Reflections on Centering Indigenous Knowledge

nitisiyihkâson Jodi Calahoo-Stonehouse niya ohci Michel First Nation ôta asotamâtowin nikotwâsik askiy, niyanân Mohawk ekwa nehiyawak. anskac nimosômak ekîpecimecik ohci Kahanawake ekwa ekîhotaskânecik ôta cîki amiskwacîwâskahikanihk. nicâpan Johnny Calahoo

wiya nistam owiyasiwew/okimâw iyiniw Association ohci Alberta, nitâniskakamâkewin tipiyaw ôta askiy ekwa ninisaweyihten kahahkameyihtamân kâkînakatamâkoyâhk nicâpan ekwa nikahâhkameyihten ewako ôma atoskewin wiya ekwa mihcet kotakak kâkîhatoskâtahkik. ewako anima kanîpawistamawâcik kâhisipaminihcik iyiniw awâsisak ekwa, kanîpawistamâwâcik

ohci kiskinohamâkosiwin ohci iyiniw awâsisak ekwa kwayask kapaminihcik ohci iyiniwak anita môniyânâhk. kâhisihispihteyihtamân nikâpimitisahen awa nicâpan kâkîhitatoskâtak kâkîhisipimohtâtahk ekwa niwîsakiskâkon kawâpamakik nitayisînîmak ekitimahihcik ekwa namoya pîtos kîkway anohc ehisipimpayitahk.

My name is Jodi Calahoo–Stonehouse. I am from the Michel First Nation in Treaty 6 Territory. We are Mohawk and Cree peoples. My forefathers paddled the rivers from Kahanawake and settled here near Edmonton. My Chapan (great grandfather) Johnny Calahoo was the first President of the Indian Association of Alberta. My roots are deep in this land and I am blessed to continue the legacy of my Chapan and continue the work he and many others set out to do, which is fight for the welfare of Indian children, to fight for good education for Indian children and to fight for fair treatment of the Indian by the white man. As honoured as I am to follow my Chapans footsteps it also hurts my heart greatly to see Indigenous people suffering and that things have not changed very much.

I am blessed to have been given a Cree name by my adopted grandfather. It translates in English as ‘The woman who walks on the Earth until her hair turns grey.’ With a name comes obligations and responsibilities. My work, my name, and my responsibility are around children and water in my territory.

Throughout my life I’ve been blessed to be invited to participate in ceremonies. Each nation has a different way to honour and uplift their legal traditions, cultural practices and language groups. In all of the territories, ceremonies or sacred events I’ve been invited to, there’s an acknowledgment of our intimate relationship with the land. ninanâskomon enahipayik ôta kâwîcihitâsoyân, ôma kahatoskâtamân, kawihtamâtakok niya niteyihcikewin kahkiyaw ohci kiyawâw

I give thanks for the opportunity to be here, to do this work and to share my thoughts with each of you.

sâkihitowin ahcahkowan.

In the spirit of love.

epewîtatoskemakik ôki, ewako ehatoskâtamân ekwa nikiskeyihten ewako tân’si kesîhiyinihkâtamân ekwa tân’si ôma kesinakinikâtehk pakwâtitowin. nitapohkeyihten kakîmînwâscikâtew kîkway, nitapohkeyihten pakwâtitôwin kâkînakinikâtew, ekwa kâkîmiyowihcetonânaw ekwa miyohotôtemihtonaw kâkîhitâstehk anita kihci asotamâtowinihk.

I joined this team, and did this work and learned about social innovation and how it might be used to stop racism. I believe that change is possible, I believe racism can be stopped and that we can live in peace and friendship as the treaty intended us to do.

We’re here to imagine how social innovation might be used as a tool to support Indigenous systems. I would like to invite you to a space where we imagine how we might co-create a different future between Indigenous peoples, settlers and immigrant peoples in Canada. This space is sacred. Wherever our feet touch the ground, that land is sacred. Wherever we sing songs, that air is sacred. Whenever our hearts and minds come together to think and work, that work becomes sacred. Berry picking during the fourth sprint

kihcihasotamâtowin ekwa kesiwâhkohtamihk anita nehiyâwiwin

Canada is continually negotiating nation-to-nation agreements with Indigenous peoples. In 2020, as we observe what is happening in Nova Scotia in the Mi’kma’ki or with the hereditary chiefs in the Wet’suwet’en territories, now is the time for Indigenous peoples to prepare, plan, and execute sovereignty, but this is also a time for non-Indigenous peoples to reflect upon their relationships and their obligations to each other and to the treaties.

Fittingly, the guiding question that grounded Shift Lab 2.0 reflects treaties and relationships: How might we create antiracism interventions that acknowledge everyone’s humanity and create behaviour change?

The context is also racism.

After listening to Shelly Tochluk, it is evident that Indigenous realities in Canada are embedded in structural, individual, institutional, and systemic racism.

