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29 October 2010: High praise for Colin Samson's work with the Innu

Writing in Canadian Dimension, Joegodson Deralcine and Paul Jackson say:

 "There are very few authors who infuse their writings with their intelligence and humanity that reflect Orwell’s moral challenge. Two such intellectuals are E. P. Thompson and Colin Samson."

In a discussion comparing the situation of contemporary Haitians with the Innu they go on to say:

"One of the very few scholarly books infused with humanity is Colin Samson’s A Way of Life That Does Not Exist. He is an observer of the Innu in the face of this continuing colonization of their territory. This is one of only a handful of books on foreign policy that connects with human beings."

Colin Samson studied sociology and medical anthropology in the United States and Britain. His more recent interests have been in questions of intercultural contact. Colin has been working with the Innu peoples of the Labrador-Quebec peninsula since 1994. The early phases of this work involved a human rights campaign with Survival International, resulting in the publication of the widely-cited report Canada's Tibet: the killing of the Innu in 1999. In addition to several journal articles and book chapters on the Innu, his book on the effects of forced assimilation, A Way of Life that Does Not Exist: Canada and the Extinguishment of the Innu was published by Verso Press in 2003. The book was honoured with the Pierre Savard Award by the International Council for Canadian Studies in 2006.