A Mind Spread Out on the Ground

Nonfiction | Autobiography / Memoir | Adult | Published in 2019

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Summary

Essay Summaries & Analyses

Essay 1

Essay 2

Essay 3

Essay 4

Essay 5

Essay 6

Essay 7

Essay 8

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Essay 10

Essay 11

Essay 12

Essay 13

Essay 14

Key Figures

Themes

Index of Terms

Important Quotes

Essay Topics

Themes

Indigenous Oppression by the Nation-State

Throughout her collection of essays, Elliott oscillates between her personal experiences and the broader context they fit within, most often as part of the history of violence perpetrated against Indigenous people by the nation-state. Ranging from descriptions of the original colonists’ contempt and murder of Native peoples to present-day Canada’s duplicitous politics, Elliott unfurls a personal, historical, and societal narrative of how Indigenous peoples have been and continue to be profited off of by the nation at the expense of their lands, children, and overall wellbeing. In particular, she cites the greed of the Western capitalist mindset in fueling colonialism, and the “extraction mindset” this brings about, pursuing profit at all costs.

Elliott equates the justification Canadians use to continue ignoring and perpetuating the oppression of Indigenous peoples to a fairytale that non-Indigenous Canadians tell themselves to keep their internal feelings of being part of a “good” nation alive. When describing critiques of Indigenous authors’ writing, she expresses that they “aren’t really about Native authors or their work. They’re about keeping narratives consistent. [...] [T]hey want to see antiquated stereotypes staring back at them because that is the fairy tale upon which Canada’s existence depends” (276). This is to say, the individuals that make up the nation-state of Canada uphold racist stereotypes and cut down Indigenous creators in order to maintain the myths that justify Canadian policies that withhold resources from Indigenous people and avoid taking responsibility for the violence the state has inflicted.

From the very first essay, the reader learns about how the settlers colonized the land that would become Canada, and how First Nations were driven from their land and violently oppressed by the nation-states these colonizers came from. In “Sontag, in Snapshots: Reflecting on ‘In Plato’s Cave’ in 2018” Elliott also brings up the ways imperialism is perpetuated by the very beauty standards society upholds in modern contexts, particularly in the field of photography. All of the background information culminates in the final essay when she explores how this treatment by the nation-state is abusive, examining the nation-state on a psychological level to explain the behaviors she has illustrated time and time again. She questions, “If the nation we live in is abusive, if it gaslights us, and if its profit margins and legitimacy as a nation depend on abusing and gaslighting us, how can that nation ever really stop abusing us, how can that nation ever really stop abuse and gaslighting? Why would it want to?” (372-373).

Intergenerational Trauma Among Indigenous Peoples

At the intersection of mental health and the oppression by the nation-state, the theme of intergenerational trauma is heavy throughout many of Elliott’s essays. From her own experiences, she describes the heavy alcohol use of her Indigenous relatives, the cycle of violence continued by her father, and the near-attempts of suicide she survived. Additionally, she draws from scientific literature and reports on rates of substance abuse, suicide, and mental illness that impact Indigenous Canadians at much higher rates than non-Indigenous Canadians, particularly white Canadians. She traces this trauma back to the genocide her ancestors endured at the hands of colonizing settlers. She also situates it in the present-day, as violence against Indigenous people is rarely brought to justice by Canadian institutions and systems, such as the criminal justice system that imprisons a disproportionate number of Indigenous Canadians, and the social welfare system that separates children from Indigenous families at an extremely high rate compared to other populations.

Additionally, Elliott lays out the field of epigenetics: how life experiences become imprinted and passed down through genes. She asks if what is known about the violence residential school survivors endured is “combined with what we are learning about the ways epigenetics passes these experiences on, how can we possibly expect survivors’ descendants to be much better off?” (195). This provides a biological basis to intergenerational trauma for the reader to consider as they continue learning about the high rates of mental illness, poverty, and violence that Indigenous communities endure. Generations of children have been forcibly removed from their families and placed in cruel environments where they’re taught to fear and hate both their heritage and communities.

Mental Health and Healing

Mental health is a theme Elliott returns to as a means to understand her upbringing and the intergenerational trauma she carries as a Haudenosaunee woman. Her mother plays a central role in many of Elliott’s essays, as her bipolar disorder threatens her ability to behave in a socially acceptable fashion. This informs Elliott’s understanding of mental health, making it challenging for her to accept her own depression. She describes the barrier, stating that she “saw the way Mom was treated by police, doctors, nurses, cashiers, total strangers and family members. They could all tell that there was something different about her; [...] I didn’t want to be looked at and dehumanized that way,” (253). Additionally, her father continues the cycle of abuse that has trickled down from the era of residential schools, but the pressure of keeping family business private is yet another burden Elliott must bear. Although the book opens with a scene between her and her therapist, she does not circle back to therapy until closer to the end of the book, instead fleshing out all the background the reader needs to understand to contextualize the opening scene.

It’s not until the 11th essay, “Crude Collages of My Mother,” that Elliott talks about realizing her depression and anxiety, after teaching herself how to handle her husband’s depression by trying to grant Mike the agency her mother never had. This road to healing, and learning to use therapy and medication, gives her insight to her mother’s mental illness and provides a full circle for the reader. Additionally, in her essay “On Forbidden Rooms and Intentional Forgetting,” Elliott examines mental health and healing as a survivor of sexual assault who wants to intentionally forget about the experience. She uses this essay to explore the agency of women who have experienced trauma, and her right to heal as she sees fit. The theme of mental health provides a contemporarily relevant lens to Indigenous issues, with mental health becoming more and more well researched for its impact on wellbeing, and increasingly socially acceptable and popular to talk about in today’s world.