Dying from improvement : inquests and inquiries into Indigenous deaths in custody Cover Image

Book

Dying from improvement : inquests and inquiries into Indigenous deaths in custody / Sherene H. Razack.

Summary:

The author argues that, amidst systematic state violence against Indigenous people, inquiries and inquests serve to obscure the violence of ongoing settler colonialism under the guise of benevolent concern. Razack's powerful critique of the Canadian settler state and its legal system speaks to many of today's most pressing issues of social justice: the treatment of Indigenous people, the unparalleled authority of the police and the justice system, and their systematic inhumanity towards those whose lives they perceive as insignificant.

Record details

ISBN: 9781442628915 (pbk.)
Physical Description: xi, 309 p. ; 24 cm.
Publisher: Toronto : University of Toronto Press, 2015.

Content descriptions

Bibliography, etc. Note:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Formatted Contents Note:

Acknowledgments -- A note on names -- Introduction : Boot print on the chest : disappearing "Indians" in life and law -- The body as placeless : memorializing colonial power -- Dying from improvement -- The body as frontier -- People die : a killing indifference -- The medico-legal alliance : Anthany Dawson and the diagnosis of excited delirium -- "It happened more than once" : freezing deaths in Saskatchewan -- Conclusion: tombstone data -- Appendix: Deaths in custody : Saskatchewan 1995-2013 -- Notes -- Works cited -- Index.