There was a time where I would have been silenced, but today I make noise for myself, for my peers and for my ancestors before me. Like many people who are considered as minorities or intersectionality-oppressed individuals, speaking our truth can feel far too vulnerable to share in the pressures of the public. The internet has created an accessible space for our voices, so in response, we “flood the feed”. I welcome you to that space, where I will be writing and curating stories of intersecting national and personal identity. Thank you for respecting, and most of all, listening.
This course is an opportunity to explore the multitude of voices which make up a “contemporary” Canada, through considering the stories that were hushed or forgotten. Canada’s colonial history has become the most dominant within our school system, as well as the literary canon. Despite the hegemonic power of western literary practice, counter-narratives exist. Through this course, we will hear a contrast of voices, and consider the voices that we don’t hear, and with these observations, we will contribute to “change”.
With the rise of blog culture and the rise of tech-literacy, people of all different backgrounds and demographics are gaining access to the online world. It’s a space where freedom of opinion can be exercised and dialogue can be provoked. With a focus on our weekly blogs, I hope to start a practice of both sharing my voice, while listening to others, through an online social and artistic network.
On this unceded land, we enter a world of a necessary unveiling of truth. We have the power to create a new canon, with voices of all octaves, tones, and expressions. So with that being said, I am ready to listen, learn, and plant seeds, and I hope you are too.
Keep on flooding the feed,
Lexi (Swamp Mama)
**Check out what Chimimandra Ngozi Adichie has to say about story, the canon, and the freedom of writing for people like herself. Once you’ve listened to her inspiring flow, take a look at the link I included bellow about the Nationwide protests against the LNG pipeline. This article updates us on the indigenous and allied voices across Canada in response to the the RCMP raid of the Unist’oten blockade.
Thousands rally in cities across Canada in support of Unist’ot’en and Gidimt’en
Works Cited
Adichie, Chimamanda Ngozi. TED, TEDGlobal, 2009, www.ted.com/talks/chimamanda_adichie_the_danger_of_a_single_story?fbclid=IwAR1H1cSWVUTqmkAc0BtY8wvJ1Ru1kPJklGaPQxUEsF05bnCekzg1peS9zls.
Brake , Justin. “Thousands Rally in Cities across Canada in Support of Unist’Ot’En and Gidimt’En.” APTN National News , 9 Jan. 2019.
Hi Lexi,
It was a pleasure to read your perspective. I want to preface my response by saying I am relatively new to consciously trying to learn more about indigenous and minority stories, so please do correct me if anything comes across in a negative way that was not intended. I am eager to learn more.
Thank you for linking Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s fascinating talk; I was particularly struck by the way she used her own experience of assuming and mentally limiting what she expected her family’s helper’s family to be capable of based on their poverty to the discrimination she faced from her own roommate, both providing examples of the commonplace ways our prejudices can corrupt our capacity to see others as fully capable, complex people and using her own story of stereotyping and being stereotyped to demonstrate the possibility of an individual to both face oppression and be oppressed. She uses her voice and storytelling to guide the audience through her own emotional growth without ever explicitly teaching in these moments, bringing them into her own experience as collaborators.
The danger of a “Single Story” strikes me in relation to how Canadians have traditionally thought of and worked with Indigenous populations; I grew up in a suburb near First Nations territory, and have memories of my older, white neighbours commenting and complaining when that community decided to build a casino. The rhetoric with which they spoke of Indigenous peoples was dismissive, toxic, and simplistic: they were drunks, gamblers, and we were subsidizing them — only to have it “wasted” on a casino, which would “inconvenience us” with increased traffic. They failed to recognize the legacies of trauma and discrimination in these communities, but they also failed to recognize the community’s efforts to rebuild. That casino provided steady incomes; its proceeds helped fund cultural programs and projects developed by that community, and it helped the community provide opportunities for its youth. Chimamanda Adichie’s lesson on empathy developed through storytelling makes me wonder at the possibility and power presented through storytelling. As you said, the rise in technology presents opportunities for individual storytelling that did not previously exist, and to challenge this single-storytelling. Thank you for contributing your voice to this goal; I look forwards to listening to more from you. I would love to hear your opinion on how individuals can use multimedia storytelling to enhance empathy and to provide complex narratives, and which media forms you believe are most promising in this realm. How can multimedia storytelling act as empowerment? How can it create conversations through distance that engage empathy without face to face communication? What complications arise in wanting to tell a complex story and raise awareness of cultural traumas and discrimination without reinforcing the simplistic “pity” response of which Adichie speaks? How can we make this storytelling process more collaborative, instead of divisive?
Hey Charlotte! Wow, great speculations, You seriously inspired further thought that I had not already considered. I feel like in attempts to tell narrative, some really great mediums would be blogs and videos shared through facebook and even twitter! In regards to emphathy, I feel like Instagram might be a good space, using tags to help produce a network of people who can relate or learn about each other. These are great questions. I’m going to make it my challenge to use these social media avenues to practice what I preach! Thank you !!
Lexi
Hi Lexi,
Thanks so much for your introduction post. First off, I would like to say that I appreciated you saying that, as a minority, speaking your truth can be “too vulnerable to share in the pressures of the public”. I think this is something that I do not always take into consideration, and it was a good reminder for me as we start of this semester. For many of the stories and pieces that we will be reading, it was an act of vulnerability on the part of the author, and that needs to be appreciated and respected.
As well, you described literature in Canada’s school system as being dominated by Canada’s colonial history.I would argue that it is not Canada’s colonial history which dominates our literature – in fact, I think that would be a step in a positive direction (at least, compared to the education I received here in B.C.). I think Canada prefers to ignore that history, and instead our school’s choose to focus on literature that actually comes from those historically colonial powers. So much of the literature studied in school systems originates in European countries, and our schools naturally deviate towards these safer choices. I can easily name countless authors from England alone, such as Shakespeare, Bronte, Dickens, Austen, Orwell and Woolf, to name a few, who were frequently talked of or studied in my high school. I was so unaware of Indigenous and Canadian colonial history while growing up, and attending a school here in B.C.
That being said, I think what you spoke about, regarding the multitude of unheard voices is incredibly relevant and important. Our school systems are a long way from where they need to be, and incorporating a variety of differing Canadian authors is a very good start. There are so many unheard narratives.
Thanks again Lexi for your post,
Rachel
Hey Rachel! Thanks for your insights. I feel like we definitely could agree that going forward, there’s a need for the public school system to refashion the curriculum to represent multiple perspectives. It’s so relevant to consider the contents of the canon of which we are taught to be “good literature”. I am grateful we can have dialogue about this, because that means there is room for innovation!
Lexi