Urban Indigeneities

Today a majority of Indigenous peoples live in urban areas: they are builders and cleaners, teachers and lawyers, market women and masons, living in towns and cities surrounded by the people and pollution that characterize life for most individuals in the twenty-first century. Despite this basic fact, the vast majority of studies on Indigenous peoples concentrate solely on rural Indigenous populations.

Aiming to highlight these often-overlooked communities, this is the first book to look at urban Indigenous peoples globally and present the urban Indigenous experience—not as the exception but as the norm. The contributing essays draw on a wide range of disciplines, including sociology, anthropology, architecture, land economy, and area studies, and are written by both Indigenous and non-Indigenous scholars. The analysis looks at Indigenous people across the world and draws on examples not usually considered within the study of indigeneity, such as Fiji, Japan, and Russia. Indigeneity is often seen as being “authentic” when it is practiced in remote rural areas, but these essays show that a vigorous, vibrant, and meaningful indigeneity can be created in urban spaces too. The book challenges many of the imaginaries and tropes of what constitutes “the Indigenous” and offers perspectives and tools to understand a contemporary Indigenous urban reality. As such, it is a must-read for anyone interested in the real lives of Indigenous people today.

Contributors Aiko Ikemura Amaral Chris Andersen Giuliana Borea Dana Brablec Andrew Canessa Sandra del Valle Casals Stanislav Saas Ksenofontov Daniela Peluso Andrey Petrov Marya Rozanova-Smith Kate Stevens Kanako Uzawa

Author Biography

Dana Brablec is an assistant professor in Race, Decoloniality and Intersectionality at the Centre for Latin American Research and Documentation (CEDLA), University of Amsterdam. She is the author of several articles published in Bulletin of Latin American Research, Sociology, and the Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies. Andrew Canessa is a professor of anthropology at the University of Essex (UK). He is the author of Intimate Indigeneities and the editor of Género, complementariedades y exclusiones and Natives Making Nation.