“It Was the Voice of a Nation”

This chapter charts how the extraordinary rise of Indigenous women’s film and media in the 21st century—with Canadian First Nations and Inuit filmmaking forming one epicenter—has an origin point in the 1970s. Indigenous women filmmakers’ diverse productions in Canada include documentary, curricular materials, fiction, and children’s films. Their work within the National Film Board/Office National du film (NFB/ONF) shaped the organization decisively, starting with the agency’s programs for inclusivity, such as the Challenge for Change program and the 1968 Indian Film Crew. Focusing on the works of Abenaki filmmaker Alanis Obomsawin, who completed her first short film for the NFB/ONF in 1971 and went on to direct more than 65 films, the chapter discusses the activism that shaped First Nations women filmmakers during a formative decade, and how this work centered relationality and resurgence, and illustrates the need to balance attention to their individual voices with their own prioritization of a collective Indigenous polity.