Dr. Janine Metallic

Janine Metallic is a Mi’gmaw scholar from Listuguj Mi’gmaq First Nation. Indigenous language resurgence is the central thread of her research program, connecting questions of language learning, education, identity, belonging, sovereignty, and the responsibilities of researchers and institutions. Her earlier scholarship examined Mi’gmaw language learning and pedagogy. This work has developed to consider the broader conditions that shape how Indigenous languages and knowledges are learned, represented, governed, and supported, including questions of language and textual sovereignty, multilingual justice, and belonging in educational and university settings. 

Indigenous research methodologies and relational accountability shape how she approaches this work. They inform the questions she asks, the relationships through which projects take form, and decisions about methods, authorship, documentation, and knowledge sharing. In Listuguj, her research grows from Mi’gmaw language knowledge and relationships with family and community, including current work concerned with language, memory, music, and cultural continuity. Her research in Kahnawà:ke developed through a separate collaboration with community researchers, language learners, Elders, speakers, and educators. That work brought linguistic archives into conversation with contemporary language learning and community knowledge in response to priorities identified within that research context. 

Research, teaching, graduate supervision, researcher development, and community engagement are closely connected within her scholarly work. Each provides a different setting in which to consider what responsibilities accompany Indigenous languages and knowledges, how educational and research relationships are formed, and what conditions support allow Indigenous languages and scholarship.