This paper examines how ecologist and
environmental activist Karsten Heuer employs a Western conception
of the pilgrimage as a metaphor in Being Caribou (2006) in
order to create a new perspective and understanding of the plight
of caribou now threatened by man’s encroachments. The
author places her analysis in a broad literary-historical
overview of Canadian pilgrimage literature to show how Heuer has
expanded existing anthropocentric definitions of pilgrimage
as well as the Canadian canon itself.