine where animals were. There were no defined male and female roles. "You look at what needs to be done and you do it". As long as the subarctic Northwest Territories of Canada were thought to contain "inhospitable land", the Dene could hunt, trap and fish. In the late 1800's, the discovery of petroleum and gold, threatened changes to the indigenous culture and way of life.

"Is there really such a thing as the best of both worlds...the formula that balances the knowledge that has been passed down orally since 'time immemorial'..." versus industrialization and extraction of resources? The cost of industrialization cannot be understated. For 150 years, up until the 1990's, residential schools forcibly removed indigenous children from their homes "the aim was to educate the 'Indian' out of them". Upon their return home, many have fought a life-long internal battle lacking self-worth, unable to connect with others. Many can no longer communicate in their ancestral language. As Fracking continues, many become dependent on alcohol, welfare, and government handouts while the old ways of community are being replaced with systems "built for capitalism to succeed, at the cost of the environment". Fracking has "created division between those who seek economic opportunity and those who believe the practice is a defilement of the land".

"Paying the Land" by Joe Sacco is a non-fiction graphic comic in the words of the First Nation. Some tribal members wish to conform to Western culture and mores while others would choose to reclaim lost land and continue to instill Dene heritage in the younger generations. Joe Sacco's in depth, thoroughly researched comic, replete with extensive interviews with the Dene and amazing artistic graphics begs the question, "At what cost, progress?" Compelling, insightful, factual...a heavy, but highly recommended tome.

Thank you Henry Holt & Company, Metropolitan Books and Net Galley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

[Dave Schaafsma · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was given a copy of this book from Henry Holt and Company in exchange for a fair review and I’ll admit, I was happy to do it. This is one of the top comics texts of the year, no doubt, a notable event. Anyone interested in the environment, spirituality, First Nations people and their history, (and the history of white destruction of native cultures), the theory and practice of comics journalism, or just in stunning comics craft, this is a must read now.

“Without the land we cannot be Dene. Without the land we don’t have integrity. Without the land we are a weak people. Ownership is not how we look at the land.”

Joe Sacco is the very dean of comics journalists, known primarily for his war-time work in such texts as Footnotes in Gaza and Palestine. He also writes about comics journalism, and his approach is NOT to pretend he is some kind of “objective” journalist, but to acknowledge his presence in the stories he tells, and his limitations. He’s always an outsider, not educated as a scholar of political history. He’s seeking to understand and he’s self-deprecating; he seeks out people in power to talk to, but he spends most of his time listening to folks “on the ground,” people most affected by policies enacted by governments and actions benefitting the rich and powerful.

So, maybe you are like me, imagining what it might be like to move farther and farther north as the planet permanently heats up? Or maybe you are at least curious about what it might mean to be living in the Far North in these times when we see--as we did the other day--a record high 89 degrees within the Arctic Circle. What might it mean for the traditional ways of life for First Nations peoples as the ice caps melt and the environment changes; as capitalism/Big Oil and Gas get more and more rapacious.

Sacco quietly spent the last several years, at the invitation of and accompanied by Shauna Morgan, exploring the subarctic Northwest Territories of Canada, with particular attention to the First Nations Dené tribes. The Dene, as with all Native people, see the land as owning them. Spirituality is linked to the land. They (we!) have to pay the land and the environment generally. We owe our existence to it. And as the climate rapidly changes their home, their traditional ways of life are threatened.

“If there’s one thing they [the elders] teach you, it’s to be humble, because without that you aren’t really going to learn anything.”

Sacco spends years listening to hundreds of people across the spectrum; the central issue for them as with all of us how to preserve a healthy relationship with the land while being economically viable. Gas and oil folks are coming into the country and laying down pipelines, offering piles of (short term?) cash and modernization--better housing, better schools, better health care. What’s the exchange? Permanent destruction of the land and the Dene relationship to it. Is there some middle position? It’s clear from the title and throughout where Sacco stands in this issue, but he listens to pro-development folks among the Dene, too (I am reminded of John McPhee’s similar move in Coming into the Country, and Arctic Dreams by Barry Lopez, among so many other books by outsiders about the role of capitalism and the future of humans).

Sacco sees the high rates of alcoholism and physical abuse and he looks for answers about how deeply spiritual people have come to this point in the north country, and he finds one answer in the horrific cultural genocide by the “residential schools” where children--for almost 150 years!!!--were forcibly ripped from Native parents in the attempt--as with the crazy “gay cures”-- to “cure” them from being Indian. I know there are (white) people in this country who say to blacks: Get over it, stop blaming slavery and all the racist treatment of the past on present conditions, take some responsibility for yourself, but while there is a grain of truth in it, it is still a largely ignorant thing to say. Trauma is real. It has long term effects. You don’t just “get over” more than a century of cultural genocide. Whites and particularly white Christians are responsible for generations of damage there (and here in the US, where this approach to forced cultural assimilation has similar effects). So this is part of the process, healing, so we can make better decisions for our souls and communities.

