IDLG News December 2017

Indigenous Directions Newsletter - December 2017

• Indigenous Futures Symposium: Link to live stream + archives
• Links to media coverage of the StartUP Nations gathering
• News from the IDLG: Welcome Chad Cowie
• The Indigenous Performing Arts Alliance's Smudging Document
• New on the Indigenous Directions Hub: Pilgrimage as Pedagogy
• Events listings: Indigenous-focused art, film, and speakers and gatherings

Indigenous Futures Symposium:

Link to live stream + archives

An excerpt from http://abtec.org/iif/symposia/3rd-annual-symposium/:
In the 3rd Annual Symposium on the Future Imaginary (November 28th, November 30th – December 2nd 2017), community members, artists, activists, academics, and technologists will share how they think the challenges of the present can be addresses, in part, through concrete, constructive, and critical dreams of the future. We welcome the playful and serious, the fantastical and the pragmatic, the traditional and the contemporary. The future will be all these things, and the future will be Indigenous.

To tune in to the live stream (December 1st and 2nd), and to access archives from the Future Imaginary Symposium, visit the abtec iif live website.

Links to media coverage of the StartUP Nations gathering
 

Roughly forty Indigenous youth from across the province gathered at Concordia University the weekend of November 17 – 19 for the first edition of StartUP Nations, a three day Youth Collective Entrepreneurship conference highlighting the importance of developing the social economy in First Nations communities.

Read IDLG member Ron Abraira's Concordia NOW article about StartUP Nations.

Listen to the CKUT Community radio interview with keynote speaker Cliff Atleo Jr., produced by IDLG members Charlie O'Connor and Brooke Wahsontiiostha Deer. 

Check out some of the other media coverage of this hugely successful event:

French

•        Radio-Canada (text)
•        MSN Canada (text)
•        Sympatico (text)

English

•        CBC News (text)
•        CTV News Montreal (video and text)
•        Yahoo Canada (text)
•        CBC Radio One (radio)

News from the IDLG: Welcome Chad Cowie

The IDLG is happy to announce that Chad Cowie (Indigenous Student Recruitment Officer) has joined the group.  Here is an excerpt from his biography on the Aboriginal students Coming to Concordia webpage:

My name is Chad Cowie, I am Anishinaabe and from the community of Manominiiking (Mississauga’s of Rice Lake – also referred to as Hiawatha First Nation) and I am of the wolf clan.  I have been involved in the field of education not only as a student but through student governance and employment since 2004. While working on my undergrad at Western University, I was also actively involved with the First Nations’ Students Association and the Social Science Students Council. Following my undergrad, I was a researcher and policy analyst for the Chiefs of Ontario. Between September 2011 and August 2013 I obtained my M.A from the University of Manitoba, where I also served a term as the Vice-President Internal of the Graduate Students’ Association. Most recently, since the fall of 2013, I had been working on my PhD at the University of Alberta.
 

It is through these experiences that I come to the role of Indigenous Student Recruitment Officer with a breadth of knowledge on what it is like to be an Indigenous person entering the world of post-secondary school, from applying to scholarships/funding to persevering and succeeding in accomplishing my education goals.

I am currently working with the Office of Student Recruitment as the Indigenous Student Recruitment Officer.  As part of this role, I will also be working alongside the Aboriginal Student Resource Centre at times.  If you have any questions, concerns or comments regarding the application process or how to become a student, please do not hesitate to contact me.  I would be more than happy to meet with you or speak with you, and support you on your academic journey.

Welcome, Chad!

The Indigenous Performing Arts Alliance's Smudging Document

The Indigenous Performance Arts Alliance (IPAA) is an Indigenous arts service organization based in Toronto, ON.  They developed the Smudging Document "to educate performance venues on the protected practice of burning ceremonial medicines as it relates to the performing arts".  The document features research by student lawyers Jane Zhang and Mimi Chen, under the supervision of Matthew McPherson (OKT LLP).  It reminds readers that "the Canadian Human Rights Commission has explicitly listed Smudging as a religious right", and provides examples of hospitals, correctional centres, and theatres that have explicitly made space for smudging.  

IPAA Smudging Document

New on the Indigenous Directions Hub: Pilgrimage as Pedagogy

Vieux Montréal to Kahnawà:ke: an annual Concordia student pilgrimage

Sara Terreault is a Part-Time Faculty in both Theological Studies and Irish Studies. Matthew Anderson is Assistant Professor at the Theological Studies department. Together, they designed the summer course on pilgrimage, which included a trek from the Old Port to Kahnawà:ke. Every summer since 2014, Profs Terreault and Anderson have taken Concordia students on a 35-km walking journey from the Hochelaga Rock monument located on the ground of McGill University to the South Shore community at Kahnawà:ke Mohawk Territory. The journey is part of their coursework in the study of pilgrimage and meaningful mobility. The students walk through the urban landscape, learning to re-read and re-member the stories alternately recorded in or erased from the fabric of the city, before crossing the Saint Lawrence Seaway on a path constructed with expropriated Mohawk land.  At the end of August, 2017, Concordia Provost Graham Carr and the Academic Cabinet undertook a 2-day professional development journey that was inspired and informed by Sara and Matthew’s unique work.

Read more on the Community-based Projects page on the Indigenous Directions Hub.