Racism is the thread that binds us in relation, tying us up in harmful and unhealthy ways. There is no one way to unravel this harm. What’s important is we start to untangle the systems. For example, we must pull apart pieces of the Indian Act and the legacy it left on how we are governed today, including our relationship with the Crown. Rebuilding these relationships has to be a holistic, participatory exercise, not one defined by courts, lawyers, legislation and policy. The question is how we can untie this but also create new bonds of respect, reciprocity, and wellbeing so that we can thrive in relation with one another. The answer has to be a lived experience for all of us.

Enter Shift Lab 2.0

Shift Lab committed to learning from local Elders, storytellers, and Treaty 6 knowledge keepers. It meant allocating time to exploring the treaty bundle and its relationship to the land and this place. Furthermore, it also meant researching the history of Treaty 6. Part of our decolonial practice was honouring oral traditions over written ones and learning specifically about Treaty through Indigenous processes, protocols, stories, and histories. It brought me great joy to witness the Shift Lab collective immerse themselves in Indigenous pedagogy and demonstrated it is absolutely possible for a committed group of settlers and immigrants to learn news ways of understanding the world. It was really beautiful and profound to watch people bring their hearts and minds to this good work.

That said, good work is not easy. Shift Lab 2.0 contains many tensions because Western and Indigenous epistemologies frequently collide. Social innovation is not a tool that comes from an Indigenous cultural group; it’s a communitydriven application of a mostly Western philosophy for making systems change. Social innovation is a lens we can look through to clearly see the systems that have and continue to cause harm to Indigenous peoples. It is a tool to leverage systemic change. It won’t do everything, it can’t do everything, but it certainly supports us in the big work ahead. This commitment to exploring where these divergent worldviews intersect forms the foundation of our Triple Helix methodology.

So many of the practices and foundations of social innovation align with indigenous epistemologies. Social innovation is a practice that is flexible, adaptable and a change-making process that in many ways will support our communities’ and nations’ needs. As we untangle complex issues such as child and family services, or address the needs of nations like constitution building, or ask ourselves how might we create a fully immersive school system rooted in the land, a social innovation lab is a way in which we could come together and explore the magnitude of where we are now, how we got here, and what we will need to move forward.

Social Innovation for Indigenous People

Given the impacts, the residue and the reality of surviving genocide, I see social innovation as an important tool in the reparation of our customary laws, our languages, our kinship practices, and our cultural traditions. Social innovation is a process that is accessible, it’s safe, and it’s smart, it makes sense. So many of the practices and foundations of social innovation align with indigenous epistemologies. Social innovation is a practice that is flexible, adaptable and a change-making process that in many ways will support our communities’ and nations’ needs. As we untangle complex issues such as child and family services, or address nations’s needs like constitution building, or ask ourselves how might we create a fully immersive school system rooted in the land, a social innovation lab is a way in which we could come together and explore the magnitude of where we are now, how we got here, and what we will need to move forward.

Guiding Principles

Make the Space

ohcitaw ispihteyihtakwan kanitotamak kawîcihikawiyahk kîspin ispayin ita emâkweimoyahk ekwa namoya nân’taw anima, kawîcihikawiyahk.

Part of the work of running Shift Lab was creating both a safe space to detoxify racism as well as processes to release it. What was observed in our Lab is the need for familiar cultural items that create an ambiance of safety. We called these mnemonic devices that remind folks of who they are and where they come from. They are visual cues from Indigenous epistemologies. Indigenous people are surrounded by Western visual cues everywhere; by disrupting these tacit colonial symbols, we created a balance of power.

Whether we’re doing work in a lodge, a big house, a longhouse, in a tipi, a classroom, an Action Lab, or by the riverbank, it’s important we all feel safe and have identifiers to remind us we belong there. How can we create a lab space that supports Indigenous nationhood, the feeling of cultural safety, the complexity of our nations and our spirituality? It’s really important to know the people in the lab, where they come from, symbols of safety for them and how can we put those symbols up in a way that’s honorable, respectful, with authenticity, that doesn’t take away from the intent of that actual object. So, it’s a bit of a juggling act. You need to be practical, but it’s about being mindful of each person who we’re going to do work with so that we can create a healthy, nourishing space that allows folks to do the heavy work that they’re going to do.

For example, to begin our Lab we feasted together and engaged in Indigenous protocol of self-location. This meant every individual disclosed where they come from, who their relatives are, and what their obligations and responsibilities are. Following this, we divided the collective into four teams. These four teams explored how they might create a charter to show up, create a safe space, and have the ability to challenge and disagree with respect and kindness. On top of the team charters, we co-created principles for the whole lab.

We also had guiding circles that centred Indigenous wisdom and had conversations around race, dynamics and trauma that lab work can uncover or trigger.

To My Relatives

ekîpemayitôtâkawiyahk ekwa namoya nân’taw kîspin kotak awiyak kawâpahtahk ehisiĥayimiyahk ekwa kâkîcihikoyahk kesi pasikôyahk.

To care for one another in this space, we have to understand some things. Indigenous peoples are on a continuum of perpetual grieving. Our lives are embedded in racism. Part of the Indigenous reality is that our world, our understanding of it and relation to it, is often very different to those who visit us in it. There is also the legacy of Indian residential schools in our communities, particularly in Alberta where we had more schools than any other province.

