The Indigenous Women Memory and Power Project was a seven-month project that began in September
of 2013 through the first story department at the Native Canadian Center of Toronto.
For over 50 years, the Native Canadian Center of Toronto has served as a place where people
of many diverse First Nations have gathered to share in each other's experiences and
work together to contribute to the development of the Aboriginal community in Toronto.
The Indigenous Women Memory and Power Project was developed from a collective of Indigenous
women and non-Indigenous relatives concerned with lifting up and moving forward the powerful
oratorical continuum of Aboriginal women who give and sustain life through teaching, role
modeling, and storytelling across generations.
In this video, we hear from four women who share their experience with us on education.
Today, these women continue to contribute to building Indigenous community and presence
in Toronto by developing and affirming their leadership roles in Toronto's Aboriginal
organizations and academic institutions.
My mother was not terribly well-educated, as was Lillian McGregor not terribly well-educated
when they first came to Toronto, but they had heart.
And what they did was, they educated themselves on what was needed, what you had to do, and
how you had to do it.
They were determined, they were hardworking, they were magnificent old ladies, they were
great.
But they shared.
If you wanted to know how to make a turkey dinner, they didn't tell you, they showed
you.
And if you were worth your salt, you'd have been standing right there beside them, doing
everything that they were doing.
When I finished my undergraduate work at Western in 1978, I was thinking, okay, so no, what
am I going to do with this education that I got?
Because I didn't really know where I was, where to use it.
Because when I went, my goal was to go to university only because people were saying
at that time that we weren't very smart, we were kind of stupid.
So I thought, geez, are we really that stupid?
And so my goal was to get through university to say, no, Aboriginal people can do this.
I taught at First Nations School for 23 years, and this is all I taught with Nishinaabe Lifeway,
Nishinaabe way of praying, Nishinaabe way of thinking.
Nishinaabe way of doing things, Nishinaabe way of talking.
So what I want to develop within our children is a good speaking voice, a good singing voice.
And that's what they bring to the people, they bring their voice.
Voices are our greatest gift, because it allows us to share what we feel.
And we know as two legates on this planet that we were created to experience everything
that life has to offer.
Not just the good things, but also to be able to accept all of the things that are not quite good.
We use a different way, we use what Art Solomon said, we use storytelling.
We use role modeling.
We use those kinds of things for how we teach our children and how they learn.
So it's always, we're looking for the end run.
And that's what thinking seven generations ahead is all about, really.
That's how it works itself out.
We always say what's the end.
Thank you.
