First Voices

An Aboriginal Women's Reader

Patricia A. Monture, Patricia D. Mcguire

• Publisher: Inanna Publications
• Year: 2012
• Print ISBN: 9780980882292
• eBook ISBN: 9781926708423
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Native American Studies
• Index: Social Sciences

A collection of articles that examine many of the struggles that Aboriginal women have faced, and continue to face, in Canada. Sections include: Profiles of Aboriginal Women; Identity; Territory; Activism; Confronting Colonialism; the Canadian Legal System; and Indigenous Knowledges. Photographs and poetry are also included. "This volume brings us the stories of wisdom keepers and artists, academics and activists, the women who have carried us, and the women who have fought for our freedom, who are working in different ways to bring about justice and healing for our people and our land. It is a work of love, and of great beauty." —Bonita Lawrence, author of "Real" Indians and Others: Mixed-Blood Urban Native People and Indigenous Nationhood.

ACTIVISM

MONIQUE MOJICA

AN INVOCATION/INCANTATION TO THE
WOMEN WORD-WARRIORS FOR CUSTOM-MADE SHOES

International Women’s Day 1989

No, I didn’t go to the march

feelings of ambivalence,

rage

time to free up some fury

unstick some spit and piss and vinegar

place them in a sacred manner

around me

unearthed unshrouded

Because even our rage must be given its due respect.

It’s International Women’s Day.

A Black voice echoes:

Ain’ t I a woman?

… unanswered.

time to roll up the chunks of hurt

resentment/rejection

like so much mucus

congested accumulated

Over the decades of trying to fit into feminist shoes.

O.K., I’m trying on the shoes; but they’re not the same

as the shoes in the display case. The shoes I’m trying

on must be crafted to fit these wide, square brown

feet. I must be able to feel the earth through their soles.

So, it’s International Women’s Day, and here I am among

the women of the theatre community — my community.

Now, I’d like you to take a good look — I don’t want to

be mistaken for a crowd of Native women. I am one. And

I do not represent all Native women. I am one.

And since it can get kinda lonely up here, I’ve brought

some friends, sisters, guerrilleras — the women word-warriors,1

to help fill up the space.

I’ve brought Chrystos to tell you that:

“I am not your princess…

I am only willing to tell you how to make frybread

1 cup flour, spoon of salt, spoon of baking powder

Stir Add milk or water or beer until it holds together

Slap piece into rounds Let rest

Fry in hot grease until golden.” 2

I’ve brought Cherrie to let you know that:

“…the concept of betraying one’s race through

sex and sexual politics is as common as corn.” 3

I’ve asked Gloria to come to say:

What I want is an accounting with all three

cultures — white, Mexican, Indian. I want the freedom

to carve and chisel my own face, to

staunch the bleeding with ashes, to fashion my own

gods out of my entrails. And if going home is

denied me, then I will have to stand and claim my

space, making a new culture — una cultura mestiza —

with my own lumber, my own bricks and mortar and

my own feminist architecture.

I’ve brought Diane to describe that to hold a brown- skinned lover means:

“We embrace and rub

the wounds together.”

She also says:

“This ain’t no stoic look.

This is my face.” 4

There is a Cheyenne saying that:

A Nation is not conquered

Until the hearts

of its women

are on the ground.

I dedicate my presence here tonight to my two sons; to

Bear who is here on the earth with me and to

Yocallwarawara who has passed over to the other side.

I thank them for the gifts and the teachings they have brought me.

It is for them, and for the unborn generations that I am here

wearing shoes that have not yet molded to my feet and

asking Lillian5 to set a place for me at her tea party.

A Nation is not conquered

Until the hearts

of its women

are on the ground.

Nya weh —

Nuedi

This monologue was written for hosting Fern-Cab, the Five-Minute Feminist Cabaret, March 1989.

Originally published in Canadian Woman Studies/les cahiers de la femme, “Native Women,” 10 (2 & 3) (Summer/Fall 1989): 40. Reprinted with permission of the author.

Monique Mojica is an actor and published playwright from the Kuna and Rappahannock nations. Her play “Princess Pocahontas and the Blue Spots” was produced by Nightwood Theatre and Theatre Passe Muraille in 1990, on radio by CBC and published by Women’s Press in 1991. She is the co-editor, with Ric Knowles, of Staging Coyote’s Dream: An Anthology of First Nations Drama in English, Vols. I & II (Playwrights Canada Press). Monique is a long-time collaborator with Floyd Favel on various research and performance projects investigating Native Performance Culture. She was also he Artist in Residence for American Indian Studies at the University of Illinois in Spring 2008. She continues to explore art as healing, as an act of reclaiming historical/cultural memory and as an act of resistance.

1From Paula Gunn Allen, The Sacred Hoop, Beacon Press, 1986.

2Chrystos, from Not Vanishing, Press Gang, 1988.

