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Objective – The Depository Services Program (DSP) provided printed Government of Canada publications to libraries until the termination of its distribution program in 2013. Full Depository Libraries (FDLs) received all eligible publications distributed by the DSP automatically. This study endeavours to determine whether academic library members of the Canadian Association of Research Libraries (CARL) that were formerly FDLs have maintained their print, federal government holdings since 2013; and what the results of the data collected in this study reveal about access to government information in Canada more broadly. Methods – The study identified a sample of 100 monographs distributed to FDLs via the DSP between 1979 and 2009. Each monograph was then searched for in the public catalogues of former FDL CARL member libraries to determine current holdings. Results – Most libraries included in the sample did not have records of all 100 publications, but every publication was located in at least 5 libraries and 12 publications were found in all libraries included in the study. Of the libraries in our sample, 1/3 had retained more than 90 of 100 publications, and 3/4 had retained at least 80. Conclusion – The redundancy that was a cornerstone of the DSP network still exists to a certain extent and should be leveraged to ensure retention and access to these essential materials for years to come. Existing collaborations and partnerships are well positioned to support a pan-Canadian discussion about preservation of and access to historical federal government information in Canadian libraries and library networks.

The Inuit Language Protection Act (ILPA) is a recent Nunavut statute. The only one of its kind in Canada, it is even more ambitious than Quebec's Charter of the French Language. A controversial statute, some question whether the legislator has exceeded its competence in adopting certain of its provisions. Indeed, section 3 of the ILPA aims to require federal departments, agencies, or institutions operating in Nunavut to provide public services and to display signs in the Inuit language, even when these organizations are acting within an area of federal legislative competence. Sections 29, 30, and 34 of the ILPA provide for the mandatory preparation of an Inuit Language Plan, detailing how an organization will comply with the legislation. The languages commissioner, who possesses broad powers of investigation in order to ensure compliance with the legislation, must approve this plan. At first glance, these sections seem to contradict the established rule that a government can legislate with respect to language provided that this legislation is ancillary to its own areas of competence. This rule derives from certain particularities of the Constitution Act, 1867. However, further analysis leads to the conclusion that this conceptual framework does not apply to Nunavut. The latter holds the power to require, on its territory, the use of the Inuit language by federal departments, agencies, and institutions.

In this retrospective I highlight the main stages in my career as an anthropologist since completing my doctoral studies at Yale University. I first tell how I found in anthropology the profession that would enable me to explore a question that I had as a child: what I might have become had I been born and raised in another environment, among “Others”? I then underscore how from beginning to end my career was enriched from my learning two indigenous languages, first in my fieldwork among the Wayuu of Columbia (September 1975 to December 1976), and then among the Dene Tha' of northwestern Alberta amongst whom I spent six months a year from 1980 to 1984. Learning the language brought me closer to Dene Tha' Elders and made possible my participation in their ceremonies which led me to write ethnographically in a way that contributed to the development of experiential anthropology. My numerous presentations and publications explore major themes in the field of indigenous studies: epistemology, ethics, methodology, ethnogenesis, rituals, shamanism, territorial claims, self-government, gender identities, conceptions of life and death, and reincarnation. In this career, I also describe what I learned from the Dene Tha' that guided me in significant initiatives in my role as Director of the Native Centre at the University of Calgary from 1988 à 1991, and as founding Dean of the Faculty of Human Sciences at Saint Paul University from 1997 to 2005.

Keywords: études autochtones, Wayuu, Dènè Tha', identités, anthropologie expérientielle, Indigenous studies, Wayuu, Dene Tha', identities, experiential anthropology, estudios indígenas, Wayuu, Dènès Tha', identidades, antropología experiencial