BODY, MIND & SOUL Why We Should Read: Black Water

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WHY WE SHOULD READ

The Warmland Book & Film Collective – responding to the Calls to Action of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission – meets August 11th online. Email WarmlandBFC@gmail. com

In his quest to know his father – which is really his quest to know himself – David A. Robertson ultimately asks the question: what is Indigeneity?

Interweaving anecdotes from his past with a present-day visit to Norway House Cree Nation, Robertson conveys his struggles with anxiety due to growing up without his father in his formative years, when the only idea he had of “Indian” was that of sports team mascots and stereotypical drunks. But in Black Water, the place his father grew up on the family’s trapline, he feels a sense of belonging, his blood memory.

It is from there that his father was removed to a place where all he knew from his life on the land counted for nothing. His father shares his experience of residential school (after his own mother had attended one as well), an experience that led him to work to transform Indigenous education.

When talking about his own daughter learning Cree, Robertson says, “Intergenerational trauma requires this kind of act, purposefully working towards healing through the connections we choose to foster… [T]ypically this acquisition of knowledge, this learning, happens through Elders, happens through stories, and happens through the language.”

While the book may sometimes seem meandering, perhaps this is by design. In response to his grappling with why his father didn’t teach him Cree culture, his father said that David would learn about what it meant to be Cree by just watching how he (his father) existed in the world. Perhaps this book is offering us to experience that discovery in the same way.

In the end, Robertson says that his five children - who are a blend of Cree and Métis and European ancestry - will each define what Indigeneity is for themselves. Why? Because it will mean something different for each person as their own life story and understanding grows and evolves… because healing doesn’t necessarily look dramatic - it may just be meandering and confused and eventual.

Submitted by David & Ranji