This is a dense, close treatment of current conditions. It’s not “entertainment,” though the cartooning here, the illustration work, is amazing, his best ever, at the tip of his game. This is comics intended to do its part in helping save the world, in speaking to what it means to sell the environment in exchange for your soul.

"What is the worldview of a people who mumble no thanks or prayers, who take what they want from the land, and pay it back with arsenic?"

A deeply compassionate and important work, crucially important to read right now. In the end, listening to young activists and older leaders, he shares with us some inspiration, and shows us a way to (maybe) survive.

For a book of comics it is denser than most comics texts. Sometimes you look close at treaty politics because it is not simple. If you want a quick read, there are other places to go, but this one explores the issues, doesn’t just give you a glimpse. Sacco always privileges the words of those he interviews over his own art representing the moment. Which is why it seems to me a humble work, an important work by a non-indigenous man contributing to the conversation.

[Adam Dalva · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excellent, winding graphic journalism looking at the consequences of resource extraction on Indigenous communities in the Pacific Northwest. The narrative often soars, and is of course extremely depressing, especially in the segment on the Residential School System. I lost a bit of the thru-line of narrative occasionally, w/ Sacco's presence and intentions a bit hard to keep track of, and it didn't feel like it knew how to end itself, but I very much enjoyed this, and learned a lot.

[Chad · Rating 4 out of 5]

Joe Sacco creates another documentary style graphic novel, this time focusing on the Dene, one of the First Nations of Canada. For generations, the Canadian government took advantage of the indigenous people, making treaties with them they didn't understand, giving everyone $5 a year and taking whatever they wanted. Forcing the children to go to Residential Schools where forced indoctrination occurred by nuns, trying to strip the Indians out of the Indians. The children were ripped away from their parents for 10 months out of the year, not allowed to see their siblings and often abused. It's truly harrowing what many of the children went through.

Sacco also visits other issues like protecting the environment versus providing jobs in a remote regions of the Northern Territories. This is a very well-researched, never-boring graphic novel told mostly through first person interviews.

Received a review copy from Henry Holt & Company and NetGalley. All thoughts are my own and in no way influenced by teh]]he aforementioned.

[Deborah · Rating 5 out of 5]

The black and white detailed sketches depicted the life of the Dene tribe who lived in the Canadian Northwest Territories. Aman recounted his life as a boy born in the wilderness of the Mackenzie River Valley and raised by his nomadic tribe. He was taught to respect and to learn from nature, animals, and the spirits. He believed he was being groomed by the tribe for a leadership role. At a young age, both sexes taught him their tasks as their were no separate roles, because you never knew when you would be alone and have to fend for yourself. You looked what needed to be done and did it. It took a tribe to raise a child. The tribe was family as everyone was related by blood or marriage. Unfortunately, mining, roads, pipelines, toxic waste, alcohol, drugs, and poverty drastically changed their way of life.

Aman was one of the many Dene tribe that were written and drawn in meticulous detail by the talented comic journalist Joe Sacco. He traveled with his guide and driver, Shauna Morgan, to meet with and learn about the lives of these indigenous people. There were a French priest, the son of a famed dog sledder, tribal and governmental leaders, activists, men and women, a teacher, a tv host, counselors, and many more.

A woman recounted of an eyewitness to the 1921 treaty with Canada which was interpreted that the Dene could stay on the land “as long as the sun kept going overhead, and as long as the river didn’t flow backwards.” Oral pledges and stories in the Dene’s culture were more important than written treaties. In reality, the Dene gave up their rights and “and all their land for $5.00 a year, for some bullets and fishnets.”

Jim Antoine spoke of how the Dene finally got to tell their stories during the Berger inquiries in the 1970s “on a proposed natural gas pipeline through the MacKenzie River Valley” and for the Dene to get back their land. The Paulette case recognized aboriginal rights. The Dene sought to negotiate a collective land claim with the federal and territorial rights, which ended unsuccessfully when the tribal coalitions dissolved.

The Dene’s culture, traditions, laws, and customs were dying. Temporary nomadic life depending on the land, the tribe, and oneself changed to permanent homes relying on governmental jobs or welfare. A form of colonization occurred. Alcohol abuse, sexual assault, domestic violence, and suicides within the Dene are much higher than the national average.

