Idle No More: from recognition to Indigenous resurgence in Canada

In the present paper, the intention is to analyze the constitution of the movement Idle More, the ideas that sustain it, as well as the evolution of the political practices of the Indigenous movement from the 1960s to the present. We choose to combine Bourdieu's concept of field with settler colonial studies to understand how the indigenist field and the kind of resources or capital for which the distinct actors compete determine the limitations of the liberal recognition. It is argued here that the Idle No More movement doesn't solely oppose the liberal recognition of Indigenous identity and Indigenous rights, but also aims at reclaiming and reconstituting Indigenous spaces autonomous from the State, as well as to redefine the discussion about Indigenous rights.