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May 10, 1999
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Looking forward
to a
powwow
Mark McKennitt strikes a pose while performing at the National
Powwow gala evening. The traditional dancer was one of the entertainers
that impressed guests, along with some of the top names in Aboriginal
entertainment.
For more on the gala evening see story
Photo Credit:
Marie Burke
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Conference goal is to empower
youth
by Allison Kidd
Feather of Hope reaches out to
help young people
by Marie Burke
Here is a full list of additional stories featured in the
May, 1999 issue of Alberta Sweetgrass. If you are not receiving
your own copy of Alberta Sweetgrass, then you have missed all
this information.
Click here for
Alberta Sweetgrass subscription information.
Métis sign provincial agreement
Colleen Klein hosts a breakfast auction for kottage
Friendship centre renovated to suit community
Edmonton's rap scene on Won-18
Preventing crime works in communites
Opening eyes about AIDS with the Be Aware video
Feather of Hope reaches out to help young people
Increase your chances, be neat and thorough
Scholarship advice given
Alternative learning environment offered
Substance abuse program uses different approach
Environmental group helping Old Man River valley
Warning issued by wildlife officials for Slave Lake
Photo project brings dignity to people
Economic and social issues protested on reserve
Women want
the children back
By Yvonne Irene Gladue
Sweetgrass Writer
HOBBEMA
A conference at a reserve in Hobbema stirred up a lot of questions
and feelings. Tears were shed as grandparents, parents, and other
relatives recounted how children from the reserve were apprehended
by the province's social services.
"We'd like our kids to come home," said Tammy Crier,
member of the newly formed Women's Support Group on the Samson
Reserve in Hobbema.
"We want our kids back in our community to learn our culture
and to live amongst family and relatives," she said.
The Women's Support Group has seven members and was formed to
address child care issues in the community. On April 20 and 21,
the bingo hall on the Samson Reserve was the location for the
conference.
The group wants the province to return 200 kids to the reserve.
The children who live off the reserve are in permanent guardianship
to the province. According to the group, another 200 are in temporary
foster care.
"On June, 20, 1997, chief and council signed an agreement
that extended family would be notified before the children were
apprehended," said Crier. The group feels frustrated because
grandparents and extended family were not contacted prior to
most apprehensions.
"Many of the children became wards of the province, without
social services notifying extended family members on the reserve.
No one called me," said a grandparent at the meeting.
"While intoxicated and on drugs, the parents were told to
sign documents that allowed social services to take the children,"
she said.
The conference scheduled a sweetgrass ceremony, lunch and an
awareness walk. Parents and relatives from the Louis Bull, Erminskin
and the Montana reserves were also represented during the conference.
The chief of the reserve, Florence Buffalo also attended the
conference.
"We have to all work together to find a solution to this
problem," said Buffalo.
"We are told to take courses on self-esteem and to go to
a drug and treatment centre. I've gone to so many courses I could
even facilitate my own drug and alcohol treatment conference,"
commented one of the fathers whose child is in permanent care
of the province.
"They keep telling me if I do this or if I do that I will
get my kids back. I've done everything they told me to do and
I still do not have my kids back," he said.
According to the group, parents not only lose their kids when
an apprehension occurs, they also lose their house that was given
to them by the band.
"I was told that I could not get my kids back because I
did not have a house," said another man.
"I had to move in with my parents when they took my house
away, so how do I get my house and kids back?" he asked.
There are a lot of good foster homes out there, said Flora Northwest,
a concerned grandparent at the conference.
"We are not saying anything against anyone, we just want
to get our grandchildren and children back," she said.
"I'm certainly looking into the situation," said Peyasu
Wuttunee, director of Family Support Services for the Child Wellness
Society at the Samson reserve. "We are willing to listen
to everyone and we are here to work with you," he said to
the crowd.
Conference
goal is to empower youth
By Allison Kydd
Sweetgrass Writer
EDMONTON
The Youth Empowerment and Recreation Symposium, held April
30 to May 3 at the University of Alberta, aimed to build on what
has been good about earlier Aboriginal Youth Conferences in Edmonton
and to add a little more.
