"I Want to Move Forward. You Can Move Forward too." Articulating Indigenous Self-Determination at the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada

The proliferation of truth and reconciliation commissions has raised serious concerns about the potential that "speaking truth to power" must transform dominant power relations. Critics argue that by employing corporal metaphors of shared wounds in need of healing for the good of the nation, these human rights instruments compel participants to speak solely about suffering and identify primarily as victims. However, drawing on ethnographic field-work conducted at the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada, I challenge this assessment. Testimonies were not merely expressions of pain from victims of colonialism; they were also articulations of self-determination from decolonizing Indigenous subjects.