Oral History on Trial

Recognizing Aboriginal Narratives in the Courts

By Bruce Granville Miller
Categories: Law & Legal Studies, Law & Society, Social Sciences, Anthropology, History, Canadian History, Indigenous Peoples & Colonial Law, Indigenous Studies, Indigenous History, Indigenous Law, Legal History
Publisher: UBC Press
Hardcover : 9780774820707, 212 pages, May 2011
Paperback : 9780774820714, 212 pages, January 2012
Ebook (PDF) : 9780774820721, 212 pages, May 2011
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Table of contents

Preface

Acknowledgments

Introduction

1 Issues in Law and Social Science

2 The Social Life of Oral Narratives

3 Aboriginal and Other Perspectives

4 Court and Crown

5 The Way Forward? An Anthropological View

6 Conclusions

References

Index

A powerful argument for the inclusion of Aboriginal oral histories in Canadian courts of law.

Description

This important book breaks new ground by asking how oral histories might be incorporated into existing text-based, “black letter law” court systems. Along with a compelling analysis of Aboriginal, legal, and anthropological concepts of fact and evidence, Oral History on Trial traces the long trajectory of oral history from community to court, and offers a sophisticated critique of the Crown’s use of Aboriginal materials in key cases. A bold intervention in legal and anthropological scholarship, Oral History on Trial presents a powerful argument for a reconsideration of the Crown’s approach to oral history.

Awards

  • Joint winner, K.D. Srivastava Prize 2012

Reviews

Oral History on Trial is a long overdue and important book with huge potential to shift the debates concerning the role of Indigenous oral histories and their narrators in the Canadian courts and beyond.

- Wendy Wickwire, The Johns Hopkins University Press