Karen Pheasant-Neganigwane

Karen Pheasant-Neganigwane (Anishinaabe/Three Fires Confederacy) is honoured as a Nokomis of eight grandchildren from her three children. She dedicates her life’s work of Mino bimaadiziwin, in keeping with the 8th Fire prophecy, as a 7th Fire prophecy community member. Karen’s path to social action and scholarly work started as a youth during the height of the civil rights era of the seventies (Toronto). She attributes her activism to her parents, who survived the Indian Residential School experience. Her early social justice engagement, established in idealism, artistic spirit, and free speech, provided a crucial beginning for her inquisitive spirit. Karen spent her early years as a dancer, artist, and writer, which evolved into education.

She spent the past forty years mentored by iconic Indigenous scholars from the Great Lakes of her people to Treaty Three, Treaty Six and currently in Treaty Seven. Her Euro-Western education includes a B.A. in Political Science and English Literature and graduate studies in Educational Policy Studies (M.Ed) from the University of Alberta. Karen is an Assistant Professor at Mount Royal University in the Treaty Seven region. She is cross-appointed to the Department of General Education, Office of Teaching and Learning, and the Department of Humanities–Indigenous Studies. She is also in completion of a PhD in Educational Policy Studies/Indigenous Peoples Education with the University of Alberta with a focus on Anishinaabe/Indigenous pedagogy and higher learning.