Category Archives: MODULE 4

M4 P2: We Can Tell Our Own History, We Can Tell Our Own Future

In this journal article, Chris Lalonde highlights the work of Hip Hop artist Quese IMC, an Indigenous rapper with a strong footing in political lyricism. What drew me to this article was that Lalonde writes at length about how Quese uses sampling to make political statements. This is is an important piece of the puzzle for my final project for this course. I have read many articles about how Hip Hop is used by Indigenous artists to promote decolonization, I have also read a lot about how Indigenous youth are affected by Hip Hop, specifically Hip Hop that discusses issues they are dealing with. What I am now starting to look for is more specifically how indigenous artists are using technology to promote these ideas. For example, Quese has a song called “Mad” where he samples an angry voice mail message from his father, who was an alcoholic and had issues with rage. as Lalonde points out:

“Mad,” is a message from his father. In that song and elsewhere, Quese chronicles the hard truth of his father’s struggleswith alcohol, with the rage that would boil up at times when a twelve pack would not cause everything to “just fade away.”

Furthermore:

The father’s recorded voice in “Mad” needs to be situated as part of the song’s foregrounding of and emphasis on media and recording technologies. The song begins in the studio, with Quese checking the microphone and asking for more volume in his headphones. The stress on amplification gives way as the conversation continues to an explanation of the song that
Quese, the producer, and the engineer are about to record. However, we only hear Quese’s side of the conversation. As such, the opening of “Mad” serves to highlight presence and absence and how technology can mediate both.

This article has helped me thing about how technology, Hip Hop, and indigenous issues merge. It will be a great source for my final project.

Click the image below to access the article

LaLONDE, C., & CHRIS LaLONDE. (02/01/2015). Mediating indianness Michigan State University Press.

M4: P2 It will look different at every school

I really appreciated this video created by the Yukon School District sharing how even though they use the BC Curriculum they are incorporating Yukon First Nations perspectives into their schools and that the content and approach will look different from school to school.

Exploring best practices and place-based specific practices is important to creating respectful cultural engagement.

M4: P1: Invite parents to be partners

Throughout this course there has been the important call to action to work not only with students but with the community. Cultivating place-based curriculum weaves many Indigenous knowledge and teaching best practices into learning. The challenge is how to build open communication with parents and families so that even if schedules and commitments prevent them from being in attendance that the are always part of the larger conversation and actively engaged in goals and outcomes.

These 10 things to consider when building relationships with family or parents are a helpful way of reflecting on what barriers could prevent that from being successful. This has important implications for decolonizing schools in communities as well.

https://www.gettingsmart.com/2019/10/10-strategies-for-schools-to-improve-parent-engagement/

M4 P1: Revolutionizing Environmental Education through Indigenous Hip Hop Culture

In this 2012 study, researchers of Environmental Education look to make a connection between Indigenous Hip Hop and the potential for Environmental Education. In doing so, they interviewed 6 members of the Beat Nation Indigenous Hip Hop collective (North America). The general theme of the article was that Hip Hop gives voice to Indigenous Youth, which enables them to discuss issues happening in their communities. As a form of literacy, Hip Hop can be used as a way to reignite students interest in their native languages. The artists also make an argument that this form of expression has the ability to disrupt colonial and neo-colonial societal patterns which are prevelant both in the education system and in North America at large. This disruption, through rap lyrics, can help ignite more discussion about Environmental Issues that Indigenous communities are engaged in (ie pipelines.)

Click below for a link to the article:

Gorlewski, Julie. “Revolutionizing Environmental Education through Indigenous Hip Hop Culture.” Canadian Journal of Environmental Educators, vol. 17, 2012, pp. 46–61.

A perspective on Hegemony

Module 4, Entry 4

Tyler Ohashi

While investigating how Indigenous culture is affected by hegemony, I came across this paper by Frank Deer from the University of Manitoba. This paper aligns well with the concepts we are discussing in ETEC 521. This paper discusses how the ideas of people at any age are the ideas that align with the ruling class (Western view). Other useful topics in this paper include:

how colonization resulted in the “Europeanization” of Indigenous people and the role education (schools) played in this process.
an interesting dilemma about trying to construct a national identity that reflects Canada due to Canada being so diverse.
how immersion in Western (Eurocentric) society can make developing a sense of identity tricky
discussions about multiculturalism and how it affects Indigenous identity
how Canadian education has failed to reflect Indigenous identity in its education system, therefore, promoting the ‘status quo’.
how ‘perspective’ can counteract ‘tokenism’

This paper is useful to help understand the effects of a dominant, ruling class can have on other cultures (namely Indigenous culture). It is well cited, well, written paper.

M4 Entry 5: Moving Forward

Incorporating Indigenous knowledge, traditions and stories into STEM education must be a collective goal, where Elders, parents, students, communities, organizations, educators, schools, and the general public work together to create a culturally responsive and culturally inclusive environment. As education and educational technologies continue to change, the living Indigenous knowledge implementations in the field of education should continue to be evaluated and analyzed. As we saw in course discussions, there have been cases of increased community control over school curriculum that has resulted in a positive change in creating a culturally responsive educational environment. Although this may not be possible in all educational settings, I am confident to say that incorporating the cultural standards in STEM education will be able to create meaningful learning environments for students. The ANKN (1998) guide for culturally responsive schools is a fantastic resource to use as a checklist for achieving this.