Dennis Arcand is the main organizer for the event that was presented
by Alexander First Nation. He explained that added component
was recreation and the University of Alberta the perfect location
for the conference.
Not only did the university offer the variety of sports facilities
the organizers wanted, but the atmosphere and size of the institution
was, in Arcand's words, "a setting conducive to [young people's]
well being and personal growth."
Besides picking the location with care, the organizers surrounded
themselves with talented First Nations role models. Dale Auger,
storyteller and educator; Dallas Arcand and Sekwan Auger, championship
dancers; Red Power Squad (Conway Kootenay and Co.), recording
artists and popular powwow dancers; Terry Bigcharles, who describes
himself as "a traditional dancer, an artist and an ambassador
for First Nations"; Asani, a group of female a capella singer-songwriters,
several of them educators as well; Arnold, Dennis and Donovan
Kootenay, and Donovan Delorme, fastball and softball players
and coaches; Mike Ryan, "social activist, youth advocate,
facultative educator and public speaker," and winner of
many volunteer awards, and there were many others.
Several of these session leaders and role models were once troubled
youth, they said. As they talked to the youth participants, who
came from all the western provinces and the north their message
was clear, "we turned our lives around; we followed our
dreams; you can too."
Success stories weren't confined to the professionals, however.
On Friday, the first night of the conference, two of the many
youthful stars were Jason Tuesday, playing classical guitar;
and Stacey Hagerty, singing favorites in her particular country
style.
Tuesday delivered his selections with passion and dexterity,
and threw in humorous quips for good measure. Hagerty was very
poised on stage, singing a variety of country rock and torch
songs. She described herself as "born and raised in Alberta"
and gave both her parents credit for her musical upbringing.
In tune with the good-natured familiarity of the evening, a young
couple trotted up to the stage and did a quick two-step (complete
with dip) in time with Hagerty's singing.
Though the conference was good fun and offered a lot of fine
entertainment, it had serious times as well. Pipe and sweetgrass
ceremonies guided by Native Elders, such as Tom Cranebear, of
Siksika First Nation, provided spiritual touchstones for the
young participants, as well as a link to traditional culture.
Dennis Arcand told how the conference was planned with the four
directions and four kinds of growth in mind: emotional wellness
(growth), intellectual growth, health (physical well-being) and
spiritual growth.
Several of the teacher-chaperones talked about how important
it is to be diligent in all of these directions. For the most
part they seemed to approve of the conference and its organization.
One teacher said she would have liked to see a little more structure
in the recreation seminars. "Without structure," she
said, "they tend to pick what they know. Kids need to see
that there's more than what they know." She also said that
learning the discipline of sports is important.
One of the sessions most discussed by both adults and youth was
called Self-Worth and Determination. It was presented by Terry
Bigcharles.
"We had to shake hands with the people next to us and say
'I love you'. I didn't think I could do it, but it felt good,"
said one teenager. Adults talked about how communication has
often been very difficult between parents and teenagers and,
for many reasons, those three little words have been the hardest
to say.
Helen Kutt, from Cold Lake, a program coordinator for Métis
Child and Family Services, Lac la Biche, said this is the legacy
of the boarding schools.
"You were taken away from everything you know," she
said. "I was the older sister, and I had a lot of responsibility
for my younger brothers. At school I had to watch my brothers
being tortured, and I couldn't go to them . . . something shuts
down inside; it's self preservation," said Knutt.
Out of these kind of experiences, parents and leaders are still
learning to say, like Bigcharles did in his workshop: "you're
not alone; others have experienced the same things don't give
up on yourself; healing takes a long time."
Another community leader, school teacher Shelly Hamelin, said
it's important that young people growing up on reserve and in
other small communities see the outside world. She's felt since
she herself was a teenager that youth conferences play a very
important role in this.
"If you open the door and let them see the outside, they'll
step through eventually," she said. "I'm compelled
to make my students ask what's out there, look out the window."
