A letter to you –

“This program has been designed for Metis individuals who were not brought up close to their traditions as a place for them to begin to learn and to reclaim their culture… to learn about our traditions through our arts.

Chances are, you’ve struggled to deal with…

• Finding meaningful ways to connect with your culture and learn how to incorporate your traditional clothing into your life
• How to find the teachings behind the clothing and traditions of our culture.
• Difficulty finding elders to learn from or even knowing how to approach them.
• Feeling awkward wearing traditional regalia (clothing) in your daily life or to special occasions, or maybe even knowing what they are and why they are worn, let lone how to make them for yourself and your little one.
• Not having time to review articles, books and websites to learn about our culture
• Not knowing where to find those articles, books and websites.
• Finding people who still live a traditional lifestyle to learn from.
• Speaking our language, with no one to practice with.

 And, you’ve tried. You’ve started learning, looking for hints. But its honestly not easy. Even joining Facebook groups where people share their thoughts on motherhood and pictures of their beadwork, and still, its just not the connection to our heritage that you’re hoping to find.

Maybe You’re Asking Hard Questions

Should I be digging back into the traditions of the past? Do I have any right to want these teachings? Shouldn’t I have an elder close to me who can teach me these things? What If I don’t have an elder or am far from my nation, am I still allowed to connect with my culture and learn our teachings?

Culture is taught gradually over time by those who are immersed in it. Normally you would be taught as a child by your parents and grandparents, and every interaction with you community beyond your family would reinforce that sense of belonging.

But, families have been broken up. removed from our traditional lands. Their lands taken, dispersed far from our original homes. Children were taken, by residential schools, the 60’s scoop, and by the eventual belief that is perhaps most damaging, that they never really had a culture that was beautiful and unique. Not only that their strong, proud, complex culture was truly not valuable or worthy of pride, but that it never existed. They were simply french, and maybe with a native relative here and there. But they certainly weren’t a nation, and definitely not a culture.

For generations this has been overtly and subtly introduced into the minds of our people, so completely that many families honestly do not know their origins. They go about their lives, hidden in plain sight.

For those who do come, by some mercy, or curse perhaps, to realize this painful past, to see this beautiful culture that was suppressed, made invisible to them, it might be by a curious family member digging in to genealogy records and realizing, there were sure a lot of family members who came from the Red River valley. Or ancestors who carry the name of our large and proud families. Or, who were listed as a halfbreed.

Or maybe its that ever nagging story that has been told in your family…grandma was NOT french. Though she swore until the day she died that she was. Looking back now you can see….she was surviving in a time and place where is was shameful and utterly unsafe to be Metis.

Perhaps like many of us, you grew up knowing your heritage, but not knowing your culture. You can say, with pride even, that you are indigenous. Perhaps it was your parents that discovered your ties, or your grandparents. You know where you come from. And yet, what it means to be Metis, our values, traditions, skills, language and cuisine …those are still mysteries. 

You know you want these teachings and to raise your child with them, so now what?

 Finding and learning our culture takes time. Not just because it requires that you experience it regularly and over time, but because it was hidden so thoroughly in many places, that unless you live in a Metis community, it can be difficult to piece it all together. Little pieces of it wait for you on websites, in archives, in books and at gatherings with elders. You feel it must all be there, and it is.

Like the rest of us, you have school, a family, a career and bills to pay. You’re curious about these people of yours, yes. But, life has a way of continuing, of continuing to place demands on us. 

Finding elders who can share our teachings can be difficult, especially if you don’t live close to your nation. Not to mention awkward…to approach someone you don’t know, and ask for the gift of your culture. And perhaps that’s where shame still lives. Not that you are Metis. You’re proud even if you haven’t fully learned why. But shame that you lost it, that you can’t fully articulate your culture. Perhaps you feel worried you won’t be accepted. That it won’t be a beautiful homecoming. That you will be an outsider. You would turn to your grandmother, but as your family members are not quite sure, or have a hazzy recollection at best of our traditions, or spirituality, our songs and food, you will have to rely on others for this knowledge. So you accept that you’ll accept what you’re able from those who do know their culture.

Perhaps you make an effort to go to the Metis Nation pancake breakfast or an AGM. You know the names of a few people who will be there. But, in the end, these events aren’t designed to teach you to practice your culture. They show it to you, with jigging demonstrations and of course, people wear sashes. But, maybe it still feels a bit alien…beautiful, enticing, but it doesn’t sing within you, though you appreciate it being sung by others.

For some, this is all our proud, beautiful and vivacious culture will ever be, a song sung by others that we can hear and appreciate. Make no mistake, this is an incredible leap forward for a nation and culture that had to hide in their own homeland for generations. To be able to publicly enjoy and watch aspects of our culture is a beautiful thing. A thing to be cherished. 

But that’s not likely why you’re here. It’s about more than being a spectator.

I remember the ache in my heart to know my traditions. I still feel it. Though I’ve been blessed to spend my life piecing it all together, and to have known my heritage my whole life, it has taken time and regular attention. I wanted to feel like I truly belonged. I wanted to feel at home in my culture. For my children to experience it as normal, a part of their everyday. And so, I learned to bead, to make moccasins, I began learning Michif, our language. I learned about our traditional birthing practices, our clothing, our heritage skills that kept our ancestors alive. To jig. To bake dang good bannock. I began to read every book I could. To be honest, I didn’t know there were so many available to me. I began to wear our traditional clothing. It was awkward at first…then I grew to love them and feel at home in them. Finally, when I was ready, I learned about our medicines, our relationship to plants and animals, and our connection to our creator and the teachings that guide us. And I’m still learning.

I would guess, this is why you’re here. You want to feel connected in some or all of these ways. And so I say to you, Taanishi, Tawaw. Hello and welcome.”

                                                                                                                                                                                                                       – Natalie Pepin