For this instalment of our 5 questions with blog series, we interviewed Alexandra Rosetta from Turtle's Back Publishing, a division of the Ontario Native Literacy Coalition, a publishing house dedicated to publishing Indigenous works that strengthen and amplify Indigenous knowledge.
1. Tell us about Turtle’s Back Publishing. Where are you located? What kind of books do you publish?
To better understand Turtle’s Back Publishing, we need to first look at the Ontario Native Literacy Coalition (ONLC). The ONLC is a non-profit organization established in 1988. They're the Indigenous stream under the Ministry of Labour, Training, and Skills Development. The ONLC oversees about 20 literacy programs throughout Ontario, and since 2007 they've been developing and self-publishing their own curriculums and resources. But it was until 2019 that Turtle’s Back Publishing became an official division of the Ontario Native Literacy Coalition.
We’re located on the Six Nations Grand River Territory and we aim to publish Indigenous works that strengthen and amplify Indigenous knowledge, and it's our mission to provide publications developed and created by Indigenous writers that enrich, advocate, and promote Indigenous literacies all across Turtle Island.
In the beginning, most of our publications were resources and curriculums focused on Indigenous themes for the ONLC audience – mostly adult learners. With topics ranging from financial literacy to digital learning, traditional knowledge and skills, and even math workbooks. But the scope of what we publish has been expanding. For example, we’ve also started publishing language and songbook resources all in Haudenosaunee, Cree, Ojibway, and Wyandot languages as well as language curriculums — for now, there are two pilots that have been published, Kanienkeha’ha – A Beginner’s Mohawk Language Curriculum and Anishninaabemwin – A Beginner’s Ojibway Language Curriculum.
We also launched a couple of other books that stepped away from the resources and curriculum genres: Akhwatsirehkó:wa My Big Family by Brennor Jacobs and Brendan Bomberry and In Memory of Feast: Memories of Residential School Survivors by Judy Reuben — these two books have brought a lot of attention to our small publishing house.
2. What’s the single best thing you’ve done to promote your books to readers?
I wouldn't say we have a single best thing, but teaming up with GoodMinds as a distributor is one of them. Also, collaborating with author Brennor Jacobs and the contributors of Akhwatsirehkó:wa My Big Family, our lacrosse book, to create promotional videos helped us put the book out a lot throughout our social media accounts and through YouTube. This, and introducing In Memory of Feast during an ONLC webinar on food sustainability helped us bring attention from the public to our books and our work.
We’ve also noticed that when readers come to our website looking for a specific book, for example, In Memory of Feast, they also end up noticing the other books, curriculums, and resources we have available. Because of that, we want to refurbish, promote, and shine a light on some of our older work.
3. Describe the culture you’d like to foster among your colleagues and your readers?
Our goal is to stay within our mandate of ONLC making sure that we’re reaching out to an adult audience while focusing on keeping it Indigenous — from our partnerships with printers, designers, and distributors to the topics we actually publish. I think that's what's important for creating our culture as Turtle’s Back Publishing, keeping it Indigenous, and making sure that we stick to that.
Left- Rhonda Davis (ONLC Administrative Officer/TBP Layout/Designer), Middle- Alexandra Rosetta (TBP Publishing Manager), Right- Michelle Davis (ONLC CEO)
4. What topics would you like to see more often in the books you publish?
I want to see more books that relate back to our older curriculum. There’s one upcoming for which the person pitched the idea and I immediately thought, “Yes, this is perfect, this is something Indigenous women need.” The book is about empowerment, loving ourselves, and the meaning of being an Indigenous woman. It's a book that fits with our older curriculum, something that I’d like to see more of — our past curriculums are amazing, they just need to be revamped.
I’d also like to see more publications in Indigenous languages. We recently published one, The Special Frog, which is currently available in Cayuga, Mohawk, and Anishinaabe languages, and we're doing three more translations this year. And tied to this and the importance of languages, we also want to look more into audiobooks, as well as graphic novels.
Graphic novels are very popular and they’re also an important learning tool. For example, my grandfather learned the English language through comic strips, so I think it’s important for our older learners that aren’t comfortable reading only text to have an alternative — see images, shorter texts, and extend their literacy that way.
And then another topic I’d like to see more of are Indigenous history books. From the history of ironworking to the history of the Haudenosaunee, the Cree, Ojibway, all the nations not just within Ontario but across Canada itself. To educate not just Indigenous people, but all people.
5. What’s next for Turtle’s Back Publishing
First and foremost is to get everything uploaded to BiblioShare — it's something so tedious, but it's fun when you start to become more familiar with the product, and I know it will help us expand our distribution. We also need to get our website up to par, make it more attractive and organized. And then this year we're putting out our very first book catalog — we're going to have a hard copy and an electronic version as well.
BONUS: What do you wish you had known about publishing when you were starting out?
That my brain wouldn't rest. My brain's always going and thinking about a project or how we can promote something.
I came in knowing a small amount of information as far as publishing, but I knew Indigenous literature. I took some small courses in publishing in university. But the funny thing is, that at the time I didn't think I would be here, I didn't think that I would be a publishing manager for an Indigenous publishing house. I thought it was impossible. My mom, who sparked my passion for books and has been my biggest supporter in my career, used to say, “There's no publishing house for Indigenous people. Indigenous literature isn't important.” And now when I'm here, I'm like, “Mom, remember when you said….”
It's been mind-blowing. I’ve learned so much and I'm learning something every day, I'm learning about marketing, and budgeting, etc. It’s been amazing to be behind the scenes and see what really goes into one book. I'm so grateful for the support of the Association of Canadian Publishers, they have been nothing but the best, always checking on me and answering my questions. And while we’re a two-person team, the ACP Mentorship Program has allowed us to continue our learning process, create a structured publication workflow, and meet our deadlines. And they're all just book lovers like me. I just love the publishing community and I can't wait to learn more.
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