Description: We Remember the Coming of the White Man chronicles the Dene First Nations People in the extraordinary time of the early 20th century. This Special Edition of the book recognizes the signing of Treaty 11, which is greatly controversial due to the emotional and economic fallout for the Dene People. The remastered film We Remember (1975) film is included with the book, on DVD and as digital Vimeo links.
Review Quotes:
"Our traditional knowledge is recorded in the stories of our ancestors since time immemorial. In this book, you will read our oral history and traditions that are our Dene parables, used to guide ourselves and our People."
--Dene National Chief Norman Yakeleya
We Remember The Coming of the White Man should be crucial reading for anyone in Canada because it speaks to the resiliency of the Dene and Metis people of Denendeh. It's also a testament to the power of memory carried in the oral tradition. To think what our ancestors have seen in one lifetime: relations with the Hudon's Bay Company, TB, Influenza, Treaty signings, the first musket loader, Residential Schools, the first radio, the first TV, a man on the moon. It is staggering. I hear so much power in these pages. I also feel it. I am grateful to everyone involved in this project because it is a life's work honouring the witnessing of so much change in so little time. Mahsi cho, everyone. I am grateful. We will have and celebrate this book and the DVD that accompanies it forever.
-- Richard Van Camp
With rare mastery of his filmmaking craft, Dene storyteller Raymond Yakeleya carries on in this book, bringing a former and still ever-present world of wolf, bear, and raven, ik'o, medicine, magic, and mystery to life, to modern meaning. -
--Antoine Mountain, author of From Bear Rock Mountain: The Life and Times of a Dene Residential School Survivor