October 12 - subTEXT

Two with First Nations connections:

• Gregory Scofield, I Knew Two Metis Women ($12: a quasi-biography of Scofield's mother and aunt, in the guise of many separate poems)
• Dara Culhane Speck, An Error in Judgement: The Politics of Medical Care in an Indian/White Community ($10: from 1987, about the 1979 death by appendicitis of a young First Nations girl in Alert Bay, BC)

Culhane Speck's book looks like it'll be deeply compelling. When young Renee Smith died, the community found a way to investigate the medical system, from a local perspective but also reaching out to the provincial and federal governments. Between January 1977 and January 1979, Alert Bay had an average of 600 white residents and 1200 First Nations residents; during this same period, there was one white death and forty-four First Nations deaths. In hospital, Renee Smith asked one provoking question that set off the investigation: why do only Indians die? I'm looking forward to this book.