Michael Asch

Michael I. Asch (born April 9, 1943) is an anthropologist in Canada. He became Professor Emeritus at the University of Alberta and works as a professor in the Department of Anthropology at the University of Victoria. Much of his work over the years has focused on issues of Indigenous rights and indigenous-settler relations in Canada.

Asch received a B.A. in anthropology from the University of Chicago and a Ph.D. from Columbia University.

He has been a part of several research projects and non-profit initiatives such as Intellectual Property Issues in Cultural Heritage (iPinCH) Asch is also credited as being one of the founding members the Canadian Anthropology Society/la société canadienne d'anthropologie (CASCA).

Life and family Asch was born on April 9, 1943, in New York City, New York. Asch was an only child and does not have any siblings.

Career

Academics Asch received his BA in anthropology from the University of Chicago and later went on to earn his PhD from Columbia University. He moved to Victoria, British Columbia, in the late 1990s, where he now works as a professor at the University of Victoria.

Indigenous legal issues Asch's first fieldwork project was with the Dene at Fort Wrigley in 1969. In the years following his initial fieldwork, Asch would be called upon to give testimony in a number of legal proceedings concerning the Dene of the Makenzie River Valley, as well as working with them in numerous negotiations with the Federal Government throughout the 1980s.

In 1985 he gave testimony at Dick v. La Reine, a case involving a non-treaty member of the Esk'etemc First Nation, who was charged with killing a deer out of season without a permit. His testimony included statements about the importance of hunting and fishing as Indigenous cultural practices. He also provided further context to the testimonies of the Esk'etemc First Nation members by describing them in terms of their relationship to their cultural framework.

Asch worked as a senior research associate with the Royal Commission on Aboriginals Peoples (RCAP) from 1993 to 1994. He served on the board of the FolkwaysAlive initiative, founded in 2004 at the University of Alberta by Professors Regula Qureshi and Michael Frishkopf (with financial support from then VP Research Gary Kachanoski), in partnership with Smithsonian Folkways Recordings, during this time. Asch continues to hold a position as an advisory board member for Smithsonian Folkways Recordings,

Asch worked with iPinCH, a seven-year research initiative spanning from 2008 to 2016, based at Simon Fraser University in British Columbia. His work on the project included researching historical documents relating to a number of treaties, Treaty 4, Treaty 6, and Treaty 11.

Awards and recognitions

The Weaver-Tremblay Award (2001) Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada in the Academy of Social Sciences (2002)

Works

Books

On Being Here to Stay: Treaties and Aboriginal Rights (2015) Home and native Land: Aboriginal Rights and the Canadian Constitution (1984) Aboriginal and Treaty Rights in Canada: Essays on Law, Equality, and Respect for Difference (1997) Resurgence and Reconciliation: Indigenous-Settler Relations and Earth Teachings (as editor) (2018)

Podcasts

Sounds to Grow On (2009-2010) IPinCH Conversations / Michael Asch on Treaty Relations (2014)