Deadly Entanglements: Resource Extraction, Cowboy Culture and Sexualized Colonial Violence in Alberta

Drawing connections between an extractivist economy, the forms of cowboy culture (and rugged, white, working-class masculinity) that have a long history of entanglement with extractivism on the territory now defined as the province of Alberta (in western Canada) and the high rates of sexualized colonial violence against Indigenous women in the province, the authors argue that Alberta has a transient white guy problem. By analyzing the Calgary Stampede as a case study of forms of white masculinity that are supported, encouraged, prioritized and, at times, glorified in Alberta, the authors demonstrate how this transient white guy problem is proving exceedingly dangerous to many Indigenous women in particular (as well as to women, girls and 2SLGBTQQIA people more broadly) and diverse local communities, the land and the environment. Their analysis aims to unpack how settler-colonial logics of extractivism and cultural practices of placemaking, too often viewed as innocuous and as central to an Albertan identity, come to be deeply implicated in ongoing violence against Indigenous women.