[BCMA] Let's all Walk for Reconciliation (and do come for lunch!)

[Moderated BCMA subscriber listserv.]

Our future, and the well-being of all our children, rest with the kind of relationships we build today — Chief Dr. Robert Joseph

 

JOIN US: Walk for Reconciliation

Sunday, Sept. 24, in downtown Vancouver

9:30 a.m.: Meet at Queen Elizabeth Theatre plaza (650 Hamilton St.); 10:15 a.m.: Walk begins

FREE Lunch & Learn Sessions at BC Alliance: Sept. 12, with Norm Leech and Donna Dickison, and Sept. 19, with Lillian Howard 

 

Tens of thousands of people are expected to attend the Walk for Reconciliation in Vancouver, on Sept. 24. The BC Alliance for Arts + Culture will be there, leading a large contingent of BC arts, culture and heritage representatives, who have joined our Walk team, Arts & Culture for Reconciliation. <https://secure.e2rm.com/registrant/TeamFundraisingPage.aspx?teamID=769327&langPref=en-CA>
We invite you to join us! Artists and cultural workers of BC, let’s show up as a community and walk in solidarity to demonstrate our commitment to the reconciliation process.

Click this link <https://secure.e2rm.com/registrant/TeamFundraisingPage.aspx?teamID=769327&langPref=en-CA> to join the Arts & Culture for Reconciliation team. We’ll see you there!


Why We Walk

The tragic legacy of residential schools cannot be overstated. Some 150,000 Indigenous children were taken from their families—many forcibly by the RCMP—and placed in residential schools where, reports indicate, virtually every single student suffered physical, emotional, and sexual abuse. Some 80,000 survivors of residential schools live in Canada today. Canadians need to hear these stories and find ways to ensure our collective future rests on a solid foundation of respect, openness, and trust. 

By coming together for the Walk, we make a commitment to transform and renew relationships with Indigenous peoples. We show that we believe in the Walk for Reconciliation’s motto, the spirit of ‘Namwayut’ - “We are all one.”


FREE Lunch and Learn Series

The BC Alliance for Arts + Culture would like to serve you lunch and to give you an opportunity to hear firsthand the stories of people affected by the residential school system. We’ll nourish you, and provide an environment of openness and honesty. We just ask you to bring an open heart and a willingness to better understand the need for reconciliation.

Tuesday, Sept.12: Norm Leech & Donna Dickison are members of the St’at’imc Nation. Norm is the coordinator for the Vancouver Aboriginal Community Policing Centre. His mother, Donna, is a residential school survivor. 

Tuesday, Sept. 19: Lillian Howard is activist of Nuu-chah-nulth, Kwakwaka'wakw and Tlingit ancestry. The Vancouver Sun, in a 2013 article about Lillian's fast in support of the Idle No More movement, described the 66-year-old like this: "Howard is a residential school survivor who was sexually assaulted more than once while at school. Unsurprisingly, she dropped out. She had grown up in a quiet village on Friendly Cove on Vancouver Island’s west coast — the spot where Capt. Cook landed. But her village was relocated to a site next to a pulp mill. Howard and others spent the 1970s blocking roads, going to protests, rallies, marches and sit-ins trying to regain their old village site. That didn’t happen, but they were relocated further from the mill, a couple of kilometres north of Gold River. In 1988, Howard graduated with a master’s degree in environmental education and communication and has worked with the Union of B.C. Indian Chiefs, the Assembly of First Nations, and the Vancouver School Board, and she was co-chair of the Nuu-chah-Nulth Tribal Council from 1994 to 1998.” Now, Lillian is a co-chair of the Vancouver Urban Aboriginal Peoples Advisory Committee. 

Both lunches take place at 12 noon, at BC Alliance for Arts + Culture, 938 Howe St, Vancouver. To join us for these free events, please register here <http://www.allianceforarts.com/walk-for-reconciliation/> before Sept. Friday Sept. 8 (for Sept. 12 lunch) and Friday Sept. 15 (for Sept. 19 lunch).  

Words from Chief Robert Joseph

“The Walk for Reconciliation is a powerful symbol of caring. Aboriginal People in communities where there is despair and hopelessness and brokenness and addiction, where bad things are happening, don't think things will ever change - they believe that nobody cares. Then all of a sudden they see 70,000 people come out on a rainy Vancouver day and they think, oh my god, people do care! At that last walk, (in 2013) there were a lot of survivors of residential schools and they were crying because they were so overwhelmed.  Our history was so bad. It’s been so bad that most of us grew up feeling that we weren't loved, even by our own parents. So to create this powerful demonstration of caring for each other is so important. This walk will be like the first walk, reminding Aboriginal People, former residential school survivors, that Canadians STILL care.

“The world is watching what we are doing here in Canada. The Truth and Reconciliation Commission was founded on ideas, which came from the survivors themselves. Even in their anger and rage they thought that what would help to save them is if they can tell their stories. The telling of their stories is the very first step to the possibility of letting it go and moving on and healing. The entire truth commission premise came from those stories and people asking for safe places to tell their stories. It hurts so much to carry these stories and never have told your mother or your sibling what happened to you. We were too ashamed and so hurt. And then all of a sudden this walk happened. I think it’s the most wonderful thing that’s ever happened in my lifetime.

“When we are reconciled, I see a Canada that is one.  I see a Canada where every child born to this country has the same potential and the same opportunity to dream and become whatever they want to become. I see that as so important.  Our kids are going to be able to look you in the eyes and say, “hi, I’m so and so” and not be ashamed of who they are, and really be proud of who they are. I think we could be a model for the world if we can do that here in Canada.” 

— Chief Robert Joseph, Ambassador for Reconciliation Canada and a member of the National Assembly of First Nations Elders Council, speaking to Debbie Douez, Reconciliation Art Project Coordinator. 




Nancy Lanthier
Communications Director
BC Alliance for Arts + Culture
nancy at allianceforarts.com
604-681-3535 ext 212

We at BC Alliance for Arts + Culture
acknowledge we are located on
unceded Aboriginal territories of the
Musqueam, Squamish and Tsleil
Waututh First Nations.


 <http://www.allianceforarts.com/> <https://www.facebook.com/AllianceforArtsandCulture/?ref=aymt_homepage_panel>




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