Norway House Cree Nation<\/a>. In an interview with YGK News, Robertson shared how connecting with his community drove his storytelling.<\/p>\n\u201cI grew up not really having much connection to ways to learn about myself, so whether it was storytelling or family connections in that way, or stuff in school, I didn\u2019t really have any of those things, so when I started writing professionally, I really thought about wanting to give people things that I didn\u2019t get to have,\u201d said Robertson.<\/p>\n
Robertson never expected that writing books about his community and his struggles would lead to awards and a doctorate.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was surprised, I\u2019m always surprised, you don\u2019t really do any of this work expecting any sort of recognition,\u201d said Robertson.<\/p>\n
\u201cI had a pretty good vision of what I wanted to accomplish, and it wasn\u2019t awards; it was really just building stronger communities and thinking of ways that we can maybe work towards some sort of meaningful social change, and I wanted to contribute to that,\u201d Robertson continued.<\/p>\n
In 2025, Robertson opened up about his mental health and what it\u2019s like living with anxiety and depression in his new book \u201cAll the Little Monsters\u201d.<\/p>\n
One of the reasons Robertson shared his struggles publicly was that he felt it created an environment where others could talk about their mental health.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s such an isolating feeling\u2026One of the most healing things for me was starting group therapy and realizing that I wasn\u2019t alone,\u201d Robertson said.<\/p>\n
\u201cAll I can do is share my own experience and the things that have helped me\u2026Whether it\u2019s just hearing my stories, sometimes it’s feeling seen in that way, I think, is important for people,\u201d Robertson continued.<\/p>\n
Robertson spoke at Queen\u2019s University on Thursday, where people were invited to join in conversation about identity, resilience and anxiety.<\/p>\n
This will be the third honorary doctorate that Robertson has received. He was awarded an honorary doctorate from the University of Lethbridge in 2025 and the University of Manitoba in 2023.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"David Alexander Robertson detailed his inspiration behind his storytelling ahead of receiving an honorary Doctor of Laws from…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":279895,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[2953,2190,9,24,63,31802,122,124,123,19664,105594],"class_list":["post-279894","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-queens","tag-health","tag-mental-health","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc","tag-psychology","tag-queens","tag-queens-headlines","tag-queens-news","tag-spare-news","tag-storytelling"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/279894","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=279894"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/279894\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/279895"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=279894"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=279894"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=279894"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}