Text or Testimony?
November 14, 2011
Iris Nicolas giving her testimony at the Commissioner's Sharing Panel on Thursday, October 27th, 2011.
I’ve had a lot to think about since the Halifax national gathering. This is the third event I’ve attended and the mix of questions, emotions, and concerns that arise from them do not get less complicated as time moves forward.
At the moment, I am still struggling with some of the same issues I found at the other events in Winnipeg and Inuvik. In part this has to do with my own relation to the events. As a graduate student who is conducting research while attending these events, the ethical considerations of listening to testimony and observing the dynamics at the events are a constant challenge. Although most people attending these public events believe that there should be more awareness about what happened at the Indian Residential Schools, the ways in which this awareness should be raised is still controversial.
In particular, I am currently wondering how to write ethically about testimony. How can I write about the words of another without appropriating them for my own academic purposes? As I transcribe some of the recorded testimony, I wonder how these words on my computer screen can possibly encapsulate the emotions, thoughts, and spirit of the person sharing their experiences? When people are talking about abuse or extreme hardship, or about their triumphs over overwhelming difficulty, how is it possible to take these stories, put them on paper and then analyze them in relation to a theoretical framework that often shapes them into something altogether different? At the moment, I am letting these questions and concerns guide my writing.
A few quotes that I’m thinking with and through at the moment:
Lee Maracle (Sto:lo) in “Ka-Nata” in Bent Box:
“Academic theories/ are but the leaky summations/of human stories” (107).
Shoshana Felman in Testimony: Crises of Witnessing in Literature, Psychoanalysis and History.
“A life-testimony is not simply a testimony to a private life, but a point of conflation between text and life, a textual testimony which can penetrate us like an actual life” (2).
(Thanks to the Aesthetics of Reconciliation in Canada research group for the great discussion about the difficulties I mention above.)
Incomplete Archives
September 27, 2011
Balloons for Canada Day and birthday celebrations in Inuvik.
I am still sifting through the notes I took in Inuvik. I spent the last few days listening to recordings and watching footage on the TRC’s website. Unfortunately, many of my own recordings are of poor quality. During the giving of testimony, I didn’t want to be intrusive with my audio recording device. Even though it’s small, I felt that it marked me as an outsider, a researcher there to observe as opposed to participate. So, for the most part, I pressed record and left it on my lap. Because the room would get cold or warm or stuffy, the sound of doors opening and closing, and the periodic whirring of a fan muffle some parts of the testimony. But even when deciphering exact words is difficult, I can hear the emotion and strength of the Survivors come through.
The recordings are an incomplete archive of what I heard and saw in Inuvik. But I suppose that all archives are incomplete. Sometimes it is in filling in the absences of these archives where the most productive work is done. In the meantime, it reminds me of the courage of those who participated in the Inuvik event.
The IRS TRC’s next national event will be held in Halifax from October 26 – 29, 2011. More information is available here.
CFP: Encuentro 2012
July 20, 2011
Artwork by Pedro Lasch at the 2009 Encuentro in Bogotá
Every few years, the Hemispheric Institute of Performance and Politics holds an amazing conference. It’s called the “Encuentro,” meaning “meeting” or “encounter.” I had the pleasure of attending the Encuentro in 2009, held in Bogotá, Colombia. (See my posts on the event: Part I and Part II.) It was absolutely fantastic, an engaging 9 days spent with inspirational people. I highly recommend the conference, and it would be great to see a large Canadian contingent there! See the CFP below:
Cities | Bodies | Action
The Politics of Passion in the Americas
March 17-25, 2012
Universidad del Claustro de Sor Juana
Centro Histórico, Mexico City
The 8th Encuentro of the Hemispheric Institute seeks to examine the broad intersections between urban space, performance and political/artistic action in the Americas. From the critical poetics of body art to the occupation of public space by social movements, the event invites participants to explore the borders, identities and practices through which subjectivities, hegemonies and counter-hegemonies are constructed in the spaces of the city and beyond. We are particularly interested in the ways in which bodies both interpellate and are interpellated, mobilize and are mobilized, by and around the diverse and complex passions that define our globalized and mediatized present—fear, hatred, disenchantment, hope and faith, among others. We seek to investigate, collectively, the strategies through which bodies (individual, social and political) make themselves present, and intervene aesthetic conventions, social formations and political structures in their search to create new meanings and new modes of sociality. This theme will be the point of departure for a vast array of performances, exhibits, roundtables, workshops, lectures and work groups.
