Reshaping the University: Responsibility, Indigenous Epistemes, and the Logic of the Gift

Rauna Kuokkanen. Reshaping the University: Responsibility, Indigenous Epistemes, and the Logic of the Gift. Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 2007. 248 pp. Paper, $37-85.

Kuokkanen begins this critique of the academy by employing the metaphor of the Deatnu River from her Sami homeland as a "border between worlds" (x). The deconstructive approach that lies at the heart of this important book employs significant insights from Gayatri Spivak's work and seeks to bring "various, even opposing discourses together" (xiv) in order to unsettle and illuminate the inconsistencies, vagaries, and fluidity of borders, particularly those borders that induce "separations and sharings" (xxi) and those that demarcate and create conceptual oppositions "in order to open up the possibility of multiple perspectives" (xxii).1 This utilization of various deconstructive and critical theories as "stepping stones" rather than prescriptive, rigid categorizations enables Kuokkanen to examine the dominant, ignorant epistemic conventions of the university and illuminate a path toward genuine transformation of the academy.

Kuokkanen asserts that as an institution the academy supports and reproduces certain systems of thought and knowledge as well as certain structures and conventions that rarely reflect Indigenous worldviews. She labels this the "sanctioned interest of the academy at large" (1). In this book she aims to interrupt these dominant academic discourses and calls for a new relationship between the academy and Indigenous peoples based on notions of hospitality and reciprocity. The academy must acknowledge and welcome Indigenous epistemes if it is to truly address and overcome this ignorance, for, as she...