Hamelin, who is also a defending North American Badminton Singles
Champion, and Margaret Belcourt, teacher's aid and Native liaison
for Hythe School, described how frightening it can be for young
people both to leave home and then to come home again.
They only want to be accepted and both agreed that it's also
vital for the young to be able to talk to their parents. The
two women agreed that, "It's great to have empowerment for
youth, empowerment for adults,the two must be put together. The
community needs to realize that [young] people change. Forgiveness
is also important."
Debra Murray, a youth programs coordinator from Calgary, was
traveling with a group of a dozen young people who are part of
a youth leadership program developed by that city's Parks and
Recreation Department.
It was obvious that both she and the teenagers were enjoying
the recreation component of the conference; the young people
were splashing in the pool, popping out every now and then to
ask her what time the pool closed.
Murray explained some of the rationale behind the leadership
program she's facilitating. It has two parts, called "Finding
Your Way" and "Taking the Lead." The young people
she works with will in turn teach the younger ones. At a recent
adult forum, her group was in charge of the children's activities.
Meanwhile, a group of young people from Saddle Lake, Alexander
and Alexis First Nations were demonstrating their leadership
abilities and their spiking techniques in a volleyball match.
"Where do you come from?" one team-member asked another,
demonstrating that sports can be great mixers. There was a spirit
of generosity and comradeship as well. The young people were
as likely to cheer the opposition as themselves, showing that
they'd internalized the ideals of good sportsmanship which are
intrinsic to Aboriginal culture.
Fundraising
gala for national powwow in Edmonton
By Marie Burke
Sweetgrass Writer
EDMONTON
A fundraising gala to kick off a national powwow in Edmonton
entertained more than 200 people on May 1 at the Northlands Agricom
in Edmonton. The money raised from the gala will be put toward
the costs of the national powwow which will take place on May
28 to 30.
The entertainment for gala evening included comedian Don Burnstick,
Asani, the Métis cultural dancers and the Red Bull singers.
Gordon Tootoosis and Audrey Johnston, acted as masters of ceremonies.
During the presentations at the gala evening, Irene Morin, represented
Senator Thelma Chalifoux's office. The gala evening ended with
a country dance to the music of Homer Poitras and his band.
Chief Eric Gadwa from Kehewin First Nation wanted to emphasis
that the upcoming powwow is a positive way for Aboriginal people
to promote their culture. The idea of a national powwow started
with two Elders, the late Norbert Jeubeaux from Kehewin and Mel
Paul, from the Paul First Nation, said Gadwa.
"The dream that these two Elders had was to get everyone
together, to focus on the good things we are doing. It is important
to show Canadian people and to educate them on the First Nation
culture," said Gadwa.
The Canadian National Powwow Society organized the fundraising
gala and the powwow in conjunction with the Confederacy of Treaty
6, the major contributor in the planning, and host of the powwow.
"We are hoping that there will be support coming in from
Treaty 8 and Treaty 7, but it's got to start somewhere,"
said Dave Scott, executive director with Tribal Chiefs Ventures
based in St. Paul.
Considering the timeframe the gala organizers had to work with,
Scott felt the evening was successful. Scott said more support
is always needed with this kind of an event.
The powwow will also be held at the Edmonton Northlands Agricom
and the society is estimating the event will draw at least 80,000
people.
There will be 16 categories for male dancers and 13 categories
for female dancers. The total amount of dance prize money available
is about $58,000. Drum groups will compete for five places with
the total prize sitting at $22,500. A hand game tournament will
also take place with $10,000 up for grabs.
The powwow society feels the events at the agricom will be educational
for the non-Native community as well as provide a gathering place
for Aboriginal people.
"This powwow is the starter for the millennium powwow we
want to organize in 2000. It is a tribute to the two Elders who
initiated the idea of it in the 1970s," said Gadwa.
Cree
artist returns home to showcase his paintings
By Terry Lusty
Sweetgrass Writer
EDMONTON
He's been one busy man with art tours in Japan, Germany and
Australia where the work of George Littlechild, a 40-year-old
Cree artist from Alberta's Hobbema First Nation is described
as very exotic.
