Category Archives: Uncategorized

Successful SSHRC Postdoctoral Fellowship Proposal This was my successful proposal for a SSHRC Postdoctoral Fellowship back in 2022. I hope it may be useful to anyone preparing their own proposals! Title: Colonial saboteurs? Settler-led Indigenous rights organizations in the Anglo World, 1840-1940 Project description This project will compare the histories of four settler-led Indigenous rights organizations between 1840-1940 to explore the complex interconnections between Indigenous rights activism and settler colonialism. Settlers from across the Anglo World (Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and the United States) formed Indigenous rights organizations. The longest lasting of these include South Australia’s Aborigines’ Friends Association (1858-2001) and America’s Indian Rights Association (1882-1994). Others were more fleeting, such as the Canadian Indian Research and Aid Society (1890-1891) and the Maori Rights Conservation Association (1906-1907). These organizations raised public awareness of Indigenous rights abuses, lobbied governments to change public policies, and raised funds to support Indigenous communities. Although…

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Successful SSHRC Doctoral Fellowship Proposal This was my successful proposal for a SSHRC Doctoral Fellowship back in 2020. I hope it may be useful to anyone preparing their own proposals! Title: Indigenous and Settler Correspondence with the Aborigines’ Protection Society: Negotiating Imperialism from within Canada, South Africa, and New Zealand, 1850-1900. Context and research questions: The Aborigines’ Protection Society (APS) was a British humanitarian organization that operated between 1837 and 1909. The mandate of the APS was to protect Indigenous peoples in the empire from exploitation and violence, but not to challenge the notion of colonialism and empire. As such, it presents a remarkable window into the operation and contradictions of British imperialism. The correspondence network of the APS, previously neglected by historians, offers crucial insight into how Indigenous peoples and settlers attempted to participate in imperial politics from the edges of the British empire, as well as insight into…

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Successful SSHRC CGS-Masters Proposal This is my successful proposal for a SSHRC CGS-M back in 2018. I hope it may be useful for anyone preparing their own applications! Program of Study In 2015, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission called for post-secondary institutions to re-center the study of history around Indigenous contributions to society. Canadian universities have begun to prioritize the Indigenization of academia, which can be summed up as the process of “re-centering Indigenous world views [sic] as a starting point for institutional decolonization” (MacDonald 2016, para. 5). However, historical research into the Aborigines Protection Society (APS), a British political organization that “advocated for”[1] Indigenous rights during the 19th century, has largely ignored the contributions and significance of Indigenous political actors. The APS was founded upon a network of Indigenous contributors from whom the Society’s intelligence was gathered, yet no research has gone into exploring Indigenous agency in relation to…

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