Be a Part of @Starleigh_Grass 's #sd78 Workshop

Hello everyone!

On Friday, February 15th, 2013 my colleague Starleigh Grass will be presenting workshop Bitterroot as a Metaphor for Indigenous Education in my school district: Fraser Cascade School District.  Starleigh is an education blogger and tweeter and can be found at @starleigh_grass on Twitter or at www.twinkleshappyplace.blogspot.ca, an excellent resource for those of you who should all be working to integrate Indigenous content into your classrooms and curriculum.

I will be introducing and Hosting Starleigh for this workshop (I don't know what hosting means, so it should be interesting.  I suspect it means making sure she has water in case she gets thirsty, but who knows).  In any case, I will be live-tweeting the workshop under the hashtag #sd78, and reading out any comments or questions that you may have for Starleigh on the topic we are covering.  That's right, it's your chance to get interactive and involved with the Bitterroot workshop.  There are several areas where we will be inviting audience participation and I will use this time to read any tweets you have for me out to the audience.

"The workshop also pauses to discuss three overarching inquiry questions:
1. If the roots of educational inequality are the invisibility of Indigenous thought and contributions in education as well as a history of education for assimilation, what are the solutions?
2. How can we hold our institutions accountable for decolonizing/indigenizing education?
3. What role do I play in decolonizing education?" http://twinkleshappyplace.blogspot.ca/2013/02/sd78-mailbag-participate-in-my-workshop.html

If for whatever reason you can't sit in on the live-tweet or attend the session, we will be doing a Twitter mailbag, using the #sd78 hashtag.  Just ask your question, share your discussion point regarding the above questions and I will check them out before the beginning of the session and put it all together for discussion.  Check out the following links to learn more about Starleigh's presentation if you can't make it: Bitterroot as a metaphor for locally contextualized curriculum reform and
Bitterroot as a Metaphor for Decolonizing Education .

Looking forward to hearing from you.  Starleigh will be writing up a summary and posting about it.  I might too. Let's take over the #sd78 hashtag on Friday to discuss decolonization.

Savages: Why Aboriginal Education Matters

Just a short video highlighting some of the recent online commentary, against Idle No More, I put together to remind you of why Aboriginal Education is important in Canada.  Set to Growing Pains, an excellent song by two former students of mine, Darren "Statt" Florence and Trevor "Bigg Phresh" Florence.  I think the images complement the song, which I have used repeatedly to share a story of the lived experience of First Nations' youth but also to illustrate the larger issues of colonialism and the ongoing legacy of residential schools.

From Evernote:

Time for Educators to be Idle No More

On Saturday, February 2, 2013 I sent an email to my Superintendent, the District Aboriginal Education Coordinator and my local Teachers' Association and informed them of my desire to hold an Idle No More rally/ teach-in during the school district's upcoming professional development day on February 15, which is ostensibly focused on Aboriginal Education.  This is an important opportunity to teach what the message of Idle No More is to the educators in my school district, but also to share with them the hard truth of Aboriginal Education in British Columbia: that we, as teachers are failing our youth; that we are complicit in creating the environment that allows for their continued oppression and for the tensions and racism we see out in the "real world" and online.

Teachers, Administrators, Ministry and Trustee people, as a whole need to understand the relationship between our curriculum and the systemic attitudes we are witnessing right now.  Stereotypes exist not because there is truth there, they exist because educators have modeled it is okay to think that way.  The stereotype that First Nations people don't care for education and don't like to work is built because educators don't challenge it, allowing people to trot it out when they see Native people protesting the unfair way we are treated in this country or to protect our rights.  Stereotypes that there is a difference between "Taxpayers" and "Indians" exist because our curriculum teaches the Canadian myth of the benevolent society, that Canada saved First Nations from themselves and the elements.  It is hidden in the context of our curriculum and it is odious.  That we do not challenge it, as educators, call it out and say this is not the reality, serves to reinforce it, whether intentionally or not.

We are telling our kids they have to give who they are to succeed.

How do we decolonize the education system?  Not by offering, half-heartedly, First Nation focused courses or holding cultural events to "celebrate" a local nation or culture.  We decolonize be changing the way we think about teaching our youth.  We change the way we look at the curriculum, seeking out the hidden contexts and challenging them.  We decolonize by not letting the status quo stand just because we are comfortable with it.  We change by recognizing what is unacceptable and challenging it.  We need to teach that is is NOT OKAY TO THINK THAT WAY.  We need to recognize that Aboriginal Education needs to be for all students so that going into the "real" world, our kids will not be subject to that kind of thinking any longer.

I have strived to teach my students to resist by succeeding, to show they can live in two worlds without having to give up any part of themselves.  Our education system has always demanded Aboriginal students walk in one world, while claiming otherwise.  It is time for us to stop living that ideology and embrace the idea of two worlds epistemologies.  Only then will we see some sort of equality, some sort of equity.

We, as educators, are the ones who have been idle far too long and it is our kids that lose out because of it.

From Evernote:

On Idle No More & Misconceptions: Responding to Some Troubling Articles

To begin, here are the articles in question: 

Aboriginals have no claim to sovereignty http://www.vancouversun.com/touch/story.html?id=7876897

Idle No More Pure Laziness http://www.ottawasun.com/2013/01/26/idle-no-more-pure-laziness

I am bothered, of late by the direction that seems to have been taken in Canada with regard to the Idle No More movement and the potential it presents to the First Nations and other Indigenous peoples of Canada.  Canada tends to have a view of itself and its relationship with Native people as one of benevolence, when in reality there is a relationship of power and privilege that is one-sided and somewhat oppressive of Indigenous peoples.  When the Indigenous peoples resist that oppression, there tends to be a push-back from the mainstream society that is both unfair and hard to understand.  Generally, First Nations are allowed to express themselves when that self-expression is acceptable to the dominant society.  When it challenges or disrupts the narrative of the dominant society, it is usually challenged and suppressed.  

