‘All my Relations’ in Ruby Slipperjack’s Silent Words (1992)

This presentation examines the extent of which Nature in Ruby Slipperjack’s Silent Words (1992) serves to reconnect 11-year-old protagonist, Danny, to his Anishinaabe identity. When Danny flees his run-down house in a settler-colonial town, he finds limitless support from the plant and animal life of Northern Ontario. The relationship between boy and Nature transcends the boundary between the human and the more-than-human world and becomes that of a student and teacher. Danny’s reconnection to Nature and his willingness to listen to its many abstract teachings are central to the reclamation of his indigeneity. With the help of some human interpreters, Danny develops the epistemological tools and the humility to allow Nature to heal his past traumas as well. The Anishinaabe medicine wheel teachings profess that a holistically healthy person seeks to find balance among their intellectual, spiritual, emotional, and physical self. Danny achieves this on his journey through the woods while decolonizing and re-indigenizing himself. This reading of the role of more-than-humans in Silent Words also identifies Nature’s propensity to share Anishinaabe teachings in subtle and unexpected ways for those who are willing to listen. Though it is a fictional text, the transformative learning and healing processes Danny goes through after reconnecting with Nature are generalizable to the real-world. In many ways Danny’s reclamation of his Indigenous identity mimics the large-scale Indigenization movement happening throughout Turtle Island today.