Since 2000, our Encuentros have been a point of contact for artists, scholars, students and activists interested in the relationship between performance and politics in the Americas. Each Encuentro brings together 400-600 participants, and is part academic conference, part performance festival, and always interdisciplinary. The Encuentro is a space focused on experimentation, dialogue and collaboration.
The application deadline for the Encuentro is September 26, 2011. To apply, see the instructions on our website (Propose a Project or Apply to a Work Group) and then fill out the Online Application in English.
Inuvik in Images
July 1, 2011
Petah Inukpuk holds up an image of his grandfather as he gives his testimony to the commission.
Like the IRS TRC’s national gathering in Winnipeg last summer, the Inuvik event is a complicated negotiation between personal, familial and national reconciliation. And like the Winnipeg event, I have a feeling it will be some time before I process and begin to understand these negotiations.
The days are long and filled with emotion. The morning and afternoon sessions (generally focusing on the gathering of testimony and expressions of reconciliation) often contain stories of extreme hardship and abuse, as well as those of resilience and survival. The evenings are then filled with music and cultural expressions; people dance and sing, ask questions, continue to share their stories and create connections.
Tomorrow (Canada Day) is the last day of the event. I’m sure I will continue to think about what I’ve seen here for a long time to come. I hope to post more about the event, but in the meantime, here are a few images from the last few days.
At the welcome ceremony.
The Commission and dignitaries face the crowd during the traditional blessings.
Dancing to "Forty Days" after a long first day.
The "igloo church" not far from the event site.
It begins with drums
June 29, 2011
Watching the stage at the welcome event.
On the night before the IRS TRC’s second national gathering, the small northern town of Inuvik was already welcoming hundreds of people into their community. On the trip up, the majority of the plane was filled with people attending the event. Some discussed the possibility of giving their testimony, others talked about reuniting with other former students, many that they hadn’t seen in decades. Some were calling the IRS TRC event “the reunion.”
In the early evening, the commissioners, representatives of the state and the churches involved in running the Indian Residential School system addressed the crowd in Jim Koe Park. After the opening remarks, and a recognition of the long days of work ahead, the evening’s attention turned to food and entertainment.
Dancers and drummers after the welcome ceremony (June 27)
Culture and History at Blue Quills
June 23, 2011
After my trip to Vancouver, I traveled to my next stop: St. Paul, Alberta. After flying into Edmonton, I drove 3 hours to St. Paul. The landscape was beautiful. Not quite the flat lands of the prairies I had been expecting, but low hills, fields of crops, and bales of hay. The grass was yellowed in spots, creating patterns that spoke to the wild weather sometimes experienced in these parts.
A back view of the school
I traveled to St. Paul in order to attend the annual Blue Quills Cultural Camp. I had read about the Blue Quills First Nations College and their story of taking back their school (in the 1970s) and wanted to learn more about it. At the time, the Minister of Indian Affairs was Jean Chretien, who predicted that the school under Aboriginal control would only last six months. Forty years later, the school is still going strong. They offer programs in Business Application & Data Management/ Office Readiness, Cree Language, Early Childhood Education, and Information Technology among others.
The school is governed by seven local First Nations communities: Beaver Lake, Cold Lake, Frog Lake, Whitefish Lake, Heart Lake, Kehewin, and Saddle Lake, representing approximately 17,500 people.
Coinciding with the national day of reconciliation on May 25th, the Cultural Camp was a week long event held at the school. The schedule was filled with arts and crafts (rattle making, decorative drums, hide scraping etc.), sharing circles, wagon rides, sweat lodges, and traditional ceremonies (horse dance ceremony and chicken dance ceremony). These events helped to create a real sense of place and a strong sense of community.
Eric Large looking up at his former school
During my visit, former student Eric Large took me on a tour of the school. He pointed out the old dormitories where he slept, the supply closet for the nurse, old classrooms. We walked through what was once the girls dormitory. “I don’t know much about this part of the building,” he said. “We were never allowed here. They always kept us apart. We didn’t take classes together, eat together or play together. Even brothers and sisters were separated.”
