Rice’s thesis explores Délı̨nę at the time of transition to self-government (2015). It describes the community’s hopes for self government’s future, the history that lead to its negotiation, the ways in which a legal agreement’s text may diverge from the ideas people hold about it, and the ways in which people are impacted by the new roles created by institutions of governance.

In many ways, Dene Ts’ı̨lı̨ has the power to transform Canadian institutions and laws, as in when Dene SSI board members in Délı̨nę use Dene Kedǝ to change the mood and content of an otherwise sterile meeting, and remind their leaders of their Dene origins. Dene understandings of the Final Self Government Agreement are different than the text itself: its oral life has different power in Délı̨nę than the written document, and opportunities for the FSGA to be a vehicle for Dene Ts’ı̨lı̨ and Dene Kedǝ lie in people’s hopes and plans for the future. In 2015, the mere idea of self-government had generated significant energy and planning around Dene Ts’ı̨lı̨ and Kedǝ preservation and revitalization.

From Abstract: "This thesis explores aspects of self-government in Délı̨nę, NT, Canada, a Sahtú Dene community of approximately 550 people. Délı̨nę’s Final Self Government Agreement (FSGA) was passed by the federal government of Canada in 2015, and the research for this thesis coincided with the beginning of Délı̨nę’s one-year transition into self government. The FSGA follows the Sahtú Dene and Métis Comprehensive Land Claim Agreement of 1993, and the region falls within Treaty 11. This thesis’ primary question is: What are the shared stories about the future of self-government that people in Délı̨nę tell? Subsidiary questions and themes that emerged from the research process include: How does the history of the Sahtú region inform contemporary negotiations, agreements, and the stories told about them? How do new roles created by institutions of governance impact the people who hold them? How does the text of a self-government agreement diverge from the ideas that people have about self-government?"

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This thesis has been made available open access from the University of Alberta here: http://hdl.handle.net/10402/era.43158

Rice, Faun. Time and Story in Sahtú Self Government: Intercultural Bureaucracies on Great Bear Lake. Master’s Thesis, University of Alberta, 2016.