One of the worse tragedies and atrocities was the residential school system, which was in practice for 150 years and became mandatory for aboriginal children to attend in 1920. Children were “‘rounded up’ by a priest, an officer of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, and/or an Indian agent.” Threats were made against parents if they did not surrender their children. The children were removed from their parental influence (who were considered savages) to industrial schools “to acquire the habits and modes of thought of white men” as stated by Sir John MacDonald, Canada’s first prime minister. The schools were used “to break the bond that children had with their families and their land.” Marie Wilson, one of the three commissioners on the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada to gather testimony about the school system in 2008 after a lawsuit had been brought by former students was shaken by their findings. “Schools were used essentially as a weapon for assimilation and acculturation and christianization – and their intent was the diminishment of everything that the children ... felt that they were as individuals and a collective.” @150,000 indigenous children were in the residential school system of which “more than 6,000 - four percent - died from disease, neglect, abuse, or other injuries while in the system’s care.” The survivors were forced into Catholicism and suffered emotional, physical, and spiritual abuse and haunt many to this day. Upon returning to their home after graduation, the children had difficulty acclimatizing and turned to alcohol and drugs. There was a lost of language, knowledge, and skills in the land and tribal ways and customs for those who attended residential schools creating a generational gap of missing knowledge. In 2008 Canada formally apologized for the residential school system. In 2015, a final report declared that Canada and its churches were guilty of “cultural genocide.”

The Dene respect the land and pay homage to it. Former Chief Edward Jumbo stated, “Without the land we cannot be Dene. Without the land we don’t have integrity. We would be a weak people without the land.”

The Dene are trying to find a balance between the old ways and the modern world, between the environment and economy, and between nature and technical. They have hopes and visions for the future. Many young men do not work nor are they motivated to work. Many are dependent on the welfare system. Some support fracking, mining and resource extraction of gas, oil, and diamonds, and others do not. Toxic waste, mining, and development has ravaged the land. There is a “battle between this land-based philosophy that ... exists in our communities [and] this need or urgency for economic development from resource extraction.” Traditions are changing and knowledge is being lost. Ski-Doos replaced sleds. Elders are aging and dying. “The Dene way of learning is to observe and do.” Now they have to be taught and supervised.

I loved the ending threading together the past, present, and the future. A fantastic visual read.

[Laura · Rating 4 out of 5]

Although not written by an indigenous person, this graphic novel about the Dene of the Northwestern Territories of Canada, is written from extensive interviews of the Dene.

Joe Sacco has gone to many areas, where he has lived with and interviewed the people there, to find out what is happening. He usually comes back with stories that have been ignored by others.

In this case, he learns how the Residential Schools, the Indian Schools where the Canadians worked hard to strip the Indian out of the Indians, as the first Prime Minister said.




The main point of the stories he collects is that you have to pay the land to use it. You don't just strip it, you give back. You live with the land, and when the local people send their children to school, and live in towns, withe electricity and gas powered vehicles, they move further way from what their ancestors had.

How do you balance this? How do you balance having to live on the land vs wanting to be educated. And how and what is it important for children to learn?

It is a good look at a very complicated issue, with many voices chiming in.

And in the end, Sacco realizes that there are some things that he, as a non-native, as a settler, simply can not understand, or be allowed to see.

Good way to get into the stories of Residential School, but there are others, such as the books that are being put out by the Indigenous people's themselves, that tell the story as well.

So, while I recommend this book, I would also recommend getting ahold of the books that Portage and Main have put out, as well as Second Story Press.

Thanks to Netgalley for making this book available for an honest review.

[Judith Johnson · Rating 5 out of 5]

There are some excellent and detailed reviews already on Goodreads (see Dave Schaafsma for a really good and thorough review), so I will just say that this is for me an outstanding work, worthy of recommendation, and I will certainly be spreading the word!

My son bought me the book for my birthday after hearing good things about it, and though I don’t usually ask for specific gifts, I have in this case requested another graphic book by Joe Sacco for Christmas and my next birthday.

Thanks to Joe Sacco for his hard work and commitment to using the graphic book genre in a wonderful way to convey important information to those of us who benefit from knowing more...

Lastly just to say that I was at times reminded of Michelle Paver’s Chronicles of Ancient Darkness series, and I think I read that she has said she owes a debt to the First Nation Peoples of Canada. Also very highly recommend her books for children!

[Rod Brown · Rating 4 out of 5]

Joe Sacco produces another of his terrific documentary graphic novels, this one focused on the Dene people of the Northwest Territories in Canada. While he starts out with an environmental slant regarding the controversies around fracking in the remote northern regions of Canada, Sacco soon brings his gaze onto the cultural genocide practiced by the Canadian government for decades by means of treaties, residential schools, and capitalism.

There are lots of heartbreaking things in here, but there is hope too to be found in the resilience and determination of some of the people he interviewed for this project. A great and human introduction to a vast and complex situation.

[Geoff · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an amazing graphic novel about an infuriating, heartbreaking history. It begins as reporting on the conflicts and choices made among the Dene, indigenous to Canada, but it eventually becomes about the ways in which colonization and explicit policies of removing children to abusive government and religious schools have created personal, familial, and cultural trauma and tragedy. Elementary school should never involve systematic beating, rape, cultural insults, and on-purpose alienation and repression, but this was a purposeful strategy by the government to erase Dene culture and force assimilation. This is a state-sponsored tragedy that is still affecting people today. So many horrible things have been done on this continent in the name of progress and greed and western civilization. Sacco doesn't have many answers, and many of those involved in the current problems of abuse, drugs, and resource exploitation feel like they are just cogs in the machine. And what's sad is so do those who are involved in cultural preservation and restorative justice and encouraging democracy. It helps to know that there are people still fighting, even if it hurts more to know about the evils that we have done (and are still doing) to each other.