As we walked through the third floor of the four storey building, he pointed to one door, now locked. “This is where the traveling dentist worked from. I gave a tour of this building before and the smell of the dental fluoride came flooding back to me. I asked the others on the tour if they could smell it. It was so strong. I guess that’s my body remembering.”
The school means different things to different people. For some it is filled with difficult memories, others recall the struggle to reclaim the space, and for current students it is a place of learning and empowerment. Thank you to Eric Large, Bernadine Houle-Steinhauer, Harvey Young Chief, Charles Wood and many of the other participants for sharing your knowledge and creating such a positive space.
Coqualeetza
June 14, 2011
After I visited St. Mary’s, I drove the short distance towards Coqualeetza. Soon after arriving, it became very clear that my short trip out west would only be long enough to scratch the surface of Coqualeetza’s history. Thankfully, Patricia Raymond-Adair and Karen Bonneau at the Coqualeetza Cultural Education Centre answered my questions and kindly photocopied a mass of documents (including old pamphlets and media coverage) that I’ve brought home with me to go through.
When I began this research, I was under the impression that many of the former Indian Residential Schools no longer existed. I had heard stories of schools that had been demolished, neglected and decayed, and had heard several times about schools lost to (both intentional and unintentional) fires. As I continued the research, however, I found that several of the schools have been taken back by communities. And I wanted to hear more about the strength and determination involved in doing so.
As I’ve mentioned previously, the former Portage la Prairie school is now being used as tribal and administrative offices. Some former students work in the same building where they went to school. The Coqualeetza school in Chilliwack also has an interesting history.
The Coqualeetza site has been used over the last centry as a Methodist Indian Residential School, a tuberculosis hospital and army barracks. In the 1970s, the Sto:lo First Nations occupied the former school to reclaim it as their own. A report in the Chilliwack Progress (May 5, 1976) describes the occupation:
Acting under orders, with the sound of tribal drums ringing in their ears, members of the Canadian Armed Forced heaved against the front door to the former nurses residence at Coqualeetza. By 7:45pm Monday 23 people were carried or led away from the scene that erupted only a short time before when members of the Stalo Indian band decided to stand ground and disobey military and RCMP orders to vacate the Coqualeetza facility.
The Coqualeetza Cultural Education website notes that the occupation was an attempt to “publicize the lack of action on achieving reserve status and ownership of the Coqualeetza Property.” The occupation certainly brought more attention to the Sto:lo First Nation’s claims to the land. The buildings, now being used as the headquarters for Sto:lo Nation and other cultural, health and educational initiatives, still show traces of the past. But they also reveal a promising future.
My next post will be about Blue Quills in St. Paul, Alberta. And shortly afterwards I’ll be heading up north to Yellowknife and then Inuvik. I hope to be posting images and reflections as the trip unfolds.
Thanks to Patricia and Karen for their help at Coqualeetza!
Traces on the West Coast: St. Mary’s IRS
June 1, 2011
The cement foundations of what was once a classroom at St. Mary's Indian Residential School
“It was an evil place. It was a beautiful place.”[i]
I recently took a trip out west to Vancouver, BC. The trip was both personal (to celebrate the wedding of a friend) and research-related (to visit the grounds of former Indian Residential Schools, first in BC and then in Alberta).
The first school I visited was the former St. Mary’s Indian Residential School in Mission, a school that was demolished in 1965. (The students attending there at the time were moved to a new government-run St. Mary’s not far away.) The remnants of the first school, the oldest permanent Indian Residential School in British Columbia, can now be found in the Fraser River Heritage Park.
It was a beautiful late spring day when I visited the park. I had printed out the map of the former school from the Park’s website before my trip and had it with me as I walked. Without the map, it’s unlikely I would have noticed the low concrete foundations embedded in the landscape of the park. The map included buildings that were still standing, that were gone but still marked in some way, and those whose traces had since vanished.
Another cement foundation marking a structure that was once part of St. Mary's.
There were a few other people in the park that day, most were walking their dogs, a few were sitting on benches over-looking the water. I was the only one taking notice of the cement structures, walking from one to another and puzzling over the map.
I found it strange that the cement foundations weren’t marked in some way, so I went to the visitor center to see if I could find more information. There I met Don Brown, a manager at the Heritage Park, who informed me that indeed the foundations were marked. He mentioned that some time ago, they had painted numbers on the structures to coincide with those on the map. But time and weather had worn those away. Then they marked them with small metal plaques. Unfortunately, Don explained, some of those had been stolen, likely to be melted down for the metal. We walked back out to the structures together to see if we could find them and, after checking out a couple, found one marking the old gym.