3Cherríe Moraga, from Loving in the War Years, South End Press, 1983.

4Diane Burns, from Riding the one-eyed Ford, Contact II Publications, 1981.

5See Lillian Allen’s album, Revolutionary Tea Party.

LYNN M. MEADOWS, WILFREDA E. THURSTON AND LAURA E. LAGENDYK

ABORIGINAL WOMEN AT MIDLIFE

Grandmothers as Agents of Change

ABORIGINAL WOMEN PLAY A vital role in the health of their communities and families as mothers, workers, and community leaders (Health Canada). Yet, in spite of that growing body of knowledge at a population health level, the local contexts and causality of health disparities that affect the day-to-day well-being of Aboriginal women in this population are under-researched and poorly understood. While there is no lack of documentation on the multiple oppressions experienced by Aboriginal people and the effect of those oppressions on health and well-being (Romanow; Stout and Kipling; Tjepkema; Young; Cardinal, Schopflocher, Svenson, Morrison, and Laing), as well as on the particular vulnerabilities of Aboriginal women who have high rates of multiple risk factors including poverty, violence and substance abuse (Colman; Romanow; Stout, Kipling, and Stout), strategies for advocacy and action to improve Aboriginal women’s health continue to lack the relevancy and community grounding needed to remedy the current situation (Thurston and Potvin). Including Aboriginal perspectives about the underlying factors that affect their health, such as social context (e.g., racism and socio-economic differences), are critical (Ellerby, McKenzie, McKay, Gariépy, and Kaufert; O’Neil, Reading, and Leader) but often overlooked (Young) as plans for health interventions or community programs are developed. Furthermore, women’s perspectives may also be overlooked if a gendered analysis and inclusion of women is not deliberate (Deiter and Otway; Dickson; Gittelsohn et al.; Sayers and MacDonald; Anderson).

Our study of midlife Aboriginal women thus focused on the question, “What are the mechanisms through which health determinants affect women’s day-to-day experiences of well-being?” We sought women’s narratives that described their health and the life circumstances that affected it, and wanted to provide an opportunity for descriptions of a holistic view of health focused on physical, spiritual, and emotional well-being (Svenson and Lafontaine). In our study of over 40 women in several Aboriginal communities, there is evidence to suggest that women who focus on the future for either themselves or their grandchildren may be change agents that help improve health not only for themselves but for their families and communities as well.

This qualitative study used elements from ethnography (Creswell) to explore Aboriginal women’s experiences and perceptions of health and well-being at midlife, defined in our program of research as ages 40 through 65 years. The Conjoint Health Research Ethics Board at the University of Calgary granted approval for the research. Techniques to enhance the rigor of the study included methodological congruence and methodological purposiveness (Meadows, Verdi, and Crabtree; Morse and Richard). Strategies of ensuring validity included situating the study in the literature, bracketing, sampling strategies, and methodological cohesion (Meadows and Morse; Meadows, Verdi, and Crabtree; Patton).

In each location in which we spoke with women, permission for data collection was obtained through a process of community engagement and review by the appropriate authorities (Meadows, Lagendyk, Thurston, and Eisener). Purposive sampling was used to include women both on and off reserves, in rural and urban areas (Kuzel) with potential participants identified using multiple strategies (Meadows, Lagendyk, Thurston, and Eisener) such as attending health fairs, snowball sampling (Kuzel) and opportunistic encounters. Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal interviewers were employed to conduct the group and individual interviews using an interview guide that was revised as new issues arose or contexts differed. Where possible, interviews were audio recorded with permission of the participants, and transcribed verbatim. Textual data were read into a qualitative analytic software program (QSRN6®) to aid in data summary, management and analysis (Meadows and Dodendorf). The multidisciplinary research team met frequently to discuss the analysis, contributing to within-project validation (Denzin; Kuzel and Like; Lincoln and Guba; Meadows and Morse). Data analysis and interpretation progressed through a number of stages: immersion/crystallization to identify general issues and topics (Borkan; Crabtree and Miller 1999a); identification of relationships and the contingencies that affected them among identified areas; and further examination for alternative interpretations, to reconcile discrepancies, and situate interpretation in the literature (Borkan; Crabtree and Miller 1999b; Meadows, Verdi, and Crabtree).

The data used in this analysis were collected in group, focus group, and individual interviews conducted in English with over 40 women who lived in a variety of locations including on reserves and in urban or rural areas throughout Alberta. We found that women’s discussion of health and wellness, consistent with existing data, was not always merely individual but connected to their community and their family (Meadows, ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Epigraph
• Contents
• Acknowledgements
• Introduction
• PROFILES OF ABORIGINAL WOMEN
• IDENTITY
• TERRITORY
• ACTIVISM
• CONFRONTING COLONIALISM
• CONFRONTING THE CANADIAN LEGAL SYSTEM
• INDIGENOUS KNOWLEDGES
• Conclusion
• Photo Credits
• Index