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Canadian Social Forum 2009

We’re blogging LIVE from the Canadian Social Forum! Here, community leaders from social development, public health, environment, community safety and recreation are brought together. The Forum targets poverty – both urban and rural. Workshops by aboriginal presenters doing innovative work across the country will play a critical role.

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Where are the people who are living in poverty??

Written by athena
May 22, 2009

Good morning,

As I sit in the McLeod room at this Canadian Social Forum I keep searching for the people who this forum affects the most and I cannot see them.

I am a Social Worker and have worked and lived with and in poverty. I am fortunate to have overcome the barriers in our society to live a comfortable life but I am very aware of the poverty in my province of Alberta. I am embarassed to say I am Albertan some days because of our wealth and poverty. It doesn’t even make sense that I live in one of the richest provinces in one of the richest countries in the world and yet there are still Albertans/Canadians who are living in a “fourth world country”.

I am a Metis woman from Alberta and have watched the First Nations, Metis, and Inuit (FNMI) people live in horrible conditions much like people in the third world. As one person commented at this Forum the FNMI people do not seem to be appropriately represented within this conversation we are having over the four days of the forum. As some of you may know, the FNMI population has an alarmingly high percentage of people living in poverty.

I would like to make a suggestion for the next forum to have a panel of people who are living in poverty speak so those of us who are doing the work can hear their voices and listen actively to make changes that are meaningful in their lives.

I have also heard discussion around having the politicians and policy makers at this forum so they would hopefully feel some empathy for the poor. This would be a step in the right direction but we need to go one step further and have them hear from the people in poverty not just people in “suits”.

Athena McKenzie Lothian

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Digital Storytelling

Written by athena
May 22, 2009

Tansi,

I have been attending this conference as a presenter as well as a participant. My research partner, Yvonne Poitras Pratt and I have been working in the Alberta Metis community discussing Digital Storytelling as a means of healing through embracing being Metis in today’s society.We are both Metis women and have strong ties to Metis communities in Alberta. My family originates from Lac Ste Anne, Alberta and Yvonne’s family is from Fishing Lake Metis Settlement.

I work for the Metis Nation of Alberta revitalizing the language of the Metis which is called Michif. Through digital storytelling I hope to engage the Metis people in a discussion of which Michif dialect/language is most used or was used in Alberta. I believe through language we learn about our beautiful culture which brings a pride that was lost after the Riel Resistance. With digital storytelling we hope to give the Metis people in Alberta a voice that has been silenced since 1885.

The use of new media forms such as digital storytelling allows us to combine ancestral ways of knowing with a powerful way to communicate across cultural boundaries.

Athena McKenzie Lothian

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