Landing : Athabascau University

The Reason Who Walk

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By Laurie Milne November 22, 2015 - 2:03pm

The Reason You Walk (Viking, 2015) by Wab Kinew is the story of a personal journey and family and cross-cultural reconciliation set within the framework of Native Canadian history of the past 100+ years.  Kinew explains that the wording, The Reason You Walk, has four layers of meaning and they are all from the perspective of the Creator.  The first meaning is "I have created you and therefore you walk"; the second is "I am your motivation"; the third  is "I am that spark inside you called love, which animates you and allows you to live by the Anishinaabe values of kiizhewaatiziwin; and, the fourth and final meaning is "I am the destination at the end of your life what you are walking towards."  This book is well written and eloquent.  Students enrolled in Anthropology 362: Aboriginal Cultures of North America will find it a superb read!