A feature show at Edmonton's Bearclaw Gallery promoted as the
Prayer Offering and Otherwise showcased Littlechild's art. Most
of his work is selling at exhibitions mainly in Ottawa, Hull,
Vancouver, Kamloops and Seattle. Littlechild makes his home in
Vancouver.
The April 19 opening of his 18-piece exhibit and sale at the
Bearclaw attracted a sizable gathering where seven of his originals
were snapped up. Working primarily in acrylic on canvas and mixed
media, it was a pleasant return to his roots, his territory and
a city he has not visited for eight years.
In that time, Littlechild has prospered. He's opened his own
gallery and there have been three books about him that feature
his art work. This Land is my Land (1993), A Man Called Raven
(1997), and recently, What's The Most Beautiful Thing You Know
About Horses.
Born to Rachel Littlechild and James Price, Littlechild was farmed
out to five foster homes from the time he was born.
Littlechild stayed with the same family during the time he was
4 years old until he turned 18. He credits his foster family
for the work he now pursues as his chosen profession. It's a
profession he has a true passion for, one that allows him to
make social statements about Aboriginal people and issues, said
Littlechild.
His foster mother, who drove him to art class as a child, influenced
him strongly.
"She was always there, she forced me to get there and said,
'You do your art,'" said Littlechild.
She also informed him in later years, that at four years of age,
he was already doing art, he said.
Another influence came from master artist Marc Chagall from Europe
who was an inspiration.
"His style was whimsical, dream-like," said Littlechild.
He also respects the works of a fellow Aboriginal artist Joanne
Cardinal-Schubert whose themes parallel those of Littlechild.
However, he doesn't like being branded as just "an Aboriginal
artist."
What Littlechild appreciates is recognition as an artist without
any race attached to the designation. Littlechild says his favorite
subjects are people who are under-dogs.
"Classically, I'm being an educator," he said.
He works in bold colors, using a lot of reds, pinks, purples,
yellow and turquoise, with more blues now, he states. And, like
many of his contemporaries, his art now incorporates text and
photography.
The themes that are somewhat constant in his art focus on residential
schools, spirituality, education, human relationships and things
that deal with our lives, both positive and negative, he said.
Much of his art answers who and what we are, and how we came
to be the spirits that we are, he said.
One particular personality that crops up in some of his art is
Bobtail, one of the original Cree chiefs in the Hobbema area
around the time of the treaties. He was a great, great, great
uncle to Littlechild and once had his own reserve, but moved
to Calgary only to discover the buffalo were gone.
Bobtail returned to Hobbema, but lost most of his band members
who eventually wound up on the Montana Reserve at Hobbema. Bobtail
is one of people that Littlechild reveres.
"Whose will to live, survive and experience life, especially
today, and their ability and will to survive is tremendous,"
he said.
"They (his pictures) are about foster children from the
'60s; there's a hundred, thousand of us that were taken. A lot
of people don't know about us," said Littlechild about his
residential school art.
Now that is slowly changing due to the efforts of writers and
artists like Littlechild who get to explain his art to many of
his customers, thanks to the fact he meets and greets most of
them personally at his gallery, the George Littlechild Studio.
Littlechild picked up on the idea of running his own shop, which
he's done since 1995, from artists like Isaac Tate and Dorothy
Grant. "They represent and empower themselves, because they
have their own galleries," he said.
Besides, the system effectively eliminates any agents or middlemen.
When your work commands $1,200 to $25,000 a piece, why hand over
hundreds of dollars to a go-between, he asked.
The gallery is situated close to False Creek, south of downtown
Vancouver. Eventually, he plans to relocate to Victoria.
"Human beings are the cruelest to each other. We don't build
each other up," said Littlechild about his biggest pet peeve.
Talk to the
Feather: The price paid for the urban rez
By Marie Burke
Sweetgrass Writer
The urban rez - it's a term that is being used lately to describe
a homeland for many Aboriginal people in the city. But even the
sound of "urban rez" brings to mind a land of concrete
that is disconnected from nature's beauty and sustainability,
a land that held false promises for the Aboriginal people who
came to find what their white brothers said was a better life
for their children.
