Feeling safe

Jean St-Onge et Alexandre Pinette
Innus
Rivière Moisie, Uashat mak Mani-Utenam

Extraits du film «Indian Time» (2016) de Carl Morasse, produit par La BRV.

Cultural transmission approaches are based on trust – whether it’s self-confidence or trust towards others. Canadian First Peoples share a long and painful heritage: assimilation policies, a stand to wipe out their culture, the tragedy of residential schools as well as the destruction of family ties have left profound wounds, all of which have not healed.

Researchers who plan on achieving a project with Indigenous communities will have to acknowledge the aftermath and consequences of such a heritage on current living conditions of their collaborators. They need to demonstrate a specific skill coined as « cultural skill ». By doing so, they will establish with Indigenous knowledge holders an egalitarian relationship based on a genuine commitment -on emotional, cognitive and behavioural levels – but also on a genuine desire to reconcile and reach out to social justice.

“Cultural skill” contributes in shifting wariness into trust. It helps creating a research environment in which individuals and communities would move freely from stereotypes and prejudice, paternalism and racism. It paves the way for consultation through dialogue. It upholds to all committed individuals that their active contributions are not only welcome but essential, and that their words will be heard. It sets an open and respectful context, which is a requirement for reinforcement and expressing their identity as First Peoples and the transmission of their culture. Then, they may safely move on to become the authors and actors of their own lives.