A Mind Spread Out on the Ground

The sixth essay draws comparisons between the scientific discovery and understanding of dark matter and the white “discovery” and understanding of Indigenous peoples. Elliott describes the contemporary injustices Indigenous people face in Canada and the United States, such as the killing of nêhiyaw man Colten Boushie by white Canadian Gerald Stanley, or the sexual exploitation and murder of a young Anishinaabe girl, Tina Fontaine, by another white Canadian, Raymond Cormier. In both cases, the white Canadian was declared “not guilty.” The author delves into the racial underpinnings of such cases and her own treatment growing up visibly poor but not visibly Indigenous. She jumps between descriptions of the still-ongoing exploration of dark matter, her childhood experiences of poverty and Indigenousness, and a present-day vacation she is on with her family when she hears about the outcome of the Boushie case. This news starts Elliott down the path of exploring Indigenous relationships with the law and welfare systems, touching on past injustices and explanations but mainly focusing on their culmination today and the continuing effects on Indigenous people like herself. Elliott creates tension as she zooms in on her firsthand experience of racism and zooms out on the ways in which racism has been ignored or gone unseen, similar to the invisibility of dark matter.

In this essay, Elliott also shares an anecdote of when she and her younger sister Missy are caught shoplifting at a convenience store.