**Thank yo to the author, publisher, and NetGalley for a free copy in exchange for an honest review.

[Nancy · Rating 4 out of 5]

“From the ‘heir to R. Crumb and Art Spiegelman’ a masterful work of comics journalism about Indigenous North America, resource extraction, and our debt to the natural world”

Author and illustrator Joe Sacco is known for his insightful graphic novels Footnotes in Gaza, Palestine and The Fixer: A Story from Sarajevo. He is a well-regarded comix-journalist who immerses himself in different locations around the world to interview and understand his subject. He once again does this with this recent graphic novel, as he journeys to the subarctic Northwest Territories of Canada to stay among the First Nations Dené tribes.

Sacco begins the book by having some elders share how they used to “live in the bush” at least part of the year, which means their families were living off the land and were often nomadic. Men and women shared duties, with no gender division because if you were alone in the wild, you needed all the life skills, not just half, to survive. This lifestyle began to change with permanent settlements which resulted in specific gender roles, technology such as snowmobiles replaced the dog sleds, jobs in the industries that were advancing into the area and the enforced residential schools run by the government. Not only was a way of life disappearing, but their surrounding habitat was changing, as oil, gas and diamond mines were wrecking the environment.

There was so much to cover and Sacco ably shows the research and time he poured into this project. He interviews several chiefs (who have different ways of looking at the economy vs environment issue), activists, trappers, oil workers, priests and elders. Different chapters tackled some of the big topics – a changing way of life, land claims, and residential schools.

The chapters on the residential schools really stood out, as they devastated the families and tribes in both Canada and the US. Children were ripped from their cultures and identities and told that they must conform to European-type standards. And while those schools have been thankfully closed for a while now, their insidious legacy lives on. The transfer of dysfunction has now moved from their abusers who were strangers (at the schools) vs bringing home that dysfunction to their families so now abuse exists within families. Parental disengagement is rampant, as is extreme alcoholism. These unhealthy cycles are now being passed down to other generations, years removed from the residential schools. Another excellent graphic novel that touches on this disengagement from their tribes and families is The Outside Circle.

At 272 pages, this a dense piece of non-fiction that will take multiple sittings to finish. In fact, even after finishing it, you will want to go back and look at certain chapters to gain even more information. I would suggest that this text-heavy graphic novel could be used in the classroom as a supplemental resource to trying to fully understand some First Nations issues. As with any complex issue, there are no easy answers and Sacco questions after many interviews “Is there really such a thing as the best of both worlds?”. He admits that because he is not Native American there are some issues that simply can not be understood. While he was given much access to the communities, there are certain people, events or situations he could not be privy to.

The black and white art shows a comix vibe, which is meant for mature audiences. Not only are the pages filled with a lot of text to convey information, but the pictures are also detailed and precise. Whenever he includes himself in a scene, he draws himself in an exaggerated caricature style, yet everyone else is drawn accurately and with respect. The beautiful landscapes are lovingly drawn in, so the juxtaposition of seeing how some areas have been destroyed is heartbreaking.

This was a deep and reflective look at life for the Dené, and Sacco tried to wrap it up with a nugget of hope as young activists there are trying to work on a myriad of issues. I would suggest you pair this well-researched book with other books written by Indigenous authors to get a nuanced view of the joys and struggles of people who live in that region. Thank you to NetGalley for an advance online copy of this thought-provoking story.

This review can also be found on my blog: https://graphicnovelty2.com/2020/04/2...

[piperitapitta · Rating 4 out of 5]

«Non è roba da fumetti», ma è Joe Sacco.

