Dimensions of Vulnerability, Survivance, and Decolonized Futures in Yvette Nolan’s The Unplugging and Gerald Vizenor’s Bearheart

The concept of surviving an apocalypse is not new to Indigenous peoples, who have long faced the consequences of climate change and colonization. Anishinaabe scholar Gerald Vizenor’s concept of “survivance,” which rejects definitions, tragedy, and victimhood, constitutes a useful asset to identify dynamics of survival and resistance of Native American people against genocide, boundaries, stereotypes, and the vulnerability engendered by environmental degradation. Indigenous speculative works in particular embrace the idea at the heart of survivance, depicting vulnerable characters who must rely on their cultural knowledge to thrive in post-apocalyptic worlds and celebrating the power to shape Indigenous futures in the midst of uncertainty. This article analyzes the decolonial potential of two Indigenous speculative works: Yvette Nolan’s play The Unplugging (2011) and Gerald Vizenor’s novel BearHeart (1990). Focusing on the link between eco-catastrophes, resource depletion, and the vulnerability of Indigenous peoples, the article aims to demonstrate how Nolan and Vizenor's works appropriate and subvert Western narrative structures, while showing Indigenous peoples’ ability to assert their land sovereignty in the face of anthropogenic eco-catastrophes. In doing so, the authors challenge stereotypes about Indigenous culture by drawing on Native American and First Nations traditional knowledge systems to reshape Western forms of speculative narrative.