Most came unequipped, without education and training, except
for the domestic skills and the memory of the strict punishment
that mission and residential schools forced upon them. Many of
them became lost in the maze of streets of the inner city and
also in programs designed to help Aboriginal people cope with
the mainstream life that became elusive.
'It is a lifestyle choice,' say many of the workers in social
service agencies and rehabilitation organizations. 'How can you
get people to change when they don't want to see what is good
for themselves?'
They tell themselves, when those people are ready, when they
have hit rock bottom, they will get help. That is how Aboriginal
people become ghosts in the rush of a busy city, where people
choose not to see who they really are.
But they survive and adapt to an environment foreign to their
ancestors who once lived and thrived in sync with the movement
of the earth. When people truly look and see the Aboriginal people
who have become the ghosts of the urban rez, they are utterly
amazed at their will to survive. Still, many lives have been
lost in the struggle to build the urban rez. For those who lost
their lives and stopped becoming ghosts in human form in the
city, it seems almost like a merciful ending. At least their
spirits were able to return to the land that they truly belonged
to.
For those that survive, the price is high. For the cost of the
construction of the urban rez is also our language and our dignity.
For to build such a haunted place, a price must be paid for our
own good - a price of change.
The files in police departments are thick with the sales receipts
of the missing, presumed dead and the children who ran away,
never to be heard from again. The funerals and obituaries paid
by social services also record the price that Aboriginal people
have paid to build the urban rez. Sometimes it seems that these
files tucked away in the cabinets of government officials are
the only proof Aboriginal people are not ghosts in the cities.
The more the Aboriginal fathers and mothers struggled to find
a connection to the land underneath the cold, black asphalt,
the more they realized the price that needed to be paid. It took
time and a schedule of payment for this generation to call the
urban rez their home.
During most genocide attempts by governments that have been recorded
throughout history, there have been those who escaped the cleansing.
Those people, though they are few, glow like a beacon, calling
the ghosts back to reclaim their ancestry. You may see them working
in the inner city with those who are still paying the price of
a so-called better life. And you need only look in their eyes
to see the dignity of our ancestors. While these revived old
and young warriors work to bring back the spirit of Aboriginal
people in the urban rez, they usually remain nameless. Nameless
to even some of our own Aboriginal leaders who cannot or will
not see the price paid for the urban rez. After all, who can
see a ghost.
Feather of
Hope reaches out to help young people
By Marie Burke
Sweetgrass Writer
EDMONTON
Life on the streets of the city is often referred to as the
mean streets, because life on the streets often leads, for many
young Aboriginal people, to self-destructive behavior that can
lead to the deadly disease called AIDS.
The Feather of Hope, an Aboriginal AIDS prevention society in
Edmonton, is focusing on reaching young Aboriginal people with
the Mean Street youth outreach project.
"We want to start the Mean Street project for youth, especially
after talking to former gang members who told us that some gangs
have an initiation code that includes they knowingly have sex
with someone who is infected with AIDS," said Jessica Daniels,
frontline co-ordinator and office manager at Feather of Hope.
More of the newly-infected Aboriginal people who are accessing
the programs at the Feather of Hope are between the ages of 17
and 22, said Daniels.
The Canadian Aboriginal AIDS Network prepared a fact sheet that
states Aboriginal AIDS cases are coming from the younger population
with 31 per cent of those who have AIDS being under the age of
30, meaning they were infected in their late teens or early twenties.
"The reason why more youth are being infected is related
to intravenous drug use and unprotected sex," said Daniels.
More young people are engaging in intravenous drug use because
of the lack of support they may have in their lives from parents
and from their community, stated Daniels.
"It is amazing what has been lost through residential schools,
like parenting skills and communication skills. This is over
generations. The youth don't have the integrity our ancestors
had because of the losses suffered by generations of Aboriginal
people," said Daniels.