This has created a legacy of intergenerational trauma. In this space it is important to listen to our own bodies but also be mindful of the folks we were sitting with and to watch their bodies, too. Our bodies physiologically respond to what we’re feeling, emotionally. When we see our colleagues start to shut down or become hostile or emotional, we need to allow for that process of grieving. Because of the horrific trauma experienced by many of our relations, talking about, being a part of groups working on issues such as racism can be incredibly triggering and make our wounds feel raw and exposed — as well as remind us of our painful childhoods and family. So, we as Indigenous people have to be cognizant of our own shit. We have to know ourselves, intimately accept ourselves, and be willing to move with our woundedness with gentleness, with kindness, with compassion. It’s okay that we have deep sadness, anger, frustration. It’s okay we feel hopeless. So much of our reality is all of those things. This reality of surviving genocide is a painful one. Many of us, since the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, are starting to unravel the legacy of the impacts on our families, our parents and within ourselves. However, we are the answers to our ancestor’s prayers. We are living miracles. Working from a harm reduction model is the most important thing we can do with our young people because of this history, trauma and pain. Part of that is also community care. What are the ways we are caring for our elders? Caring for our young people? How do we create community care so that we’re part of a circle, so that we belong, and so that reciprocity of giving love and accepting love becomes a common practice in our lives?

It’s also important to recognize if we bring in elders or guest speakers or folks who are experts in the area, on the flip side, what are images that are triggering and might remind us of the Indian Residential School particularly, so that we are not causing more harm to folks. Always keeping peoples’ wellbeing and safety at the forefront. Having conversations with people before bringing them in. Is there anything that you need to feel safe? How can I make this space supportive of your journey as we walk together through some horrific things. Generally, people will tell you, but we have to make the time to ask and then do the things that people have asked us to do for them.

Recognize Expertise

* kamamihceyihtamak kimekosiwininawa ekwa kamâtinamâkeyahk ekwa ohcitaw piko kwayask katipahamakawiyahk ewako ohci.

Indigenous peoples need to be brought along as equals. We can’t co-create solutions if we’re not there talking about the solutions together with you. We have a history of folks creating policy, programs, for us and about us as Indigenous people to solve our problems without us being a part of articulating what is the actual problem we’re trying to solve. So, it was my colleagues and the Indigenous experts that we brought in and who shared their expertise that helped formulate and guide the direction in which our collective would move forward. As part of running a lab, it’s critical that you draw on community experts who are already making systemic change, who are already leading initiatives from an Indigenous worldview and paradigm. They are the lead changemakers doing the work in the trenches. Make sure you’re honouring and lifting their work, their way of doing things, to co-create something together.

Indigenous advisors and knowledge sharers

Fill the Cup

Each one of my colleagues took on the burden of extra work of mine. They would create drafts and other things. They were aware my reading and writing skills are low. They would take the time to have a conversation about how to support. They were always doing the background work. They listened and then wrote my parts and we would talk it through to get it right. If it was a presentation, I would have a co-presenter to co-steward. It was managing the responsibilities. A lot of my workload was going onto them because I was managing the kinship obligations. Because the Shift Lab came to the reserve and invited people in, my colleagues also got to see my kinship responsibilities.

Being a relative is like trying to live two worlds at once. If wood needs to be cut, if feast food needs to be made, if someone needs transportation, you have to do it. The burden of the work in our communities is very heavy because the social ills are prominent. My time and energy go to supporting many people. The big idea is to fill my cup so that I can come to do this work with room to give. Others were able to explain the settler perspective to settlers, rather than me. That lifted my burden. My colleagues gave me the space to explore with my family what it might be that we were missing. My colleagues were used to having a very organized, formalized approach; I was like ‘We need a pipe ceremony’. They supported my intuition, my Indigenous wisdom. They didn’t know that I would know berry picking would help people. Berry picking is an intentional exercise of kinship responsibilities and it is part of property rights and entitlement, governance, and connection to the land. On one of our retreats in my community, I suggested berry picking as a way to emotionally ground everyone and connect.

In many of our worlds we often have very clear, linear lines around our colleagues. You go through 9-5, you talk through email. In our worldview, though, you become a relative. My colleagues adapted and became a relative. They cared for me like a relative.

Get in There

For non-Indigenous people, part of the work is being able to physically connect with each other’s worldviews. We’re rooted in one way of being. Taking the time to explain and experience a non-Western worldview was game-changing for us. You have to go out to a reserve and experience a sweat lodge. We talked and talked theory. But when my non-Indigenous colleagues sat in the sweat lodge, it clicked. It was this profound moment that this is actually different. That was paramount. The place and space. It’s not just theoretical. It’s immersive.

kinwes kanohcihtânaw , sâkihitowin, ekwa miywâyawin kâwe kwayask kesipimâcihoyahk ewako anima miyohayâwin asci.

It’s going to take us a lot of time, love, and energy to get us into a place of living together in a better place.

ispihteyihtakwan ohcitaw kâpacihtâyahk kipîkiskwewininawa. Using languages is important

Top and bottom: Berry picking during the fourth lab sprint