Ancora un fumetto reportage di altissimo valore: che il tema trattato sia il conflitto israelo-palestinese (Palestina e Gaza 1956. Note ai margini della storia), la guerra nell'ex Jugoslavia (Goražde: Area protetta) o la colonizzazione ai danni delle popolazioni native dei Dene nei Territori del Nordovest canadesi, l'interesse, l'impegno e la cura con i quali Sacco si dedica ad approfondire temi non proprio semplici da trattare, sono sempre altissimi. Anche in questo caso, come nei precedenti, non è facile comprendere tutto e riuscire ad avere chiara la situazione in tutti i suoi aspetti, mentre quello che è chiarissimo è lo sfruttamento della terra sottratta (miniere, fracking & co.), perlopiù, con l'inganno a popolazioni che la vivevano, la rispettavano, la amavano, in un programma di colonizzazione che, come in terra statunitense, ha visto usare i metodi più biechi per sottrarre non solo la terra, ma anche l'identità dei suoi abitanti; attraverso programmi sistematici, terrificanti, come quelli attuati per mezzo delle residential school, in cui oltre allo scopo che si prefiggeva di educare secondo un processo di assimilazione cristiano occidentale, i bambini in età scolare, strappati con le minacce alle famiglie, sottoposti a violenti abusi, alla privazione del diritto di crescere secondo le proprie usanze, di parlare la propria lingua (dimenticata e persa da moltissimi dei bambini, trasportati anche a centinaia di chilometri) e di crescere in seno alle proprie famiglie, umiliati nel corpo e nello spirito, erano spesso anche stuprati.
Che le conseguenze di questo abominio, a distanza di una o due generazioni, si siano trasformate in un problema endemico di alcolismo, apatia sociale e indigenza e siano anche il frutto di una forte disuguaglianza intersezionale all’interno dei territori e dei confini canadesi, non stupisce - no - ma addolora e rende molto difficile non comprendere la rabbia e l’impossibilità di sentirsi parte di una nazione che fino a pochi anni fa non aveva mai operato verso una vera, e condivisa, riconciliazione.

[Maricruz · Rating 4 out of 5]

Leer este cómic te destruye toda impresión de Canadá como país especialmente civilizado y «buenecito». Me ha coincidido casi su lectura con la de noticias que hablan del hallazgo de más de 200 cadáveres de niños y niñas en un internado para indígenas, de modo que me ha ayudado a contextualizar ese horror, y enterarme del genocidio perpetrado por las autoridades canadienses y la irremediable pérdida cultural que ha supuesto para los amerindios de esas tierras. En lo que no cae este cómic es en el simplismo de presentar a estos como meras víctimas del colonialismo (que víctimas son, no cabe duda), sino que, al darles voz, presenta la siempre compleja elección a la que se tiene que enfrentar un pueblo que ha visto su forma de vida tradicional prácticamente destruida: ¿rechazar de plano las prospecciones mineras y el fracking?, ¿volver a un modo de subsistencia respetuoso con la naturaleza pero increíblemente duro, y mucho menos fructífero ahora que hace años, debido al calentamiento global? ¿O participar en la gestión y los beneficios de la extracción de petroleo y gas natural de unas tierras que al fin y al cabo les pertenecen, y de lo que esa riqueza puede proporcionar a los indígenas? Es, como todos los cómics periodísticos de Joe Sacco, una lectura densa, y tengo la sensación de que Sacco lleva tanto tiempo desarrollando este estilo de trabajo, que a estas alturas es un virtuoso del periodismo gráfico. Bravo por él.

[Kat Matcas · Rating 5 out of 5]

Magnífico reportaje gráfico que nos ilustra Joe Sacco sobre la evolución de los pueblos indígenas de Canadá. Me ha estremecido y horrorizado lo relatado aquí .Desconocía por completo a la barbarie que fueron sometidos esta gente pacífica. Las consecuencias que sufren generaciones despues este pueblo por culpa de la colonización. Impresionante!

[Parker · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5
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"After all, what's the difference between me and an oil company? We've both come here to extract something."

Dense and disturbing, Paying the Land is an excellent piece of journalism. I'm very interested in reading Joe Sacco's other books, especially Footnotes in Gaza and Palestine. His work is incredibly unique, and his drawings are so beautifully detailed. Those landscapes! Those faces! Those hands!! This book is like a printed documentary. Immense care is put into sharing the stories of the Dene people, with nuanced perspectives abound. How Sacco interprets himself and his work through the lens of colonialism is particularly fascinating. Graphic fiction and non-fiction need to be treated with a hell of a lot more respect. Although I think Parts I-IV are the strongest (I think the latter half of the book is too thematically scattered), I strongly recommend checking this out.

[Elizabeth☮ · Rating 4 out of 5]

Joe Sacco goes into the Canadian Northwest Terrorities to better understand the Dene nations that call this their homeland. The stories are far reaching and reflect the many facets of colonialism: residential schools, ravaging of local resources, negligence of the Dene people, generational trauma.

The illustrations are detailed and require the reader to slow down. Initially, it felt overwhelming to have so much to look at, but once I dove into the story, I found the history compelling. It seems Canada wasn't any better than the United States when it comes to honoring the First Nations and their cultures. There are so many that have worked to retain (reclaim?) what rightfully belongs to them. Some have been successful, only to have a newer generation far removed from the traditional ways of living off the land.

It's not that the old way of living is rough (sub zero temperatures in an unheated tent? tough sale), it's that the resources that brought sustenance and some income are dwindling. All in all, it's a book that celebrates the tenacity of the Dene nations while also offering a realistic and complicated view of what it means to love your home and your identity.

[Robert · Rating 5 out of 5]

Without any doubt this is the best book Joe Sacco has written - I'll boldly say that it surpasses Palestine.

A humane, balanced and insightful piece of work which focuses on how capitalism is destroying Native American culture.