A lot of Aboriginal young people are emulating the American black
people's culture in their style of clothing, in the music and
the language, said Daniels. It's the racism, the disenfranchisement,
the lack of knowledge of Aboriginal history and culture, she
said.
"We are thinking of starting a Cree-bonics language to give
them back some of their identity," said Daniels. Ebonics
was reported by the media to have been developed mainly in the
ghettos by black Americans. The language used in many rap songs
by black rap artists is also referred to as Ebonics.
"We base our teachings about AIDS on Aboriginal culture
and that is something our youth may be missing in their lives.
Our approach is community development and leaving an open door
for communication to take place," said Daniels.
Terrying About -
Remembering hockey's greatest
By Terry Lusty
Tansi!
Tansi!
Well, the Great One has come and gone. Wayne Gretzky, No. 99,
has retired, but memories of him for Aboriginal people have not.
Many Native people attended hockey games at the Edmonton Coliseum
to watch and marvel at the Great One. And I, for one, recall
first meeting him around 1986. Another time, I photographed him
up close when he was presented an Inuit art piece. And, how many
of you know that one of Windspeaker's former columnists, Rocky
Woodward, wrote and recorded a song about 99? I'm sure there
are many other recollections and stories out there in Native
country about No. 99.
While on the topic of hockey, a fine gesture at Tsuu T'ina Reserve
during the Native Provincial Hockey Tournament. Just before the
April 8 afternoon games, the Hobbema Avalanche Midgets retired
No. 14 out of respect for the late Jordie Buffalo who had played
for them but died in a September auto crash. A plaque was presented
to his parents , Betty and James Buffalo, by Colleen Dodginghorse,
and a prayer and honour song offered by Hobbema's Leo Cattleman.
The High Prairie Native Friendship Centre has a new director
as of March 1 in the person of Trent Kenyon. At their recent
volunteer appreciation awards, top honors for Volunteer of the
Year went to Billy McGillis. Way to go guy! The centre's arts
and crafts shop, which has been in limbo for some time, is back
in operation and will be going on the internet soon. Look under
northern traditions.net.
As with many centres during the summer, there will be day camps
for low income families "to give their kids something to
do," says Kenyon. In addition, their Eagles Nest Survival
Camp will focus on wilderness training and Native traditions
with five summer students working along with the program.
Peekiskwetan, a mental health and human services organization
at Wabasca with Jeanne Cardinal as program coordinator and Kerrie
Manchur as agency administrator, offers programs and counseling
on anger management, self-esteem and parenting, etc. One-on-one
assistance for parenting may be requested (780-891-3640) by those
feeling the need for help. The organization's AGM is usually
in October or November and is led by president Patricia Auger.
James McAra, director of the Lloydminster Friendship Centre reports
that he expects "between $100,000 and $125,000 dollars from
the National Association of Friendship Centres" for an urban
youth initiatives program. The centre has established youth council
to govern the program.
A high risk workshop for youth, focusing on issues that create
the potential for children to be at high risk of trouble, was
conducted April 19 to 21. The centre has about 200 members and
is served by a 12-person board.
Alberta's best professional boxing prospect for a world title,
Willard Lewis, beat out a 10-round unanimous decision over Las
Vegas fighter Steven Spidel who was 10-2. Spidel took 10 stitches
to his right eye, courtesy of Lewis, as Judges scored in Lewis'
favor 99-91, 99-91, and 96-93.
On the same fight card, Edmonton's Ritchie Goosehead won again,
this time near the close of the first round, over fellow-Edmontonian,
Patrick Graham, who was unable to continue due to a torn bicep
muscle. On the undercard, amateur great Dana Laframboise stopped
his Quebec opponent.
Word has it that Lewis will fight a Detroit boxer on Instabox
on May 29. Watch TSN for this one. It should be a dandy. A month
later, he could be fighting champion Dale Brown with three title
belts on the line between the two fighters.
May 28 to 30 is your opportunity to be part of history, the first-ever
Canadian National Powwow at the Northland Agricom in Edmonton.
Call 780-474-2677.
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