This dissertation examines both the literature and my personal experiences regarding the implications of cyberspace, with a view to contemporary Native and First Nations peoples in Canada, particularly in light of the Seventh Fire Prophecy of coexistence and cooperation (Patterson 1995).
I examine the role of Information Technology (IT) in the emerging First Nations cybercommunities in Canada, also the ways in which IT impacts on people's lives. This dissertation seeks to determine what is being gained and lost in exchanges between people and computers, people communicating in new ways via IT, and in new global dialogues.
I then describe some visions for the future use of cyberspace, with a caution to be aware of its contradictory possibilities, concluding that First Nations in Canada should take a proactive approach to this new territory still in the process of creation, to refine and redefine Native and non-Native priorities with regards to cultural survival, self-determination, and mutual recognition.

Confessions of a Webmaster: on Morphing to the Transhuman Era

This paper enters cyberspace, a place that brings the Internet, telecommunications, World Wide Web and other communications technologies together, a place virtually populated by a select group of people. Through research of the literature, the implications of the convergence of human and machine (cyborgs) are examined, along with some First Nations perspectives on the potential of cyberspace.

Walking the Dog: An Urban Ethnography of Owners and their Dogs in the Glebe
(Where Can 'Lassie' 'Go?' -- Territoriality and Contested Spaces)

An examination of stratified layers of legislation and local, more personal views on dogs, combined to provide a picture of a society in transition and partition, particularly with regards to public land and park use. The paper shows that dogs are 'lightning rods' for different levels of public opinion, which are manifestly concerned with animals but latently more involved with human socialization, with governance of the neighborhood, and with allocation of natural resources in the area.

Where the Forest meets the Highway

An exploration of Technology in the Bush, to see where Information Technology and the Knowledge Economy meet First Nations: Some Theories and proposed Methods for Research. This essay first appeared in Alternate Routes, Fall 2000.

From Australian-Canadian Studies 14/1/96, in WP5.1:

The following is in WP5.1 format in a .zip file for downloading; it is some 300 pages long...

Natives in Canada have maintained their value systems throughout colonization. Today a strong movement toward self-determination has begun in this country. Tools brought by the Europeans and others are being used by Native peoples to allow them to break the constraints of imposed marginalization and colonization policy. One of the strongest of these tools is music.

At first European colonizers imposed their own music and worldview in an attempt to assimilate Native people and their expressions. For many years Natives kept their instruments and songs to themselves and learned Western musical culture. The drum and teachings related to the land and spirituality remained, hidden or cloaked in new expressions.

Today Native people in Canada are speaking out through their music. As Natives begin to answer the process of colonization and redefine their role in Canada, they are reflecting traditional teachings. These include Cree and Hopi teachings of the "purification," the Seven Generations Prophecy (Iroquois) and the Seventh Fire Prophecy (Ojibwe). These teachings are related to concerns about the killing of mother earth along with her medicines, trees, fish and animal life (environmental degradation), and also with the social and economic crises in this and other countries.

Today we are living in the age of the Seventh Fire. This thesis explores how a new music combining the spirit of the drum and technology from the popular music world is helping to bring Native songs, perspectives and prophecies to the centre of the world stage.