A big YES from me

[Kate♡ · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.25/5stars

SO important, so beautifully done, haunting but again, so, SO important

[Raquel Cacereño · Rating 4 out of 5]

Reportaje gráfico que ilustra de forma dinámica y exhaustiva la problemática que hay en los territorios del noroeste canadiense.
Para mí era esta una realidad desconocida y que este libro me ha permitido descubrir, para, desgraciadamente, llevarme en ocasiones las manos a la cabeza. Es estremecedor conocer cómo la realidad occidental ha ido barriendo todas las diferencias culturales, en este caso, valiéndose de los internados, en cuya oscura misión el autor incide y es chocante ver cómo un pueblo pacífico, arraigado a la tierra, a la familia y a la comunidad ha ido corrompiéndose hasta tener tan altas cuotas de alcoholismo y de abusos sexuales. No obstante, el reportaje, pues la obra no deja de ser el fruto de una labor periodística muy bien plasmada mediante unas imágenes que te van conduciendo por las distintas zonas, como si estuvieras viéndolo televisado, además de abordar los males actuales, ofrece una panorámica de las distintas posturas que existen respecto a los orígenes, la manera de enfrentarlo y las soluciones que pueda haber.
En ocasiones me ha resultado un poco difícil seguir el hilo de la narración, porque no deja de ser un formato poliédrico en el que se van superponiendo las entrevistas, con las partes más expositivas y con otras más narrativas basadas en recuerdos de los propios entrevistados o en momentos que el autor inserta, aunque no siempre bien hilvanados.
Destaco una de la frases finales de la obra, en una de las últimas páginas, donde el autor baja a una antigua mina de oro ya cerrada y lanza la siguiente reflexión sobre nuestro modo de vida actual (y el de los denes) en comparación con las tradiciones de culto a la tierra y asociación que los aborígenes tenían: "¿Cuál es la cosmovisión de un pueblo que ni reza ni da las gracias, que arrebata a la tierra todo lo que desea y paga su deuda con arsénico"?

[Ignacio · Rating 5 out of 5]

Sacco vuelve a dar la palabra a las personas que se encuentra en un viaje, en este caso al Territorio del Noroeste, para contar lo que supuso para sus pueblos la colonización, exponer las consecuencias del desarraigo y la pérdida de su cultura, y las tensiones para recuperarla. Una cuestión clave para solucionar problemáticas aterradoras como la falta de oportunidades, el alcoholismo o los abusos de todo tipo. 20 años añorando volver a leer al Sacco de Palestina y Gorazde y me lo he encontrado un poco por casualidad, en esta historia oral triste y, sin embargo, llena de esperanza.

[Emilia P · Rating 5 out of 5]

Yep. Best book of 2020, right here.
If you want a good primer on the horrors and fruits of systemic racism, here you go.
Also why rampant capitalism is hot garbage.
But for all purposes, Sacco lets the story tell itself, and draws beautiful, rich visuals of the Northwest Territories and of the people there that make it totally impossible to turn away. Again and again, I was shocked by how little editorial edge he put into his interviews and observation, and how ... there was still so much to break your heart from so many angles. Like -- I want non-lefties to read this so hard -- it's so hard to argue with this subtle demonstration of how capitalism and capital P Progress has everyone, willing or not, firmly in its grip. Just like. Read it. It was work, and it was very worth it.

[Electra · Rating 4 out of 5]

Quand on s’intéresse comme moi depuis longtemps à la question des autochtones, on n’apprend pas énormément de choses mais on découvre par contre la culture Dene et leur combat pour se retrouver. Ce roman confirme malheureusement les terribles dégâts causés par le gouvernement canadien et ses pensionnats et les religieux. Les chiffres sur les taux d’alcoolisme et de suicide et d’abus sexuels sont effrayants. J’ai aimé le dessin, l’écoute de l’auteur, les témoignages et le choix narratif. Une lecture indispensable si vous souhaitez comprendre ce qui se passe dans ces territoires canadiens.

[Danielle · Rating 2 out of 5]

I learned so much about the Dene and the Aboriginal experience in general, especially since I'm not Canadian and the country and its land are totally foreign to me. The book itself was really crowded and I wasn't super into the artwork - I had to force myself to work through this, which isn't really a common experience for graphic novels. This is a great source of information but the format in which it was presented really hindered my enjoyment of the book.

[Kyle Dinges · Rating 5 out of 5]

Paying the Land is the latest work from acclaimed comics journalist Joe Sacco, who is best known for his works like Palestine and Footnotes in Gaza. In Paying the Land, Sacco turns his eye towards the Dene, who are the people indigenous to the Mackenzie River Valley in the Canadian Northwest. Sacco recounts the the impact that the booming mining and oil industries have had on the lives of the Dene Nation. Sacco then works his way back through other struggles the Dene have faced as they continually weigh the benefits of industrialization with the costs to their way of life.

