Carolyn Roberts is a Coast Salish woman from the Squamish Nation in North Vancouver, British Columbia. I had the privilege to listen to Carolyn Roberts speak at a district professional development workshop this year, she is an articulate speaker and is passionate about Indigenous education. The video below was her presentation at the TEDxLangleyED event, where she speaks about her own experiences and the responsibilities of all Canadian citizens in Indigenous rights. We all have to help with reconciliation and work to right the injustice from the past that continues today.
As Roberts (2013) said it in her presentation, “in order for us to move forward in reconciliation, we need to be able to move forward side by side, not one someone in front, not someone behind, but together side by side”.
Ways to move reconciliation forward as Canadians (Roberts, 2018),
- Learn about the territory where you live and work. Where is their community, what languages do you speak, and how can you give back to them.
- Educate ourselves about land claims and treaties in place, what does it mean for us? What does it mean to them?
- “It is education that got us into this mess, it will be education that gets us out of this mess” – Hon. Murray Sinclair as quoted by Roberts (2018)
Additional resources from Carolyn Roberts:
wanna be an ally? https://youtu.be/zk7bnaf8dus
https://www.carolynroberts.net/
References
Roberts, C. (2018) Reconciliation in your community. [YouTube, 17 mins]
Thank you Timothy for this invaluable video. I have been been living in Canada for the past seventeen years and unfortunately, I never considered taking a trip far back in history to understand Roberts (2013) insights: With no power to influence the education of their children, Indigenous families were forced by the Canadian government to adopt a new system of knowledge transference that was completely in contrast to their own worldview and philosophy. Youth were often forcibly taken from the direct care of their families into an environment of of oppression, assimilation of even physical destruction.
After watching Roberts (2013), I asked my children, unlike me, they are born, raised, and educated in Canada: “Whose territory do we live in? What language do they speak?” They had not given me an answer that relates.