Rita Mestokosho

• Name — Rita Mestokosho • Born — 1966 • Birthplace — Mingan, Quebec • Education — University of Quebec in Chicoutimi • Occupation — Innu writer and poet

Born in the small Innu village of Ekuanitshit, Mestokosho spent a great part of her childhood wandering the forest with her parents, who were hunter-gatherers. After her high school in Quebec City and then in Montreal, Rita Mestokosho began studying political science at the University of Quebec in Chicoutimi. Returning to her native community, she has participated for several years in the creation of an "Innu mitshuap uteitun", a house of Innu culture, where she still works as a coordinator. Rita Mestokosho is an indigenous activist who fights for the recognition of the Innu-aimun language and the development of the culture and heritage of the Innu Nation. She is a member of her local Innu Council and a spokesperson for her community. She fought against the project for the construction of a Hydroelectricity dam on the Roman river. Her poetry and activism are deeply interlinked. Michele Lacombe has argued that Mestokosho has not chosen poetry but that she thinks it is "more useful than political speeches for defending environmental causes closely allied to Innu people's traditional homelands". In the Oxford Handbook of Indigenous American Literature, Sarah Henzi argues that Mestokosho's work uses poetry to "take control".

• Eshi uapataman Nukum: recueil de poèmes montagnais, Mashteuiatsh, Les Éditions Piekakuakami, 1995 • Eshi uapatam Nukum / Comment je perçois la vie, grand-mère (preface by J. M. G. Le Clézio), Göteborg, Beijborn Books, 2010 • Née de la pluie et de la terre, Paris, Éditions Bruno Doucey, 2014 • Atikᵁ utei. Le cœur du caribou, Montréal, Mémoire d'encrier, 2022