Today, Jesse Thistle is a celebrated professor of Indigenous history in Canada. But as a child, he was a high school drop-out, raised by his disciplinarian white paternal grandparents and cut off from his mother and his Métis Cree roots. It set him on a self-destructive path to drug addiction, homelessness and prison. In jail and in his 30s, Jesse learned to read. After he was released, he would reach the pinnacle of academic success – finding his identity, his calling and along the way, his long-lost mother. Jesse’s memoir is called From the Ashes.

Presented by Anu Anand

Produced by Sophie Eastaugh and Maryam Maruf

Image: Jesse Thistle

Credit: Lucie Thistle