“We’re Still Here”: Teaching and Learning about Métis Women’s and Two-Spirit People’s Relationships with Land in Winnipeg
Date
2022-04-29
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Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
ORCID
Type
Thesis
Degree Level
Masters
Abstract
In conversation with five Métis two-spirit, transgender and cis heterosexual women educators, I explored ways of knowing, teaching and learning about Métis women and two-spirit people’s enduring relationships with land in Winnipeg, Manitoba. I inquired how an urban land-based education can (re)story Winnipeg as Métis land, and (re)centre Métis women’s and two-spirit people’s relationships with place. I employed a Métis-specific kitchen table methodology that honours the Métis visiting way (Gaudet, 2019) and positions the kitchen table as a site of queer Métis women’s organizing and resistance. Methods included a relational recruitment strategy, conversational interview method, holistic analysis (Saldana, 2016) of the transcripts in their entirety, and a relational, feminist analysis (Chu & Gilligan, 2019; Fowler, 2022; Paliadelis & Cruickshank, 2018; Woodcock, 2016) of excerpts. I found that Winnipeg is undoubtedly a Métis place, and that many Métis women are deeply rooted to land in the city. The Métis two-spirit, transgender and cis heterosexual women who participated in the study confidently relate to land through ancestral people and places, but sometimes expressed doubt, disconnection and a sense of uprootedness with respect to their own personal, lived relationships with land and place. Despite the ongoing impacts of urbanization, heteropatriarchy, a rigid religious education and upbringing, and a mainstream curriculum that harms Métis land-based epistemologies, some Métis women have maintained their own relationships with land and community in Winnipeg, and continue to enact those relationships in their daily lives. Tracing ancestral routes across Winnipeg while planting their own roots in urban land may help Métis learners foster a sense of belonging in the city.
Description
Keywords
Women, Two-Spirit, Métis, Land-based education, Urban, Winnipeg
Citation
Degree
Master of Education (M.Ed.)
Department
Educational Foundations
Program
Educational Foundations