My friend Jarita Greyeyes invited me to speak at her event at McMaster. The event was called ‘The Indigenization Post Truth and Reconciliation Commission Gathering’ and you can read an article about it here. Each panel contained early career and established Indigenous scholars and together we reflected on what has happened in post-secondary in the ten years since the TRC Final Report was issued. Marie Battiste and Bev Jacobs were there and it was an honour to meet them because I have been inspired by their work and I consider both of them to be role models. It was also super cool that my cousin Russel Myers Ross was there too. I think Jarita pulled together a great group of people and I really appreciated the many ideas discussed at this event.
I'm really grateful that I was able to be part of this event and I have to say that it was definitely the most well-organized event that I have ever been to.
Here are some other photos which I took on the trip.
This is the building we were in
We went to the Woodland Cultural Centre at Six Nations and there was a display celebrating Iron Workers Local 136. My presentation was about collective bargaining so it was cool to see a display at Woodlands celebrating the history of Indigenous workers in labour. My panel presentation was Centering, Celebrating, and Supporting Indigenous Workers and my handout is here.
I went to UBC's Museum of Anthropology a few weeks ago to check out their exhibit, "Nuxalk Strong: Dancing Down the Eyelashes of the Sun." The Nuxalk are neighbours of the Tsilhqot'in and one of the stories that my grandma used to tell had to do with one of our ancestors spending the winter in their territory.
Their exhibit featured some blankets, and stories about blankets.
One of the stories was about a blanket which was taken to Winnipeg, and then they were able to repatriate it. The story for the blanket above, however, was that no one knows where it is. The caption says that the yakyanlh (mountain goat wool robe) was passed down. It contained rights to hunt in a specific area. And the woman brought the robe, along with the rights, with her into marriage. But now no one knows where the blanket is.
I was really moved when I read this story. Blankets are about warmth and protection, yes. But they are more than that. A blanket can be about identity, who you are, and how you are connected to others. It can carry rights and responsibilities. It can represent belonging within a community and belonging to the land.
During that dark period of time of the potlatch ban and pass system, how painful it must of been for the family to know that this beautiful blanket existed, and to not be able to share the blanket with the next generation. How difficult it must have been to not be able to show it to the children and youth and say, "Your ancestors created this beautiful item for you. This is who you are."
I read about the repatriation from the Vatican. I noticed how one of the Metis leaders implied that repatriation would insult the ancestors who gave the gifts. This comment does not take into consideration the fact that many of these gifts were "given" under duress. Due to government and church policies, many Indigenous communities were in survival mode, and people felt like they had no choice except to part ways with their belongings. Repatriation is not an insult to the ancestors. It's a reconnection with the creative spirit that they placed into the items that they created.
While I was at the MOA, I visited the blankets in some of the other exhibits too. I always find it interesting to learn about the different materials in the blankets. Wooly dog wool, wool, mountain goat wool, jute, cedar... I was curious about what Tsilhqot'ins made blankets out of so I did some asking around and someone sent me a photo of a fur blanket. The fur was made into strips and woven together with wool. They said it was wild cat fur, possibly mountain lion. Of course Tsilhqot'in ancestors would have the most intense blankets lol.
Anyhow, I really need to blog about today's book today because I am going to lend this book to my mom next time I see her.
A Steady Brightness of Being: Truths, Wisdom, & Love from Celebrated Indigenous Voices is a collection edited by Murray Sinclair's family members, Sara Sinclair and Stephanie Sinclair. In the introduction they talk about how one of their grandparents was a holocaust survivor, and her trauma was recognized by society. But their other grandparent was a residential school survivor who carried shame, and during his lifetime they did not understand his trauma because it was not recognized by society. And so they never had an opportunity to really know him and they carried regret over that. The introduction contains a letter from one of the sisters to Murray, and the letter was written while he was in the hospital. During that period of time, my mom had tickets to see him at the Vancouver Writer's Festival. But he was sick so he could not come and I felt sad that she was not able to meet him.
The book is a series of letters written from prominent Indigenous writers. the letters are addressed to various recipients: relatives, students, future ancestors, the Boreal Forest... Niigaan Sinclair has a letter to Canada. In the letter he talks about how his dad, Murray Sinclair died. He gives some biographical information about his dad's background and career - in particular his work with the TRC and RCAP. And then he says that he is angry because Canada took his dad from him because his dad spent so much time working against racism and genocide. And he talks about a conversation where he asks his dad why. Then he talks about his dad's final days, and how his dad asked him to talk about the creation story and what happens after someone dies and he reassures his dad that he will do the specific things attached to those beliefs. Normally when I encounter a passage in a a book and it moves me, I share an excerpt. In this case, though, I think you just need to read the book. Niigaan talks about his dad's duty and care, and how we all need to take up his work.
As much as I bawled my head off reading Niigaan's piece, I felt comforted knowing that Murray Sinclair's family was able to provide him with those reassurances that they would take care of him after he passed.
The cover of the book is beautiful. And the cover suits the book.
