Truth and reconciliation response projects, 2016

When the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) of Canada released its findings and 94 Calls for Action in 2015, members of Arts worked with Indigenous partners to develop responses. This page summarizes two 2016 projects that involved numerous Indigenous and non-Indigenous organizations and individuals.

Mush Hole Project | Integrating Knowledges Summit

Archival photo of Mohawk Institute Indian Residential School buidling exterior

The Mush Hole Project, September 16-18, 2016

The Mush Hole Project was an immersive, site-specific art and performance installation event taking place at the Mohawk Institute Indian Residential School (the Mush Hole) and the Woodland Cultural Centre in Brantford, Ontario. Audiences were toured through the building by survivors of the school and along the way encountered performances, artworks, installations and other expressions and responses to the space and its dark history.

University of Waterloo professors Andy Houston and Sorouja Moll collaborated with Woodland Cultural Centre to co-lead the project and curate the 35 Indigenous and non-Indigenous artists, performers, archivists and researchers who presented their site-responsive works.

The project aimed to respond to the TRC’s Calls to Action and to preserve, query, and reveal the complex personal, political, and public narratives around Canada’s residential school system, in general, and the Mohawk Institute Indian Residential School.

Visit the Mush Hole Project archive for programming details.

The Mush Hole Project and Save the Evidence

The Mohawk Institute Indian Residential School building at the Woodland Cultural Centre has been providing in-depth and historically significant insight into the Residential School System for the past 44 years. The Mohawk Institute is one of the last residential schools still standing across Canada. With close to 10,000 visitors every year, tours and programs offer a distinctive look into First Nations and Canadian history. The Mush Hole Project aimed to raise awareness and encourage support for the Save the Evidence campaign, to ensure that the physical evidence of this dark chapter in Canadian history is never forgotten.


Illutration of two-row wampum belt

Integrating Knowledges Summit, October 14-16, 2016

Co-hosted by the Faculty of Arts and the Waterloo Aboriginal Education Centre (now the Waterloo Indigenous Student Centre, United College) , the summit was an intercultural calling-in of social justice advocates, community elders, researchers, artists, students, and many others both Indigenous and non-Indigenous. The broad goal of the summit was to respond to the TRC Calls to Action related to education, and to:

  • mobilize debate and discussion,
  • create spaces to share knowledges and research,
  • access resources of new and renewed disciplines, methodologies, and practices,
  • acknowledge the heterogeneity of Indigenous peoples and pedagogies,
  • work together to decolonize ourselves and the structures of systemic oppression and exclusion.

Keynote address by Dr. Cindy Blackstock

The summit was opened with a keynote address by Dr. Cindy Blackstock, Executive Director of the First Nations Child, and Family Caring Society of Canada. Watch the video recording of the opening ceremony and Dr. Blackstock's address.

Summit highlights

  • 3-Day Theatre Workshop: Performing Practice Truth & (Re)conciliation featuring actors Bruce Sinclair, PJ Prudat, Falen Johnson
  • Youth Workshop: Mush Hole Project & Integrating Knowledges
  • Elder-in-Residence: Jean Becker
  • Nine circle discussions on summit themes
  • Oral Storytelling by Rene Meshake
  • Archive & Representation Installation + Workshop with Susan Roy and Ian Mosby
  • Digital Storytelling Installation, “A Canadian Conversation,” by Kim Anderson
  • TRC Reading Challenge
Remote video URL

Full schedule of summit proceedings

Friday, October 14

Time Event Participants Topic Location
7:30 am - end of Summit Sunrise Ceremony – Opening Sacred Fire Fire Keepers, Al McDonald, and Howard Loft   St. Paul’s Fire
8:30 am - 9 am Refreshments Janace Henry, Pies and Things   Modern Languages foyer
9 am - 9:45 am Thanksgiving Address, Opening Ceremony

Al McDonald; Myeengun Henry, Thanksgiving Address; Mino Ode Kwewak N’gamowak

Opening Ceremony

Theatre of the Arts, ML 135
9:45 am - 10:45 am KEYNOTE Dr. Cindy Blackstock Introduction by Jean Becker

Keynote / Q and A

Theatre of the Arts, ML 135
11 am - 12 pm CIRCLE 1: Survivor Stories

Howard Loft, Lee Loft, Lila Bruyere, Shawn Johnston, Sherlene Bomberry

Intergenerational stories of survival and empowerment Alumni Hall, St. Paul's University College
12 pm - 1 pm Lunch Break      
1 pm - 2 pm CIRCLE 2: Education and Decolonization

Tim Paci, Alyssa General, Loise MacDonald, WAEC, Youth Workshop delegates, Mary Baldasaro

Facilitator: Mary Baldasaro

Youth and Education, Cultural Appropriation, Curricula, Recruitment

Alumni Hall, St. Paul's University College
2 pm - 4 pm Breakaway Youth Session Kelly Laurila and student delegates   St. Paul's University College Chapel
2 pm - 2:15 pm Break      
2:30 pm - 3:30 pm CIRCLE 3: Oral Storytelling and Pedagogical Practices Jean Becker, Linda Warley, Myeengun Henry Methods and ceremony, practice and making meaning Alumni Hall, St. Paul's University College
3:30 pm - 3:45 pm Break      
4 pm - 5 pm CIRCLE 4: Law, Media, and UnColonizing the Gaze