There was something both beautiful and haunting about that space. It was both serene and unsettling. While at the visitor center, I purchased Amongst God’s Own: The Enduring Legacy of St. Mary’s Mission, a book that captures the contradictions of St. Mary’s. As author Terry Glavin explains, the history of St. Mary’s and the Indian Residential School system is complicated. He writes:
“This book is about a terrible story. It is a story that involves great suffering, betrayal, love, sacrifice, loss, and redemption. This book is also about a wonderful story, a story that involves faith, memory, comfort, forgiveness, sorrow and loyalty. It is also an unfinished story” (11).
The testimonies from the former students in the book discuss both the difficulties and opportunities they experienced at St. Mary’s. Without downplaying the horrible intentions and legacies of the system, the author and the former students involved in the book complicate the narrative of the IRS system as one where only heartache and destruction were the result.
In my next couple of posts I’ll write about the other schools I visited on the trip: Coqualeetza in Chilliwack, BC and Blue Quills in St. Paul, Alberta.
[i] Glavin, Terry and former students of St. Mary’s. Amongst God’s Own: The Enduring Legacy of St. Mary’s Mission. Mission, BC: Longhouse Publishing, 2002.
North of North
April 13, 2011
On a recent visit to New York, I was talking with an American friend about my upcoming trip to Inuvik (to attend the IRS TRC’s second national gathering at the end of June). This is how our conversation went:
Friend: How are things going in Toronto?
Me: Good. I’m planning my trip up to Inuvik.
Friend: Inuvik? Is that like 5 hours north of Toronto?
Me: No way – it’s way further. It’s like…way north. North of north.
But at that point, I realized that I didn’t really have a good grasp on exactly how far north it was. So we google-mapped it. The first image that comes up doesn’t give you a good sense of anything except that there isn’t too much around Inuvik.
If you zoom out a bit, you start to get a sense of how far north it is.
If you zoom out a bit more, you see that it is certainly farther than 5 hours north of Toronto!
The conversation made me realize just how much of Canada, especially up north and outside the urban centers, I have yet to see.
On my way up to Inuvik, I’ll be stopping in Yellowknife too. Looking forward to exploring this part of Canada!
NOTE: The IRS TRC has announced that it will be holding a statement gathering event at the Multiplex in Yellowknife on April 14, 2011. And will then be traveling to some of the other communities in the Northwest Territories until May 12, 2011. More information can be found here.
Event Recap: Memory, Art, and Modern
April 4, 2011
The last couple of weeks have been crammed full with interesting events. Recently, I posted about the Memory Studies conference in New York. The event, which started off with a fascinating opening night screening called A Film Unfinished, brought memory scholars from around together to discuss their research. It was the first time I was able to present some of my research on the IRS TRC’s national gathering in Winnipeg, Manitoba last summer, and I think (and hope) it went well.
Still from "Canned Meat". Image from Harbourfront Centre website.
Back in Toronto, I attended two other wonderful events. On Wednesday, March 30th, the Harbourfront Centre hosted Aboriginal Women in the Arts: Using Art to Reclaim Traditional Roles with Terril Calder, Lee Maracle and Cheryl L’hirondelle. Calder’s film, Canned Meat, was a jarring and beautiful film that spoke to themes of isolation, memory, and community. Maracle’s poetry, as always, was moving. Her responses during the Q and A were insightful and inspiring. And L’hirondelle’s songs were heartfelt and beautiful. (One of the songs was written in collaboration with Aboriginal women in prison in Saskatchewan.) My favourite song was “Wishful Heart,” written while walking through Vancouver’s downtown east side.
Image of the exhibit's book cover from the AGO website.
And last but not least was the Art Galley of Ontario’s symposium called Inuit Modern. The symposium, on April 2nd, brought together Inuit artists and curators to discuss the new exhibit at the AGO: Inuit Modern. As one of the moderators noted, it was the first time so many Inuit artists were gathered together in “the south.” (I learned that Toronto counts as part of “the south” when the point of comparison is so far north.) The participants discussed the tensions between concepts like traditional and modern, north and south, and art and authority.