It's a small book, less than 200 pages, but powerful. Here is the publisher's blurb:
Drawing on the wisdom and personal experience of its esteemed contributors, this first-of-its-kind anthology tackles complex questions of our times to provide a rich tapestry of Indigenous life, past, present, and future. The letters explore the histories that have brought us to this moment, the challenges and crises faced by present-day communities, and the visions that will lead us to a new architecture for thinking about Indigeneity. Taking its structure from the medicine bundle—tobacco, sage, cedar, and sweetgrass—it will stir and empower readers, as well as enrich an essential and ongoing conversation about what reconciliation looks like and what it means to be Indigenous today.
I think it hits the mark. It is like a balm. It does not ignore or shy away from difficult things, but it provides kind and gentle encouragement to those who are doing the difficult work. Some books are for when you need to breathe fire. Some books are for when you come home from being breathing fire all day and you need a soft place to land. This book is that soft place. The title of the book comes from Terese Marie Mailhot's work, "To Indians Now and Forever Surviving." She says,
I believe we are a steady brightness of being, like a running wheel of light. Native people carry power. All Indigenous people are bound to something inextricably connected to the land, the sky, and the universe. (Mailhot, 2025, p. 13).
I listened to her memoir, Heartberries, and it was an emotionally difficult read. Her contribution is the first piece in this collection, and I think it set a very warm and supportive tone for the rest of the book.
There are 25 contributions from people such as Miss Chief Eagle Testickle, Joshua Whitehead, Cindy Blackstock, katherena vermette, and Jennifer Grenz. I won't go over each and every contribution, but I will say that I felt like all of the pieces belonged in this work and positively contributed to the overall vision of the collection.
The final piece is by Waubgeshig Rice, who writes to his great great grandchildren. For those teaching his novels, Moon of the Crusted Snow and Moon of the Turning Leaves, this letter might be a good way to introduce his work and also a good way to introduce the concept of Indigenous futurisms.
This book found me through the algorithm. I don't think that I would have sought out sound studies on my own. So, thank you to the tiny robots inside of my phone for suggesting this book. While the book is written from the standpoint of someone who performs in the arts, I think a lot of the concepts within this book could be helpful to any Indigenous person who stands in front of mixed crowds physically or virtually.
The book sets out to address a problem in the performing arts where inclusion involves "a fixation upon - Indigenous content, but not Indigenous structure." (p. 6). "Hungry listening indicts those displays of equality that are more concerned with importing Indigenous content and increasing representation than with redefining the structure of inclusion." (p. 6). This is what he identifies as hungry listening. In place of hungry listening, he says that "the act of listening should attend to the relationship between the listener and the listened-to" (p. 15).
He ends his first chapter with a Garneau except on irreconcilable spaces. "Irreconcilable spaces of Aboriginality are gatherings, ceremony, nehiyawak (Cree) - only discussions, kitchen table conversations, email exchanges, et cetera, in which Blackfootness, Metisness, and so on, are performed without settler attendance. It is not a show for others but a site where people simply are, where they express and celebrate their continuity and figure themselves to, for, and with one another without the sense that they are being witnessed by people who are not equal participants. When Indigenous folks (anyone really) know they are being surveyed by non-members, the nature of their ways of being and becoming alters. Whether the onlookers are conscious agents of colonization or not, their shaping gaze and trigger a Reserve-response, an inhibition or a conformation to settler expectations. (Garneau, 2016, 27)." Thus, the next chapter "is written exclusively for Indigenous readers." (p.25). I love that because I am often not the target audience. Even within reconciliation discourse, often direct address is made to non-Indigenous audience members, disappearing me within a discourse about me. It is tiresome to be a secondary audience, as though the messages are hand-me-downs, concepts created with someone else's needs in mind, but I can try them on for size if I like. So, I always appreciate the rare occasion where I am the target audience. The chapter is an attempt to build an equity space inside of a book.
The book is packed with a wide variety of interesting concepts. The concept of hungry listening ties diverse theoretical perspectives together in a way that makes them coherent. In terms of methodology, I found this perspective helpful "to see Indigenous and Western theoretical discourses as mutually exclusive and to refuse all that is not essentially Indigenous is to impoverish our work as Indigenous writers and scholars, not to mention to assume that we do not make critical choices and repurposings of non-Indigenous theory in ways similar to how we have always repurposed non-Indigenous tools to advance our work." (p. 105). That being said, sometimes this repurposing occurs inside of an Indigenous structure or logic, and the Indigenous logic is not always visible to non-Indigenous people (p. 106).
Something that I really appreciate about the work is that it does not equate non-Indigenous feelings with actual reconciliation. If a work allows "the feelings of being transformed to satisfy" - that is not actually transformation. Actual transformation requires one to "unsettle and engage with the enormous amount of work that must still be done." (p. 232). Additionally, Deborah Wong cautions that sometimes responses to the TRC lead non-Indigenous people to think that "feeling guilty and ashamed is equivalent to holding oneself accountable." (p. 241).
By providing examples where Indigenous people have challenged the logic and structure in which their artistic performances take place, and attempted to create an Indigenous logic which engages the listener as an active participant with relational responsibilities, the book provides encouragement to Indigenous people to thwart attempts de-politicize Indigenous art.