Sacco structures his graphic novel much the same way you’d expect to see in other visual medium like a documentary film. Sacco illustrates the people he’s interviewing while they recount their story as if they were talking on camera. In between these panels, Sacco has interwoven illustrations of his journey through the area and the history and topics that his subjects discuss in their interviews. The style has a way of establishing a human connection that would be lacking otherwise. It is so much more effective than simply re-telling the history as you’d find in a history book. It's important to note that Sacco is an outsider here, and there's always a risk of getting the story wrong when you are writing about a group of people that you are not a part of. But it seems like Sacco did his homework and his purpose was not one of exploitation, but rather to use his platform and skills to share an important cultural legacy and struggle that might otherwise go unheard.

The history of the Dene is one that will surely be familiar to anyone who has learned about the history of indigenous people across the globe. One distinction between the subjugation of the Dene and Native Americans in the United States is that the method of subjugation in the case of the Dene was mostly bureaucracy instead of violence. Rather than forcefully remove the people from the land, the Canadian government signed treaties stripping the Dene of any ownership claims in return for a pittance. There may have been less bloodshed, but Sacco makes clear that the end result has largely been the same. Paying the Land explores the impact these treaties have had on the Dene and the division that has occurred as members struggle with taking government resources and trying to reclaim their land and identity.

Beyond treaties and bureaucracy, the Canadian government also used several methods in an attempt to “reform” the Dene so that they followed a more Euro-centric culture. Particularly brutal was the practice of kidnapping children from their parents so they could attend state-sponsored schools hundreds of miles from home. The curriculum offered in these residential schools was built on beating the cultural roots out of the children. The government did this in an effort to eradicate the Dene culture and assimilate the indigenous tribes into those that more closely aligned with the government’s idea of Canada. It’s truly harrowing to witness the adults recount the horror stories of abuse at the hands of the state and the church in these “schools”.

The later portion of the graphic novel largely focuses on how the impacts industrialization locally and globally have changed the way of life for the Dene. As the Dene accept access to more amenities and luxuries of modern Western culture (snow-mobiles, modern electronics, mass-produced food and alcohol, cell phones, etc…) it has caused some divisions in the community. Some accept these changes as the price to pay for conforming to Western norms, but other members of the tribe feel like the Dene culture and history is being lost. On top of serious local issues like rampant alcoholism, global problems like climate change are rearing their ugly heads, as well. Many among the Dene still depend on the land and water for at least some portion of their diet and income, and global warming is creating environmental changes that could threaten those sources.

What Sacco has crafted in Paying the Land is a centuries-long history of a people that’s told in their own voice. The amount of research, investigation, and interviews done by Sacco surely parallels that of the very best of the investigative journalism field. Sacco’s knack for weaving a compelling narrative from the bits and pieces of Dene history and first-hand accounts from the members of the community work to create an engrossing read. It’s surely one of the better comic book histories I’ve read and is certainly worth your time. Joe Sacco is not an artist that has anything left to prove, yet his dedication to the craft of comics journalism remains as strong as ever.

[Tuck · Rating 5 out of 5]

sacco is so talented of condensing complicated topics with his simple but brilliant art. this about indians (dene) in nw canada

[Bandit · Rating 3 out of 5]

Turns out there are docucomics out there. I had no idea. I just wanted to read a graphic novel and this was available and going by the cover it looked competently drawn and interesting. But just in case you like ore specifics before diving into a book…this is essentially a meticulously crafted documentary complete with backstories, interviews, historical facts, etc. about the First Nations people of Northern Canada, especially the Dene. And much like all the other stories of this sort, it’s about how white men came and, out of greed and self righteous arrogance, f*cked an entire society for generations to come. Sure, Canada as of late has been nothing but apologetic, sorries were said and moneis were paid, but it seems that the effects of what was done, specifically the forced education systems for indigenous children where the Canadian government ripped children away from their families and put them into nightmarish boarding schools in order to properly Canadize them, this went on for years and the abuse in these establishments was rampant. The situation in turn led to communities that no longer seemed culturally homogenous with generations of angry young adults who didn’t fit into the world at large and no longer really did into their own much smaller world either. This led to alcoholism, abuse, incest, rape, etc. All of which are present in tragically high rates all over the reservations. And then there’s the constant looming shadow of the economy looking to exploit the resource laden lands, presenting the ongoing dilemma of screwing nature for money and whether the increase in jobs and wealth is worth it. So essentially you have communities of First Nation people that are no longer ubiquitously practicing their old ways or living at peace with the land are not quite assimilating with the world at large, the terrible in between liminal state of things is the main subject of this presentation, it seems. The author, late Garry Shandling look alike as drawn, and his friend must have spent a significant amount of time in the Northern wilderness of Canada to create such a detailed account. You can’t fault the determination and diligence of this project and the art is absolutely terrific, especially the meticulous detailing of the large panoramic panels, but…this just wasn’t my sort of graphic novel. For me the format traditionally presupposes a sort of fun and usually quick entertainment of the genre movie variety. I’m aware the format can be and is used for a variety of other things and hey, I salute the diversity, but that doesn’t really make me want to read a documentary turned into a long graphic novel. Different strokes and all that. This is the sort of thing that would in fact made a very good documentary, one I’d probably watch, something along the lines of Dirty Money, but in this form it took too long to get through and kind of dragged. My completist nature was a major driver behind finishing this one. An important and objectively well done book, but you must know what you’re getting into and adjust your mood accordingly.