The first article above, by Barry Cooper and published in the Vancouver Sun challenges the Idle No More demonstrations by questioning and demonizing the very legitimacy of First Nations sovereignty by imposing the western European worldview understanding of sovereignty and nationhood.  He seems to be arguing that our inherent rights do not exist because our understanding of those rights are not in line with the understanding of the western world.  Cooper invokes the idea of terra nulleus in his argument, implying that the cultures of "the New World" were not as advanced (read: civilized) and hence were not capable of nationhood in the modern sense, as it was invented by Europeans.  Cooper has chosen not to engage in understanding the difference of worldview and nationhood as practiced by First Nations people, as he has already decided that they are not legitimate.  It is unfortunate that he has picked this way to address the issues, ignoring the different understandings of the Treaties and the Royal Proclamation of 1763.  The idea that only one point of view has validity in an increasingly globalized environment is somewhat anachronistic.  In this way, I am able to say that Indigenous people have an advantage, forced into the two worlds metaphor, we have been indoctrinated into the western education system and worldview, while still being placed in the context of our Indigenous epidemiologies, whether they are fully formed or not because of the residential school attempts to assimilate. 

The second article takes a slightly different route to pushing back.  John Robson argues that the Idle No More movement is a lazy way to change things, choosing to block roads instead of working, engaging in fake hunger strikes instead of pulling ourselves up and getting the work done.  He even references Chief Louie of Osoyoos Indian Band in his attack on lazy, shiftless Indians, ignoring the advantages that Louie has in his reserve land-base and its location.  Many of the reserves in Canada were placed on the least desirable land, at least until it became known what is potentially available under those reserves.  Robson plays with all the stereotypes that have been thrown at First Nations people and makes his argument one of belittling.  

The views expressed above are reflected in the online universe as well, which is really unfortunate.  I had been, for a while, collecting screen grabs of some of them but gave up after about 200 images, reading them was making me feel sick and gave me a nasty headache that took hours to manage.  

This one's sort of polite.

There was some short-term attempts to understand and learn what Idle No More was about but it was abandoned somewhere along the way.  What Canada did was say: I feel your pain.  I get it.  Sorry.  I understand.  I empathize.  Woo hoo.  This passive empathy was a way to engage in identification with the pain of Indigenous peoples, without having to engage in the discourse that would address the issues that led to the place of oppression in the first place.  This passive empathy leads those with privilege to believe that they are identifying with the oppressed and, hence, feeling their pain.  In that regard, there is a belief that there is no need to investigate further. There is no challenge to a worldview, nothing that leads to justice.  This is a way to negate any responsibility for any negative effects of the residential school experience and other colonial acts, and by extension, the unequal social conditions and general powerlessness, is placed back on the First Nations.  When Idle No More didn't go away after that January 11 meeting, the pseudo empathy turned to anger and to push-back as we are witnessing in the mainstream media above.  There seems to be a lack of identification with Indigenous people or the challenges faced on a daily basis.  There seems to be a lack of desire in trying to understand and engage in the solution making.  There is only a return to the status quo of victim blaming, arguments that we are only making noise rather that seeking solutions, ignoring the fact that the demonstrations are the only way that we can be heard when we try to engage in a discourse to seek solutions.  Canada doesn't listen otherwise.

I wish I had the answer as to how to move beyond this state of affairs.  I have encountered educators, online, concerned that Aboriginal students are being pressured into participating in Idle No More.  I reject the implication in this thought, it seems to suggest that, somehow, our youth are not capable of critical thinking and learning what is important to them.  It suggests that somehow Idle No More is not a legitimate movement that has meaning to people.  It suggests that it is not something of value to Indigenous people.  I am aware that I am reading more than is probably there but what we see in the words is important, their meaning is always in the ear of the beholder, whatever you think you meant.

From Evernote:

Why Idle No More Matters

Aboriginals have no claim to sovereignty http://www.vancouversun.com/touch/story.html?id=7876897

From the Vancouver Sun article: "European and Indian civilizations were not equal. That is why Europeans came to the New World, not the other way around."

Part of my job, not just the teacher thing but that whole being a Native role model thing because I'm a grown up, is to teach our children, all children, that First Nations people, that our children, have value in this world and deserve to have the dignity of being respected without having to give up a part of who they are.  I guess I should say thank you Vancouver Sun, and the rest of Canada it feels like some days, for continuing to ensure that it isn't an easy job, what with everyone always telling them that they aren't, in fact, of any value.  Pseudo-intellectual ramblings like this follows the same line of reasoning that, last year, gave a non-Native student permission to call me an "uncivilized spear-chucker, living out in the woods" if not for Europeans saving us.

It is tripe, I'm sorry, and serves no purpose other than to divide, to put people in their place.

Idle No More matters to me, not because of the demonstrations against the erosion of Indigenous rights contained in Bill C45 (though those are incredibly important), but because, for the first time in a long time, I see hope in my students of Aboriginal ancestry.  I see engagement in the world around them.  I see pride in who they are.  I see them asking me questions about what is wrong in Canadian society that allows social injustice to exist in this "civilized" country.  I see them not wanting to be invisible or silenced.  I see them wondering why.