Métissage, from which the Canadian word Métis is derived, is a site for writing and surviving in the interval between different cultures and languages; a way of merging and blurring genres, texts and identities; an active literary stance, political strategy and pedagogical praxis. As Métis has been appropriated from its original and negative meaning "half-breed," we appropriate métissage from its original meaning "mixed-blood" to become a creative strategy for the braiding of gender, race, language and place into autobiographical texts. As three researchers working collaboratively with the concept of métissage, we intend to create dialogues between and across different educational sites and discourses.

Cynthia Chambers
Dwayne Donald
Erika Hasebe-Ludt

Faculty of Education, University of Lethbridge

We gratefully acknowledge the support and funding of this project by the Curriculum Redevelopment Centre (CRDC) and the Literacy Research Centre at the University of Lethbridge, University of Lethbridge Research Excellence Envelope and Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council Research Initiative grants. In particular, we thank Emily LeBaron, Tanya Farley, Trevor Woods, Craig Brouwer and Bernie Wirzba of the CRDC for their collaboration with technology as well as Narcisse Blood, Michael Pollard, and Leah Fowler for lending their voices to the audio.

This work is being published by Educational Insights
Volume 7, Number Two, December 2002.