[Kristy · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a fantastic book. I appreciated that the point of view came from Natives themselves, instead of being described only from people on the outside. I enjoyed all the different points of view; instead of assuming that all Native people feel the same about everything.
There is a lot of information to absorb from the timeline of events to all the different opinions and points of view. I definitely will reread this book, and read more about this topic. As a Canadian it is important to know all of our history, not just that of white people. White people also need to be aware of the damage that was done to Natives and their culture, and to work with them to figure out the best ways to repair the damage.

[Nicola Pierce · Rating 5 out of 5]

A sobering read and, alas, a story that is all to familiar to anyone who had read up on the Native American Indian or any indigenous history - that of the pursuit of progress and 'riches' at the expense of another's heritage and culture. Sacco gets to the heart of the story - the history- he wants to explore by meeting and listening to a wide range of people, young and old, and allowing their own experience and opinion to shine through. I think this is going to stay with me awhile.

[Alexis · Rating 5 out of 5]

An absolutely brilliant, moving and necessary book about the lives of indigenous people living in the NWT. Joe interviews people and lets them tell their stories, focussing on resource extraction, loss of tradition and residential schools.

Well done, and very moving. I learned a lot, and enjoyed the intricate drawings.

[E.M. Williams · Rating 5 out of 5]

Content advisory: genocide, residential schools, the Sixties scoop, colonization, drug abuse, alcohol abuse, sexual abuse

"What is the worldview of a people who mumble no thanks or prayers / who take what they want from the land, / and pay it back with arsenic?" (Sacco p. 249).

I've had Joe Sacco's Paying the Land for some time because unlearning Canada's colonial history is an ongoing commitment of mine. I ended up reading it after Palestine, and the comparison is visually and thematically deep.

For Paying the Land, Sacco spent time in the Northwest Territories, listening to and learning from several groups of Dene people. Where Palestine's visuals were all about confinement and narrow spaces as he tells the story of Palestinian occupation under the State of Israel, Paying the Land is grounded in expansive settings where there are barely any people.

But the Dene, like the Palestinians, have been targeted for their land and are/were stripped of their rights at various points in their history with the Canadian state. Residential schools come up a lot, as does the tension over resource extraction, both between the state and the Dene, and between different groups within the Dene.

One thing I admire about Sacco's work is how willing he is to explore complexity (e.g., the ways in which Canada's internal borders create problematic land claim situations) and varying perspectives within overlapping issues. It's messy and it's personal and there are no easy answers.

In the sections where survivors and second-generation survivors of residential schools tell their stories, his ability to superimpose the adult telling the story alongside the child experiencing its trauma is incredibly powerful.

Like many books about Indigenous rights, Sacco circles back to the change being led by Indigenous youth and the importance of their connection to their land.

There's a sequence where a young man named Eugene relates his experience of connection to Sacco near the close of the book. The starkness of the words and the sweeping, expansive space in the visuals work together to underscore why that connection is so vital, and that the best thing a government interested in being an actual partner and not a controlling, paternalistic force is to fund programs led by Indigenous people to encourage that education for others.

As with any book about colonization and as Sacco's quote above illustrates (relayed when he explores an abandoned gold mine left in breach of environmental safeguards by successive corporate interests), to read Paying the Land as a settler is to confront the moral and ethical hollowness in my own culture and society.

It's not easy, but it's never been more important to look and think.

[Bridget McGovern · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was my first time reading comics journalism and it was phenomenal. Although Joe Sacco isn't Dene himself, the entire novel centers on the Indigenous experience from many different interviews, portraying a variety of experiences with dirty development and the struggles that came as a result of strict Canadian assimilation policy. Of course, I've heard of these issues before, but it's entirely different and much more impactful to really hear the experiences themselves accompanied by quite harrowing images. The residential school experiences were particularly haunting.

Moreover, I think in the Western world, non-Indigenous people often romanticize Indigenous groups, but they're obviously not a monolith. Sacco provides a wide range of accounts and opinions regarding the oil and gas industry, economic development, and traditional living off the land that I appreciated. Overall, I would highly recommend this graphic novel.

(I am curious as to how the Dene involved were compensated for their involvement in Sacco's novel, however. Sacco, himself, posited the question of how he was any different than the oil companies going in extracting resources when he was doing the same - extracting resources via information. I hope he took a different approach than the oil executives.)