Blog One: Recognizing Origin Stories
First off, I think that this process of Finding one’s sense of origin & belonging; Finding ‘one’s self’ or Finding ‘one’s center’ is a very interesting topic in regards to treaty education, and even the educational profession as a whole. My initial thoughts are that in order to educate others and to ensure they understand the importance of the past and of the relationships between Indigenous and non-Indigenous peoples (or settlers), one must do work on themselves in regards to their own history and relationships.
Based on the required reading from this week, Chelsea Vowel’s Indigenous Writes : A Guide to First Nations, Métis, and Inuit Issues in Canada I have come to consider how I understand myself as a Canadian, as a non-Indigenous person, and maybe even as a settler. I think that I am all of those things and more, and they are largely what shape my perspective of treaties and of treaty education. My social position, and my intersectionality of identity is mainly that of unearned privilege being a white, middle class, heterosexual, able bodied, cis-gendered female. In these social standings, I remain for the most part on the side of unearned privilege, which has in a way affected my thinking, and has made me consider more carefully my view of the world compared to that of another person. In relation to treaty, I identify myself as someone who is wholly affected each and every day because of treaties made on these lands. Every day that I am at the University, learning to become a teacher, I am respecting that my learning is taking place on Treaty 4 land. This Treaty plays a role in my life, and is only one among many.
This semester my plan to explore my treaty identities mainly consists of acting like a sponge and soaking up all of the possible pieces of information that I can regarding treaties, Indigenous peoples, and the continuously evolving relationship between non-Indigenous and Indigenous peoples and the land. I feel that despite learning treaty education throughout my schooling I am still lacking the knowledge of what it truly means to be a treaty person, and how to ensure I provide my future students with the best possible education from these Indigenous ways of knowing. This semester I will commit to learning with an open mind and a clean, fresh slate to fill with new information and new understandings of prior knowledge.
Alex MacPherson 