Missing & Murdered Indigenous Women & Girls

For decades, indigenous women in Canada have been disappearing and dying violently at alarming rates. An unprecedented RCMP report, released in 2014, found there were 1,181 police-reported cases of homicides and long-term disappearances involving indigenous women and girls between 1980 and 2012.

One year after indigenous women in Val-d'Or, Que., came forward with explosive allegations of police abuse that rocked the local community and captured the country's attention, prosecutors say they are now on the verge of revealing whether any provincial police officers will face criminal charges.

THE B.C. government announced on Monday that it has passed an order in council that gives the commissioners of the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered indigenous Women and Girls the authority to examine matters within jurisdiction of the province.

The next time you cross the Red River in Winnipeg you'll notice red ribbons adorning bridge beams to honour Canada's missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls. On Monday, following a drum ceremony, Melissa Paypompee and a small group headed on to the Louise Bridge to tie dozens of cloth ribbons to call attention to the crisis.

Helen Betty Osborne had been hanging out with her friends at a café and she was excited for her future. No one will ever know what Osborne could have achieved because the young Cree woman was murdered, sparking a conversation around violence towards Indigenous women across the country.

On Mother's Day back in May, Brad Firth - a marathon runner from the Gwinch'in First Nation, who goes by the name Caribou Legs - left Vancouver by foot. In full war paint, with no entourage and only a single small knapsack to carry supplies, he set out on a 7,800 km run across Canada to raise awareness for missing and murdered Indigenous women.

By Lailani Upham Char-Koosta News "Chorus is one of my favorite classes," said Marita. She wears white paint from eye to temple to represent peace in her school and community. (Lailani Upham photo) POLSON - Among the store-bought fashions worn by Polson High School students the attire that stands out is worn by senior Marita Growing Thunder.

The poems in Witness, I Am serve as testimony for Métis poet Gregory Scofield. Inspired by calls to reconciliation between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Canadians, Scofield's urgent, emotional collection speaks to the injustices experienced by his mother, Dorothy Scofield, and aunty, Georgina Houle Young, who was murdered in 1998. Scofield, who

There's another story to the tragic saga of missing and murdered Indigenous women (MMIW) and it's coming to light through an Instagram project created by the National Film Board (NFB). What Brings Us Here -- a project by writer and filmmaker Katherena Vermette and producer Alicia Smith -- profiles volunteers of the Drag the Red and Bear Clan Patrol of Winnipeg.

Brad "Caribou Legs" Firth shared his story in a talking circle at the Qalipu First Nation community room on Wednesday. The event welcoming Firth to the city on his cross-country run to raise awareness about murdered and missing indigenous women was hosted by the band and the Corner Brook Aboriginal Women's Association.

While it wasn't a full house, the audience was engaged at Amnesty International's public forum in Fort St. John on Friday, Nov. 4. The forum acted as a venue to discuss the findings of Amnesty's report Out of Sight, Out Of Mind: Gender, Indigenous Rights, and Energy Development in Northeast B.C., and had five panelists on stage as voices for various aspects of the report.

That is because he is running across the country from Vancouver to Newfoundland to raise awareness about the missing and murdered indigenous women in Canada. This run recently brought him to Shelburne County. The number of unsolved cases is high and is a problem.

An aboriginal man who set out on a cross-country journey from British Columbia on Mother's Day has arrived in Newfoundland. He's known as "Caribou Legs" and he's trying to shine a spotlight on the issue of missing and murdered indigenous women. NTV's Don Bradshaw reports.

Karen Kejick, holding an eagle feather, and other members of Iskatewizaagegan (Shoal Lake 39) First Nation head out to Highway 17 to raise awareness of missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls and other forms of violence against women on Monday, Nov. 7.

Many people have seen the kneels that National Football League quarterback Colin Kaepernick of the San Francisco 49ers has taken during the national anthem to protest racial oppression and police brutality in the United States. Since Kaepernick's gesture gained widespread attention in late August, teams at various levels in several sports have followed his example.

Standing on Canada's Parliament Hill, meters from the historic Centennial Flame, Canadians witnessed another year of commemoration, representing the many missing and murdered Aboriginal women across Canada. Stories of loss and hope, grief and frustration, filled with song and dance and spoken word, left many standing in a mesmerizing stare; they were moved by powerful words, but remained speechless. The event was one of the annual Sisters in Spirit Vigils to honor lost sisters, wives, daughters, and aunts, among friends, families, activists, and supporters, who have fought in their communities for so long. Families and leaders have lobbied governments for decades, facing the reality of the Canadian government's inaction and omissions relating to the investigation of hundreds of missing and murdered Aboriginal women. Families and leaders are faced with the dissatisfactory inaction that has persisted too long at the cost of so many. And despite countless setbacks and hardships endured, Aboriginal voices and allies calling for action remain strong.

Historically, violence against women has been an accepted practice across the globe. Violence against women activism emerged as part of women's rights, women's liberation, and womanist movements of the second half of the twentieth century. Collective actions to end violence against women vary in emphasis of accountability, victim support, and empowerment and in levels of advocacy, including individual, relationship, community, societal, and global.

Cogan, Marin. "The Sisterhood." Foreign Policy 219 (2016): 68.

The literature review for this Major Research Project (MRP) documents research on violence against Indigenous women and leads to the following observation: if we look at the historical roots of why these women become targets of violence today, we realize that Indigenous men were also the targets of this very same historical colonial violence. Yet, research has shown that Indigenous males have largely been studied from the perspective of the perpetrators of violence and never as victims (Brownbridge, 2008; Brzozowski et al., 2006; Chenault, 2011; Dylan et al., 2008; Innes, 2015; RCMP, 2014; RCMP, 2015; Statistics Canada, 1998, 1999, 2003, 2005, 2006; Thibodeau et al., 2013; Weaver, 2009). The question then becomes, why are Indigenous males not being researched as victims of violence, and why do we only view them as perpetrators of violence?

Pro gradu -tutkielma käsittelee Kanadan poliisivoimien, Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP), vuoden 2014 operationaalista raporttia Kanadan kadonneista ja murhatuista alkuperäiskansojen naisista. Heitä katoaa ja murhataan Kanadassa suhteessa huomattavasti enemmän kuin muita naisia. Aihe on hyvin ajankohtainen sekä kriittinen ja siihen on paikallisten organisaatioiden lisäksi kiinnittänyt huomiota mm. Amnesty International ja Yhdistyneet Kansakunnat.