Ducks: Two Years in the Oil Sands

Content Warning: The graphic novel and study guide discuss rape, sexual harassment, and victim blaming.

Katie Beaton is 21 years old and has just graduated from Mount Allison University with an arts degree and a lot of student loan debt. She returns home to Mabou, Cape Breton in Nova Scotia, Canada, to look for work. Cape Breton once produced fish, steel, and coal but has not done so for generations. It is a “have-not region of a have-not province” (10), and everyone has left for work elsewhere. This has been going on for so long that it has become woven into the local culture. Katie reflects that “I can have opportunity or I can have home. I cannot have both” (12). While Katie loves her hometown, she must leave to make a life for herself.

Katie looks for work and decides to work at the Alberta oil sands to pay off her debt because there are no jobs in her field. Katie’s uncle advises her to start with a job in an oil sands plant tool crib; it’s a good job for a newbie and will help her get a foot in the door. She makes note of this advice.