Joshua
Whitehead
Joshua Whitehead is an Oji-Cree/nehiyaw, Two-Spirit/Indigiqueer member of Peguis First Nation (Treaty 1). He is the author of the novel Jonny Appleseed, which was longlisted for the Scotiabank Giller Prize and shortlisted for a Governor General's Literary Award in fiction, and the poetry collection full-metal indigiqueer, which was shortlisted for the inaugural Indigenous Voices Award for Most Significant Work of Poetry in English and the Stephan G. Stephansson Award for Poetry. Whitehead is a past finalist of the Dayne Ogilvie Prize for LGBTQ Emerging Writers. Currently, he is working on a PhD in Indigenous Literatures and Cultures at the University of Calgary's English department (Treaty 7).
Award History
2018 Finalist
Dayne Ogilvie Prize for LGBTQ Emerging WritersJury Citation
“Joshua Whitehead harnesses queerness, Indigeneity, and reclamation to articulate storytelling’s invaluable role in challenging the intelligentsia. In his collection, Full-Metal Indigiqueer, Whitehead plays particular attention to acknowledging ancestral connection and the body; he fuses Indigiqueer wisdom through the infinite potential of poetics and personhood. His debut novel, Jonny Appleseed, is provocative, compelling, and fiercely intersectional. Whitehead is a radical hybrid thinker, and a bold new voice who brings the deep past into the boundless present, which extends into a not so faraway future. Whitehead builds worlds within words.” -- 2018 Dayne Ogilvie Prize for LGBTQ Emerging Writers Jury (Ali Blythe, Greg Kearney, and Shannon Webb-Campbell)
