Endayang

Change is in the air.

My tiny corner of the Internet (or locker, maybe?) has been quiet lately. Between my full-time university job, teaching a college course, and trying to maintain some semblance of a personal life, I haven't had time to think about much other than the immediate tasks at hand.

I think maybe this is the framework that has allowed this new idea to grow.

What's the idea? It's radical. Dare I say, crazy. Really, really... really out there.

I want to go home (ni-endayang).

There is sort of a perfect storm of events that have recently occurred that have made space in my mind and my life for this idea to form:

1. My Chief's Talk: A couple of weeks ago, my Chief, Gilbert Whiteduck, was speaking at a conference I was at. One of the things he talked about is how people have always told him throughout his career: "Baby steps. Stepping stones are important. We'll get there." While no one would deny that all of these small changes connect to one another to formulate something great, Gilbert says: "What we need now are leaps and bounds. Our people are in too dire of a state for baby steps." And I couldn't agree more. I love the work I do and I believe in it. But it's not a leap or a bound. On a more cerebral level (and I'm not sure how well this will translate to a blog), he described an experience returning our ancestors to the land and what it means to just be in the community; and, all throughout his talk, the words that kept running through my mind were: "I have to go home. I have to go home. I have to go home."
2. Red Man Laughing: I just finished listening to the Red Man Laughing podcast featured chat with Mskwaankwad Rice, who talks about his decision to leave behind his life in Ottawa and move back home to his community, sit with his grandmother, and learn his language. The simple facts of his story got me excited; if he could make this decision and move from Ottawa (the same city I'm in now!), maybe I could, too? Just maybe? They had a really thought-provoking discussion about our generation and how we're basically writing our own rules. We're in a unique position as Anishinabe youth/young people living in the world today and, in some sense, no one has written the guidebook on or beaten the path that determines how to live as Anishinabeg youth in the wake of the acts of genocide committed directly against our grandparents' generation and the impacts its had on our parents' generation.
3. My Career Path:  While I cannot overstate how much I care about the work I'm doing right now in the university, I know that this work is not my final stop on my career path. My career goal is to become a professor and contribute to the growth of the field of Indigenous Studies. But, over the past week something has become crystal clear to me: My education is imbalanced. I've learned a lot about the history of colonization in this country, critical perspectives of Canada, and the impacts its had on our people. That's important, but after teaching these perspectives to my college class this fall, I've realized that it's only one side of the story. What I'm missing in my "repertoire" (a career-focused way to say self-actualization) is the knowledge and education that exists only in my family, my community and amongst the Anishinabeg: our family stories, our language, our ceremonies, our community history, our ways of knowing the world. I can't be the kind of professor I want to be or make the changes I want to make without this education from my own family and people.

Something has happened within me and it's happened quickly. That's not to say I'm going to be quitting my job and making a Musky-esk change tomorrow. But I'm closer than ever to believing I could do it.

I've always had this goal to learn my language before I have children so I can pass it on. What have I been doing about it? Not much. I've been "talking the talk." I need to, in the words of Ryan McMahon, "walk the talk." I've always thought I wanted to give my future children the opportunity to grow up on a reserve because, although it comes with all of its complexities, it brings with it a love that no Anishinabe child should be denied of. No matter these goals, I was always immediately struck down with stress afterward, wondering, How? How do I make this happen? After having lived in the city for so long, gotten my degrees, secured a good job, and started a life with an amazing partner, the possibility of going home seemed to move further and further away until it was nearly insurmountable.

I can't explain the change in me, but on Saturday morning it was suddenly like all of these barriers had been lifted for a moment. And, luckily, I am still in that moment. So maybe it's not "a moment" after all? I suddenly realized (and this is a deliberate pun, since I'm watching the US presidential election as I type) that yes. I. can. I can leave my amazing job if I want to. I can give up my apartment if I want to. I can go home if I want to.

And guess what? I want to.

A Response to Prof. Doomsday & Where are the Sheep?

Don't you just hate it when you put your heart and soul into writing something, only to have your computer crash before it saves or to have Blogger tell you it cannot complete your request and when you hit the 'Back' button it's gone?

Yeah, me too.

I was just reading the blog post 'The Mythological Indian' over on Where are the Sheep?, and it was totally provoking my thoughts. I started typing my comment, and I entered into one of those writing modes where the words just flow out of you and appear perfect on the page (you know, those ones that are impossible to recreate?).

Rather than slamming my head on the desk and declaring myself done for the day, I decided to pull up my socks and write my own blog post in response to Robert's.

One particular paragraph in 'The Mythological Indian' ignited a small fire within me:

It is true that the stripping away of language and culture has had a devastating effect on Aboriginal peoples that will continue to have repercussions for generations to come. It has had a negative effect on my family; I do not speak the language or practice much of the cultural traditions. I do not consider myself to be less than another Aboriginal person however. I know who I am, where I come from and I am still learning what I am capable of and where I might be able to take it, were I permitted the space and trust to do so.

I'll never forget the words of an Irish anthropology professor I had in my undergrad who was teaching a course on 'Aboriginal History in Canada' (or some variant of it). The day's lesson was on language, with an apocalyptic focus on Indigenous languages and their demise.

"It's a well-known fact and proven in history," he began (and you know professors always tell the truth), "that when a language dies, the culture and the people follow."

Never in my life had a single statement instilled so much fear in me!

Of course, me being maybe 21 at the time and him being a professor, I took his words as absolute fact (and, to top it off, he prefaced his statement by citing it as fact).

But these days, I'm beginning to wonder...

I understand the importance of our language. I am faced with it oftentimes when I ask my grandmother the meaning of a word in Algonquin and she pauses, squints her eyes closed for a strained moment, then answers me in a paragraph in English. There are so many cultural nuances contained in our languages that only the Elders understand. My grandmother speaks the old Algonquin, always the second term in the English-Algonquin dictionary, not the new one which I suspect is influenced by Ojibway.

I am fortunate enough to have opportunities to learn my language, if only I make the time to take advantage of them. But what if I don't? And what if my children don't? And my children's children? And then my community? Does that mean we will cease to exist as Algonquin, as Anishinabe?

I hope NOT!

If we acknowledge that our people and our cultures are not static and capable of "death"; if we understand that our people and our cultures will grow, transform and flourish; if we use the English (or French or other) language in our own ways; if we take so-called "western" concepts and traditions, and meld them with our own to form something new...

...if we do all of that, then we will always be here.