January Newsletter

Travelling Against the Current: Reflections on Indigenous experiences in Academia is a panel series composed of 3 separate events that all focus on the experiences Indigenous undergraduate students, graduate students, and faculty members have had not only at Concordia University, but along the paths that led them to Concordia as well. 

The purpose of the panel series is to provide visibility for the Indigenous community at Concordia and to share the unique obstacles we encounter in and outside of the classroom. This panel series is also to share the many ways we have found the support needed to overcome these obstacles, weather it be through the Aboriginal Resource Center, mentorship, research, or activism, etc. This will allow other current and potential Indigenous students to become more acquainted with these support networks so that they may be better equipped as they continue travelling through academia.

Featured Speakers at this week's panel :
Suzanne Kite, Maize Longboat, Gage K. Diabo and Travis Wysote

Moderator: Cherry Smiley
For more information, visit the event page on Facebook: 
Travelling Against the Current Panel Series

What futures do we envision for Indigenous people at Concordia? 
You are invited to participate in a collective conversation about the challenges and opportunities that Indigenous staff, students, and faculty experience here at Concordia.  Three members of the Indigenous Directions Leadership Group will give short presentations, and then we will open up the conversation to other Indigenous voices. 
 
Featured speakers:
Brooke Wahsontiiostha Deer is in her final year as an undergraduate student in Management, and President of the Indigenous Student Council.
 
Heather Igloliorte is an Assistant Professor of Art History, and University Research Chair in Indigenous Art History and Community Engagement in Montreal.
 
Jason Lewis is a Professor of Design and Computation Arts, and University Research Chair in Computational Media and the Indigenous Future Imaginary. 
 
Moderator:
Orenda Boucher-Curotte is Bear Clan from Kahnawake, a Concordia Alumni (Religion and Culture, BA ’09, MA ’12), and currently works as coordinator of the Aboriginal Student Resource Centre.

The Department of Religions and Cultures is pleased to announce a public lecture by John Borrows, Canadian Research Chair in Indigenous Law (University of Victoria Law School).
The lecture will include responses by Professor Karl Hele (First Peoples Studies) and Professor Eric Reiter (History Department).

Excerpts from John Borrows' profile:
Indigenous law helps us answer pressing questions facing indigenous peoples and Canadians in general. It is based on things such as custom, deliberation, stories, song, dance, language, legislation, treaties, agreements, and contracts. Indigenous laws are also drawn from analogies related to the environment. 

Dr. John Borrows, Canada Research Chair in Indigenous Law, is focusing his research on how “environmental” laws of indigenous peoples (the laws which flow from how they use natural processes to guide them in regulating their communities and resolving their disputes) can be applied more broadly. ...

Borrows and his team will also study Anishinaabe legal traditions from the Great Lakes, and explore how the theory and practice of akinoomaagewin (aki meaning earth and noomaage meaning to point towards and take direction from) provides guidance about how the Anishinaabe should practice law.