Twice Colonized (2024) Plot Summary Explained

In Twice Colonized, Aaju Peter uses the phrase 'twice colonized' to describe how her people, the Inuit, have been subjected to colonization in two distinct waves. The first came from Danish settlers in Greenland beginning in the 18th century, and the second came through modern-day Canadian policies and institutions affecting Inuit communities across the Arctic. This double colonization has left lasting cultural, political, and personal wounds that Peter argues continue to shape Inuit lives today. The concept becomes both the emotional core and the political foundation of her advocacy work throughout the documentary.

• twice colonized
• inuit colonization
• danish greenland
• canadian indigenous policies
• aaju peter
• colonial history

Peter's central political goal in the documentary is to establish an Indigenous forum within the European Union so that Arctic Indigenous peoples have a direct voice in European policy decisions that affect their lands and communities. She urges European institutions to confront their historical role in colonization and to include Indigenous perspectives in ongoing governance. This EU campaign runs in parallel with her broader fight for the recognition of Indigenous human rights across the Arctic.

• eu indigenous forum
• european union
• arctic indigenous rights
• aaju peter
• indigenous advocacy
• european policy

Throughout Twice Colonized, the film deliberately runs Peter's campaign for Indigenous rights alongside her grief over the loss of her youngest son, presenting the two as inseparable parts of her life. Her activism is grounded in the understanding that colonization has stripped Indigenous families of children, language, and identity across generations, and her own loss becomes both a personal wound and evidence of that systemic harm. By refusing to separate the political from the personal, Peter shows that her fight for her people is also a fight to reclaim herself.

• personal grief
• political activism
• son loss
• reclaiming self
• intergenerational trauma
• colonization impact

Peter suffers the devastating loss of her youngest son, a tragedy that profoundly reshapes her personal life and becomes one of the emotional anchors of Twice Colonized. Rather than shield the viewer from this pain, she chooses to share the experience openly with director Lin Alluna as part of her commitment to having 'everything' documented. The documentary follows her through this grief, treating it not as a private aside but as a central part of her story as an Inuk woman and activist.

• youngest son
• aaju peter
• grief
• personal loss
• inuk family
• documentary

Twice Colonized was filmed over a seven-year period between 2016 and 2023 because director Lin Alluna needed time to capture the full arc of Peter's activism as well as her personal journey of grief and healing. Peter was not willing to rush the project; she asked the filmmakers to show 'all the good, all the bad, and everything in between,' which required a long observational approach. The extended timeline also allowed the film to document real political developments, including Peter's push for an Indigenous forum at the European Union, as they unfolded.

• seven year production
• lin alluna
• documentary timeline
• long term filmmaking
• filming period

Twice Colonized grew out of the 2016 documentary Angry Inuk, directed by Alethea Arnaquq-Baril, which originally began as a film about Aaju Peter but shifted into a broader issue-based project that could not capture her more personal side. Peter later partnered with Lin Alluna to make a new film that would finally center her as a full person rather than a symbol. Twice Colonized is therefore both a continuation of that earlier work and a deliberate correction that puts Peter's grief, identity, and inner life at the center of the story.

Foreshadowing: Angry Inuk's struggle to capture Peter's personal side foreshadows Twice Colonized's decision to follow her life in much greater depth.

• angry inuk
• alethea arnaquq-baril
• documentary evolution
• aaju peter
• 2016 film
• personal documentary

To fund Twice Colonized, the filmmakers had to rely on the official co-production treaty between Canada and Denmark, the same two colonizing nations whose policies are critiqued in the film. This structural irony underscores how Indigenous creators still depend on the institutions of their colonizers just to tell their own stories. The financing arrangement highlights the systemic obstacles Inuit and other Indigenous filmmakers face, even when making a film that directly challenges those very nations.

• co-production treaty
• canada denmark financing
• colonization
• indigenous filmmaking barriers
• systemic obstacles

Peter told director Lin Alluna that she wanted the film to show 'all the good, all the bad, and everything in between,' because she felt previous portrayals of her had either reduced her to a symbol or hidden the harder parts of her life. She describes how difficult it has been to be colonized and to reclaim herself, and she believes that honest self-representation is part of decolonization. Her openness is what allows the documentary to move between political advocacy, personal grief, and everyday moments without flinching.

• everything shown
• honest portrayal
• reclaiming identity
• decolonization
• aaju peter motivation

Twice Colonized is the first film co-produced by Inuit from both sides of the colonial border separating Greenland and Canada, uniting Indigenous creators whose homelands were split by different colonizing powers. This cross-border collaboration is itself a political statement, showing that Inuit communities can build cultural infrastructure together despite the national boundaries drawn over their territory. It marks a groundbreaking moment for Inuit-led storytelling and Indigenous self-representation on screen.

• first inuit co-production
• cross border collaboration
• greenland canada
• inuit filmmaking
• indigenous self-representation

Reclamation is the throughline of Peter's personal arc in Twice Colonized: after a lifetime shaped by Danish and Canadian colonization, she works to recover the language, identity, and inner life that those systems tried to erase. The documentary tracks this process through her advocacy, her return to her Inuk roots, and her willingness to share her grief publicly rather than suppress it. Her reconciliation with her own history becomes inseparable from her fight for her people's rights, framing self-reclamation as both a personal and political act.

• reclaiming identity
• inuk heritage
• cultural recovery
• self reclamation
• decolonization journey

The first layer of the 'twice colonized' experience begins in the 18th century, when Denmark established colonial control over Greenland and its Inuit population. Over generations, Danish rule imposed foreign languages, legal systems, and social structures that disrupted traditional Inuit ways of life and continue to shape Greenlandic society today. The documentary treats this history not as distant past but as the foundation of the ongoing colonial relationship that Peter and other Inuit activists are still working to dismantle.

• danish colonization
• greenland history
• 18th century colonialism
• inuit displacement
• colonial legacy