Altona’s Steps Toward Reconciliation group welcomed Niigaan Sinclair to town last week for an evening of discussion and reflection.
The Tuesday night gathering drew a sizeable crowd to the Rhineland Pioneer Centre to hear from the Anishinaabe writer, editor, professor, and activist.
Sinclair’s hour-long talk saw him reflect on a range of topics, starting with his work as a professor of Indigenous studies at the University of Manitoba.
He noted a third of the students in his introductory course are international students, many learning about Indigenous people for the first time.
“Most of them have never seen snow before and now I’m talking to them about the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples … most of them didn’t even know Indigenous people existed and now here we are, four months into their time [here] … and now, boom, here they are in my class having to understand the 46 articles of what Indigenous intellectual property rights in the list consist of. Why is it that there’s dream catchers at Walmart? Is that a violation of intellectual property? So it’s a very interesting time that we live in.”
He reflected on Prime Minister Mark Carney’s recent speech at the World Economic Forum in Switzerland where he called on the international community to strengthen alliances during the global uncertainty being wrought by the current United States administration.
“Find some friends, diversify your relationships, and then, most of all, start working together as if the bully doesn’t exist, because the bully lives off your fear,” Sinclair summarized of the Canadian strategy of dealing with our volatile neighbour to the south.
“I want to ask the question of you tonight … where do you think Prime Minister Carney learned that … where do you think Canada learned to work together, to focus on one another, and to most of all commit to each other, even if we don’t always agree?”
That Canadian nature has its roots in the Indigenous peoples who first called this land home, Sinclair said.
The European settlers learned a lot from the First Nations, he noted, especially the French ones who married into Indigenous families, creating the Red River Métis.
“They’d been working, living, trading with Indigenous peoples, and they were learning some things along the way,” Sinclair said, noting the British settlers were generally less open to taking advice from First Nations, but that didn’t stop leaders like Chief Peguis from aiding the Selkirk area settlers as they struggled to survive their first winter in Canada.
Surviving Manitoba’s harsh winters has always come down to cooperation, Sinclair reflected.
“Winter is coming—that’s really the only truth of this place,” he said. “How long would you last by yourself outside with nowhere to go? Minutes … what the Indigenous people learned thoroughly, absolutely, is that you will never, ever survive alone. You have to commit to the person beside you and it doesn’t matter how they think, how they act, how they vote, what gender they are. It doesn’t even matter what they said yesterday, because you need them to share their medicines with you, share their food with you, and help you build a lodge.”
Learning to get along and build a community together—sharing what you have with others, ensuring everyone is taken care of—is a hallmark of Indigenous nations, Sinclair said, and it’s a character trait Canada retains by way of its social support and health care systems.
“That is the premise for treaty, that’s the premise for what it means to work together, and that’s also the premise for democracy,” he stressed. “It’s what Indigenous peoples understood, which was a central, core principle: that the only way we’re going to survive in what is often harsh circumstances is by committing to the person in front of you.”
Sinclair also shared memories of growing up Indigenous in Canada and of his late father, Murray Sinclair, who headed up the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada.
He also spoke on the partnerships between Indigenous and non-Indigenous groups in aiding Manitoba’s unhoused population, and in the growing number of Indigenous leaders serving on municipal councils across the province.
“We as Manitoba do radical, radical things … we have more Indigenous small town mayors than any other province in the country,” he noted, pointing out as well that the University of Manitoba currently has more Indigenous students than at any time in its history. “3,248—that’s 11 per cent of the entire campus. That’s doctors, lawyers, nurses, teachers, psychologists, criminologists, kinesiologists, scientists, botanists. There’s no bigger on-campus community this year at the University of Manitoba.”
He reflected on the Orange Shirt movement and its meaning for all Canadians, Indigenous or not, as a way to honour residential school survivors and those who did not make it home.
“This is not about trying to figure out and feel sad about the past,” he stressed of the symbolism of donning an orange shirt and participating in the National Day for Truth and Reconciliation. “It’s about saying, ‘This is what I’m going to do for the future.’”
Educating others as to the importance of reconciliation and about the mistakes of the past is something every Canadian can do, Sinclair said.
“You’re here [tonight] because you have learned, you’ve talked, you’re interested, you’re engaged—hopefully you talk about this with your friends … go talk to a person who would never come to this event and just tell them whether you enjoyed it … go out and talk about what you’re learning, what you’re thinking.
“You don’t have to agree with me—just the fact that you’re talking about it, talking about what it means to work together, live together, be with one another means that we are the most critically aware generation in history.
“This is critical mass … we’re talking, we’re listening, we’re engaging, thinking, and dreaming about what the future might look like.”