Indigenous STEM is a broad avenue and there are many different pedagogical and implementation strategies to plan, design and facilitate Indigenous STEM education. Throughout the course, discussions and my blog posts, I have come to understand that facilitating culturally responsive curriculum and/or instructions is essential in creating an inclusive learning environment. Students should be provided opportunities to explore their cultural values, discuss their perspectives with others, and learn about their community and the local environment and its’ connection to their lives. This way, they can be engaged in meaningful education where the demonstration of learning is a reflection of their identity and their culture. I am hoping that my final project can act as a useful classroom resource and/or provide some guidance for creating a culturally responsive and inclusive classroom for our learners.

I really enjoyed organizing and planning for my final project with blog posts. It was a valuable experience and I also liked reading everyone else’s posts as well. There were a lot of project topics I thought were very interesting and I look forward to seeing everyone’s final projects! Good luck everyone!

References

Alaska Native Knowledge Network (ANKN). (1998, February 3). Alaska standards for culturally-responsive schools. http://ankn.uaf.edu/Publications/culturalstandards.pdf

M4-P3 KAKWITENE VR- Language Revival and Retention

MoniGarr is an Onkwehone XR producer (amongst other titles) who asks a very important question: “As we decolonize, how do we teach and learn Kawkwitene language in a way that can minimize colonial values placed in our language?”

MoniGarr uses Ancient Intelligence (not Artificial Intelligence) to create a virtual garden embeded in the Kakwitene language. The bright colours and flora are meant to replicate the “bright summer garden environment inspired by Iroquois Woodlands Raised Beadwork” (MoniGarr). The user enters the platform and has free navigation, there are no goals or quests to complete (like what can be found in more Western examples of gaming). Instead, one fly’s around almost like an insect onto “colorful pollen spores, which when flown into play audio recordings of Mohawk words. Users can repeat these words back to the VR system and improve their pronunciation” (MoniGarr). Users can repeat the words back through the head piece to work on pronunciation. What is interesting about this project is MoniGarr believe that language revival leads to a healthy way to “heal, overcome negative bias, and share a strong respectful message to All of Creation about each of our identities, values, and connections to our ancestors and homelands since time immemorial” (MoniGarr).

MoniGarr also conducted a small survey and concluded that new language learners were speaking with confidence within 3-7 minutes pers session. MoniGarr hopes that “our Onkwehonwehneha tactics, our source code, and software templates can be re-used by anyone working on similar projects” (MonGarr).

References

MoniGarr. (2020). Kakwitene VR – First Person Scholar. http://www.firstpersonscholar.com/kakwitene-vr/

Greenwood, M.North Country at Work: Akwesasne’s Monica Peters designs virtual worlds. Retrieved from https://www.northcountrypublicradio.org/news/story/39534/20190918/north-country-at-work-akwesasne-s-monica-peters-designs-virtual-worlds

M4: P3 – Spark: The Disappearing Web

The idea of obsolescence and Indigenous knowledge on the web came to me through my last post: Keoni Mahelona and Peter-Lucas Jones on Indigenous Data Sovereignty. In that interview Jones and Mahelona explain that if the medium through which a language is stored is lost, then part of the culture is lost with it. In this episode of Spark, Young (2021) explores how previous forms of print material are available to historians, but digital data is pervasively disappearing from the web. This is, of course, a dire predicament when it comes to storing Indigenous knowledge through online platforms.

Reference

Young, N. (Host). (2021, June 10). Disappearing web. [Audio podcast episode]. In Spark. CBC.

M4: Entry 4 – Beyond Territorial acknowledgments

Chelsea Vowel is a Métis language instructor at the University of Alberta. In her blog – âpihtawikosisân – which is the Cree work for Métis, she writes about Indigenous issues from a Métis perspective. One section of her website titled Indigenous Issues 101 has multiple resources related to Myths or Misunderstandings (articles include: An Explanation of Indian Status and The wandering nomad myth) and Historic and Continuing Injustice (articles include: First Nations farming in the Prairies and High Arctic Relocations).

In a blog post from 2016, Beyond territorial acknowledgments, she addresses the purpose, best practices and going beyond the territorial or land acknowledgment. She believes they can be transformative only if they cause discomfort for the audience and speaker. They need to address “what needs to be done once we’re ‘aware of Indigenous presence’. It requires that we remain uncomfortable, and it means making concrete, disruptive change.” (Vowel, 2016).

Vowel, Chelsea (âpihtawikosisân). (2016, September 23). Beyond territorial acknowledgments. âpihtawikosisân: Law. Language. Culture [blog]. https://apihtawikosisan.com/2016/09/beyond-territorial-acknowledgments/

M4: Entry 3 – We are all Treaty People

A great resource that could be used in the classroom is the kids magazine – Kayak. It is made by Canada History Foundation, which also publishes an adult version called Canada’s History. They cover a range of topics and include lessons plans suitable for Grades 3-6 or 7-12 for each edition.

To explore more closely what was gained and lost through Treaties in Canada, I found the September 2018 issue called, We are all Treaty People . It includes a short story called Del’s Truck that tells the story of a truck that was taken and sold by someone that was not the owner because they claimed they found it with the keys in it. It was written to illustrate issues with land claims. A short graphic novel, Power to the People, tells the story of the James Bay Hydroelectric Dam in the 1970’s. There are also timelines and articles that explain Canada’s troubled treaty history and how these treaties and unceded land across the country continue to shape our future.

Canada’s History Society. (2018, August 22). We are all Treaty People. https://www.canadashistory.ca/explore/in-this-issue/we-are-all-treaty-people