Norma Dunning

Eskimo, now that's a word. White word. White word for white people to wrap around their pink tongues. Esquimaux. Spell it any way you want and it still comes out the same, skid row and all. - from "Kabloona Red" In Annie Muktuk and Other Stories, Norma Dunning portrays the unvarnished realities of northern life through gritty characters who find themselves in difficult situations. Dunning grew up in a silenced form of Aboriginality, experiencing racism, assimilation, and colonialism; as she began exploring her Inukness, her writing bubbled up to the surface. Her stories challenge southern perceptions of the north and Inuit life through evocative, nuanced voices accented with Inuktitut words and symbolism. As with Alootook Ipellie's work, these short stories bring Inuit life into the reality of the present. Robert Kroetsch series

Annie Muktuk and Other Stories

From the winner of the 2021 Governor General's Award for literature, a revelatory look into an obscured piece of Canadian history: what was then called the Eskimo Identification Tag System In 2001, Dr. Norma Dunning applied to the Nunavut Beneficiary program, requesting enrolment to legally solidify her existence as an Inuk woman. But in the process, she was faced with a question she could not answer, tied to a colonial institution retired decades ago: “What was your disc number?” Still haunted by this question years later, Dunning took it upon herself to reach out to Inuit community members who experienced the Eskimo Identification Tag System first-hand, providing vital perspective and nuance to the scant records available on the subject. Written with incisive detail and passion, Dunning provides readers with a comprehensive look into a bureaucracy sustained by the Canadian government for over thirty years, neglected by history books but with lasting echoes revealed in Dunning’s intimate interviews with affected community members. Not one government has taken responsibility or apologized for the E-number system to date — a symbol of the blatant dehumanizing treatment of the smallest Indigenous population in Canada. A necessary and timely offering, Kinauvit? provides a critical record and response to a significant piece of Canadian history, collecting years of research, interviews and personal stories from an important voice in Canadian literature.

What’s Your Name? The Eskimo Disc System and a Daughter’s Search for her Grandmother

Kinauvit?

A new collection of short stories that illuminate Inuit experience in the Canadian South.

The Unseen Ones, Short Stories

Tainna

"Eskimo Pie: A Poetics of Inuit Identity" examines Dunning's lived history as an Inuk who was born, raised and continues to live south of sixty. Her writing takes into account the many assimilative practices that Inuit continue to face and the expectations of mainstream as to what an Inuk person can and should be. Her words examine what it is like to feel the constant rejection of her work from non-Inuit people and how we must all in some way find the spirit to carry through with what we hold to be true demonstrating the importance of standing tall and close to our words as Indigenous Canadians. We are the guardians of our work regardless of the cost to ourselves as artists and as Inuit people, we matter.

Norma Dunning

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