Chantal Fiola

Title:Associate Professor
Office:Room:131, 541 Selkirk Avenue
Building:Merchants Corner
Phone:204.988.7185
Email:c.fiola@uwinnipeg.ca

Biography:

Chantal Fiola is Michif (Red River Métis) with family from St. Laurent and Ste. Geneviève, MB. She is the author of Rekindling the Sacred Fire: Métis Ancestry and Anishinaabe Spirituality, which won the John Hirsch Award for Most Promising Manitoba Writer and the Beatrice Mosionier Aboriginal Writer of the Year Award. In 2021, with an Awards to Scholarly Publications (ASPP) Grant funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC), she released her follow-up book, Returning to Ceremony: Spirituality in Manitoba Métis Communities. She has also been the recipient of a SSHRC Connections Grant as well as a SSHRC Partnering for Change Grant. Dr. Fiola was named Distinguished Indigenous Scholar’s Chair in 2021(-2024) by the University of Winnipeg (UW). She is an Associate Professor in the Department of Urban and Inner-City Studies at UW. Dr. Fiola researches, publishes, and teaches in the areas of Métis (and selected First Nations) identity, culture, spirituality, history, urbanity; Indigenous, community-centred methodologies; Indigenous genders, sexualities, feminisms; colonization and decolonization; and Indigenous resurgence and sovereignty. She is a founding and executive member of the Two-Spirit Michif Local of the Manitoba Metis Federation and sits on other boards, including for the Two-Spirited People of Manitoba. Chantal is two-spirit, Midewiwin, a Sundancer, and lives with her wife and their daughter in Winnipeg.

Photo byMadix Photography

Courses:

Dr. Fiola’s course offerings include:

Indigenous Ways of Knowing (UIC-1010; fulfills Indigenous Course Requirement [ICR])

Decolonization and Resurgence (UIC-1002);

Métis Identity, Culture and Rights (UIC-2010; fulfils ICR)

殖民和原住民的Canada (UIC-2020; fulfils ICR)

Two-Spirit, Indigiqueer and Indigenous LGBTQ Realities (UIC-3010; fulfills ICR)

Re-Storying Indigenous Education: A Directed Readings Course (UIC-4001)

Publications:

Peer-Reviewed Books

Fiola, Chantal. 2021. Returning to Ceremony: Spirituality in Manitoba Métis Communities. Winnipeg: University of Manitoba Press.https://uofmpress.ca/books/detail/returning-to-ceremony

Fiola, Chantal. 2015. Rekindling the Sacred Fire: Métis Ancestry and Anishinaabe Spirituality. Winnipeg: University of Manitoba Press. [Winner: John Hirsch Award for Most Promising Manitoba Writer (Manitoba Writers’ Guild); Winner: Beatrice Mosionier Aboriginal Writer of the Year (Manitoba Writers’ Guild)]https://uofmpress.ca/books/detail/rekindling-the-sacred-fire

Peer-Reviewed Book Chapters & Journal Articles

Fiola, Chantal. “Métis Nationhood: Thoughts on Diaspora, Spirituality, and Kinship.” In Relation and Resistance: Racialized Women, Religion and Diaspora, edited by Sailaja Krishnamurti, and Becky Lee. Montreal: McGilll-Queen’s University Press. (Forthcoming)

Fiola, Chantal. “Prenatal/Postpartum Ceremonies and Parenting as Michif Self-Determination.” In Strong Metis Women Academics: Our contributions, edited by Laura Forsythe and Jennifer Markides. Winnipeg: University of Manitoba Press. (Forthcoming)

Fiola, Chantal, & Albert McLeod. “Two-Spirit Resistance and Resurgence in Winnipeg.” In L. Fontaine, J. Loxley, S. MacKinnon, K. Mallett (Eds.), Indigenous Resistance and Institutional Development in Winnipeg: 1950 – 2019. Winnipeg: Arbeiter Ring. (Forthcoming)

Fiola,尚塔尔和Shauna麦金农。2020.“城市and Inner-City Studies: Decolonizing Ourselves and the University of Winnipeg.” In Decolonizing and Indigenizing Education in Canada, edited by Sheila Cote-Meek, and Taima Moeke-Pickering, 155-177. Toronto: Canadian Scholars’ Press.

Fiola, Chantal. 2020. “Naawenangweyaabeg Coming In: Intersections of Indigenous Identity, Feminism, Sexuality, and Spirituality.” In In Good Relation: History, Gender, and Kinship in Indigenous Feminisms, edited by Sarah Nickel, and Amanda Fehr, 138-153. Winnipeg: University of Manitoba Press.

Fiola, Chantal, and Sharanpal Ruprai. 2019. “Two-Spirit and Queer Trans People of Colour: Reflecting on the Call to Conversation Conference (C2C).” Canadian Journal of Native Studies 39(1): 45-64.

Fiola, Chantal. 2019. “Expanding Métis Curriculum.” In Research Journeys in/to Multiple Ways of Knowing, edited by Jennifer Markides, and Laura Forsythe, 185-195. New York: DIO Press.

Fiola, Chantal. 2013. “Transnational Indigenous Feminism: An Interview with Lee Maracle.” In Transnationalism, Activism, Art, edited by Kit Dobson and Aine McGlynn, 162-170. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.