Warren Cariou is a Canadian writer and associate professor of English at the
University of Manitoba
The University of Manitoba (U of M, UManitoba, or UM) is a Canadian public research university in the province of Manitoba.[University of Saskatchewan
A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. Universities typically offer both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In the United States, t ...](_blank)
and an MA and PhD from the
University of Toronto
The University of Toronto (UToronto or U of T) is a public research university in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, located on the grounds that surround Queen's Park. It was founded by royal charter in 1827 as King's College, the first institution ...
(1998). In 1999 he published a book of short stories, ''The Exalted Company of Roadside Martyrs'', with Coteau Books. This was followed up in 2002 with his memoir ''Lake of the Prairies'', which gained him a wider audience. It won the 2002
Drainie-Taylor Biography Prize
The Drainie-Taylor Biography Prize was a Canadian literary award, presented by the Writers' Trust of Canada to a work judged as the year's best work of biography, autobiography or personal memoir by a Canadian writer."$10,000 biography award launch ...
and was shortlisted for the 2004
Charles Taylor Prize
The RBC Taylor Prize (2000–2020), formerly known as the Charles Taylor Prize, is a Canadian literary award, presented by the Charles Taylor Foundation to the best Canadian work of literary non-fiction. It is named for Charles P. B. Taylor, a ...
. In 2005 Cariou served on the jury for the prestigious
Scotiabank Giller Prize
The Giller Prize (sponsored as the Scotiabank Giller Prize), is a literary award given to a Canadian author of a novel or short story collection published in English (including translation) the previous year, after an annual juried competition be ...
.
Cariou was one of three featured authors in Coming Attractions '95, and has had short stories appear in Stag Line: Stories by Men and Due West, both published by Coteau Books. As well, his fiction was awarded a CBC Literary Competition Prize in 1991.
He grew up on a farm near
Meadow Lake, Saskatchewan
Meadow Lake is a city in the boreal forest of northwestern Saskatchewan, Canada. Its location is about northeast of Lloydminster and north of North Battleford. Founded as a trading post in 1799, it became a village in 1931 and a town in 1 ...
, a place he describes in ''Lake of the Prairies''. He has worked as a construction labourer, a technical writer and a political advisor. He holds a Ph.D. in English from the University of Toronto and now teaches Aboriginal Literature at the University of Manitoba. He is currently working on a novel entitled ''Exhaust''. Cariou is married to the poet and literature professor
Alison Calder. Cariou is also the director of the Centre for Creative Writing and Oral Culture
and is also an activist for the Protection of Indigenous Oralities.
Honours
* 2002
Drainie-Taylor Biography Prize
The Drainie-Taylor Biography Prize was a Canadian literary award, presented by the Writers' Trust of Canada to a work judged as the year's best work of biography, autobiography or personal memoir by a Canadian writer."$10,000 biography award launch ...
* 2005 Greifswald
Canadian Studies Canadian studies is an interdisciplinary field of undergraduate- and postgraduate-level study of Canadian culture and society, the languages of Canada, Canadian literature, media and communications, Quebec, Acadians, agriculture in Canada, natu ...
Fellow in Residence,
University of Greifswald
The University of Greifswald (; german: Universität Greifswald), formerly also known as “Ernst-Moritz-Arndt University of Greifswald“, is a public research university located in Greifswald, Germany, in the state of Mecklenburg-Western Pom ...
, Germany
Works
* with W'Daub Awae,
Kateri Akiwenzie-Damm
Kateri Akiwenzie-Damm is an Anishinaabe writer of mixed ancestry from the Chippewas of Nawash First Nation in Canada. She lives and works at Neyaashiinigmiing, Cape Croker Reserve on the Saugeen Peninsula in southwestern Ontario, and in Ottawa, ...
,
Daniel Heath Justice
Daniel Heath Justice is an American-born Canadian academic and citizen of the Cherokee Nation. He is professor of First Nations and Indigenous Studies and English at the University of British Columbia. He started his studies at University of Nor ...
, Lesley Belleau: ''Speaking True: A
Kegedonce Press
Kegedonce Press is an Indigenous publishing house in Neyaashiinigmiing Reserve No. 27 (Chippewas of Nawash Unceded First Nation, Cape Croker), Ontario, Canada, owned by Kateri Akiwenzie-Damm. Started in 1993, it is one of only a handful of dedicat ...
Anthology.'' Kegedonce, 2006 Book
Books
* Exalted Company of Roadside Martyrs.
* Lake of the Prairies: A Story of Belonging. This book won the Drainie-Taylor Prize.
Films
* Documentary: Overburden by Neil McArthur and Warren Cariou. Released 2009-01-03.
* Documentary: Land of Oil and Water by Neil McArthur and Warren Cariou. 2009-01-01.
Photography (Petrography)
* In 2013 Cariou wrote and created documentaries Overburdened and Land of Oil and Water with Neil McArthur about the highly destructive production of tar sands impacting the Indigenous communities of Saskatchewan and Alberta. Cariou then decided to begin using the toxic material to create photographs he has named petrography.
* He began experimenting with the new medium with assistance from Dr. Dusan Stulik, a Senior Research Scientist at the Getty Conservation Institute.
* Cariou uses a specific medium of petroleum and sunlight in his photography “Petrography is literally petroleum-photography: the creation of images through the interaction of sunlight and the heavy petroleum product known as bitumen, which is the main source of the vast supplies of oil in Canada’s Athabasca tar sands region”.
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Cariou, Warren
Canadian literary critics
Canadian male short story writers
Living people
People from Meadow Lake, Saskatchewan
Canadian people of Breton descent
20th-century Canadian short story writers
21st-century Canadian short story writers
20th-century Canadian male writers
21st-century Canadian male writers
Canadian male non-fiction writers
Year of birth missing (living people)
20th-century First Nations writers
21st-century First Nations writers
First Nations academics
First Nations artists