A Line of Blood and Dirt

Book excerpt: "This book examines the creation and enforcement of Canada United States border from 1775 until 1939. Built with Indigenous labour and on top of Indigenous land, the border was born in conflict. Federal administrators used deprivation, starvation, and coercion to displace Indigenous communities and undermine their conceptions of territory and sovereignty. European, African American, Chinese, Cree, Assiniboine, Dakota, Lakota, Nimiipuu, Coast Salish, Ojibwe, and Haudenosaunee communities faced a diversity of border closure experiences and timelines. Unevenness and variation served as hallmarks of the border as federal officials in each country committed to a kind of border power that was diffuse and far reaching. Utilizing Historical GIS, this book showcases how regional conflicts, political reorganization, and social upheaval created the Canada-US border and remade the communities who lived in its shadows"--