Augie Fleras, Lisa Monchalin, Lev Marder, Susan Roy 

Haldimand Tract, histories, treaties, and apologies Alumni Hall, St. Paul's University College
5:30 pm Gathering and Fire Al McDonald and Howard Loft  

St. Paul's Fire

6:30 - 8:00 pm Summit/History Speaker Series

Lisa Monchalin, 
Introduction by Susan Roy

The Colonial Problem: An Indigenous Perspective on Crime and Injustice in Canada Alumni Hall, St. Paul's University College

Saturday, October 15

Time Event Participants Topic Location
7:30 am Sunrise Ceremony Al McDonald and Howard Loft   St. Paul's Fire
8:30 am - 9 am Refreshments Janace Henry, Pies and Things Alumni  Alumni Hall, St. Paul's University College
9 am - 10 am CIRCLE 5: Languages and (Re)Conciliation

Amos Key Jr., Trevor Holmes, Lila Bruyere,  Shawn Johnston

Making Indigenous Languages Official Alumni Hall, St. Paul's University College
10:15 am - 10:30 am Break      
10:30 am - 12 pm CIRCLE 6: Health and Nourishment

Kim Anderson, Blu Waters, Ian Mosby, Conrad Sichler

Memory, Medicine, and Education Alumni Hall, St. Paul's University College
12 pm - 1 pm Lunch Break      
1 pm - 2 pm CIRCLE 7: Territorial Acknowledgement Luane Lentz, Cheryl Maksymyk, Emma Smith Research, Process, and Practice Alumni Hall, St. Paul's University College
2 pm - 2:15 pm Break      
2:30 pm - 5 pm Optional Summit Activities Facilitators: WAEC and volunteers

Discussion Circles, TRC Reading Challenge, Performance Workshop Viewing, Archive Installation + Workshop with Susan Roy and Ian Mosby, Meditating Process with Conrad Sichler, Digital Storytelling Installation “A Canadian Conversation” viewing by Kim Anderson, Call to Action # 83 – exhibition viewing and discussion, Local Gallery Programming, Invitation to the Fire.

Activities/exhibitions at UWaterloo & St. Paul’s campuses

Collaborative Local Galleries: Art Gallery of Guelph artist Don Russell’s Circle Mound; Canadian Clay & Glass “On Firm Ground: a reposition of being” curated by Patricia Deadman

5:30 pm

Gathering and Fire Al McDonald and Howard Loft   PAS - UWaterloo
6 pm - 8 pm Feast – All Welcome: Free but registration required Janace Henry, Pies and Things, Six Nations of the Grand Oral Storytelling by Rene Meshake Alumni Hall, St. Paul's University College

Sunday, October 16

Time Event Participants Topic Location
7:30 am Sunrise Ceremony Al McDonald and Howard Loft   PAS - UWaterloo
8:30 am - 9 am Refreshments Janace Henry, Pies and Things   Alumni Hall, St. Paul's University College
9 am - 10 am CIRCLE 8: Idle No More Kelly Laurila, Darren Thomas, Shannon Dea
Amy Smoke
Social Action, The Ethical Space, and Circle Pedagogy Alumni Hall, St. Paul's University College
10 am - 10:15 am

Break

     
10:30 am - 12 pm CIRCLE 9: Curating Change Pat Deadman, Naomi Johnson, Andy Houston Mush Hole Project – Truth and Reconciliation in Art Alumni Hall, St. Paul's University College
12 pm - 1 pm Lunch Break      
1 pm - 2 pm  "The Offering" Ensemble performance

Public Performance with Bruce Sinclair, PJ Prudat, Falen Johnson, Waterloo Theatre and Performance students. Facilitated by Spy Dénommé-Welch

Theatre of the Arts, ML 135

2:30 pm Closing Ceremony  Blue Sky Singers  Led by Amy Smoke Theatre of the Arts, ML 135. Walk to St. Paul’s and the closing of the Fire.

Collaborative partners

  • Woodland Cultural Centre (Brantford)
  • Waterloo Aboriginal Education Centre, St. Paul’s University College
  • Faculty of Arts, University of Waterloo,
  • Department of Drama and Speech Communication
  • Six Nations Polytechnic (Brantford)
  • Chocolate Woman Collective (Toronto)
  • Native Women in the Arts (Toronto)
  • Art Gallery of Guelph (Guelph)
  • Canadian Clay and Glass Gallery (Waterloo)
  • Art Gallery of Burlington
  • Research Entrepreneurs Accelerating Prosperity (REAP)
  • Centre for Memory and Testimony Studies (Wilfrid Laurier University and partner universities) 
     

Funding and support

The Integrating Knowledges Summit was made possible with the support of the University of Waterloo (Faculty of Arts), Waterloo Aboriginal Education Centre (St. Paul’s University College), SSHRC Connection Grant, Bob Harding Humanities and Social Sciences award, Ontario Arts Council, Research Entrepreneurs Accelerating Prosperity (REAP), Department of Drama and Speech Communication, Centre for Memory and Testimony Studies (Wilfrid Laurier University and partner universities), and the generous contributions from many collaborating organizations and individuals.