Our Story: Aboriginal Voices on Canada's Past (2 page)

These stories look at the society and culture that have been created here, north of the 49th parallel, in a significantly different way than we generally do. Property is not simply to be possessed by someone who pays the most or cuts the best deal. When one character says, “no one in this country has to deal with ancestry in quite the way we must,” it is a very poignant statement about possession and dispossession and the maintenance of Aboriginal identity.

For identity is essential to these stories. Métis life in the early 20th century, plagued by despair in the face of a proud history ignored, is seen through the eyes of Francis in Tantoo Cardinals “There Is a Place.” “I was lost, lost for a long while there,” he says as he struggles to overcome grief and separation. Flashes of joy and hope lie in the closeness of forgiving relationships and the kind of history that is written from parent to child, or grandchild. “The Moon of the Dancing Suns” is by Jovette Marchessault, a Montagnais writer, and it finds hope in similar places as it explores the role of Aboriginals in two world wars. We should all know and be ashamed that they did not get the same financial and educational opportunities that our other veterans did after fighting for their country. In her tale, “while death galloped rapidly around the world,” there is acceptance and a sort of redemption in the vision of children, even though their fathers, “like so many other Natives, were buried in the lovely Canadian military cemeteries somewhere in Europe. ‘
Kahgee pohn noten took,'
the Crees say. This means, ‘the battle is over.'” The gentle irony, the dance of hope and despair in these two stories, is heartbreaking.

In “Coyote and the Enemy Aliens” and “Hearts and Flowers,” Thomas King and Tomson Highway deal with identity and the question at the very heart of racism: is the Other a human being? Even though our laws did not explicitly state that Aboriginal people were not human, they were routinely excluded from society. They were separated because they were Aboriginal, and this comes forward very clearly in King's sly and darkly humorous story of the connection between Aboriginal people and the Japanese
Canadians who were imprisoned and dispossessed during the Second World War. The trickster Coyote is again at work here, and the loss and humiliation of these two marginalized peoples is shown to be fundamentally inhuman and rather ridiculous. In Highways telling, the long-withheld conferring of the vote to Aboriginals—in 1960!—preoccupies a young boy whose musical talent does not obscure his awareness that people like him, in the eyes of many, are not worth consideration. Appreciating and creating beauty make us truly human, yet there exist hideous structures and attitudes which reject this and cause the boy to suffer and wonder what it means to be a human being.

When we read a work of literary art, it should never be a purely didactic exercise, a moralizing lesson. It is something that pleases us and helps us to understand what we haven't experienced, what we might not have known that we didn't know. That's what
Our Story
does. That's why these stories are important. These are voices which we must all listen to, for they form a part of all that we are. And they tell an amazing tale.

Adrienne Clarkson

IMAGE CREDIT: ARNOLD JACOBS

W
HEN
I
WAS INVITED
to write about a “defining moment” in our people's history, I considered and immediately rejected obvious dates of great historical significance like 1492, when Columbus was discovered. And 1527, when Pizarro unleashed the holocaust of epidemics that eventually wiped out fifty million people. I rejected recent Canadian dates like 1982, when “aboriginal and treaty rights” were enshrined in the Constitution.

I also rejected significant events in the history of my own people, the Rotinonhsyón:ni—the people of the Six Nations Iroquois Confederacy. The people here in my home community of Grand River have long memories and a strong sense of history, and many would nominate 1779 as a defining moment. That's when George Washington burned our villages to the ground, thus earning him the Iroquois name that he and all the subsequent presidents of the United States are known by: Ranatakáryas, the Town Destroyer. Many would say a defining moment was 1784, when we were forced to move from New York State to the Grand River Territory. Others would say one was 1799, when the Seneca chief Skanyatarí:yo had a vision that led to the establishment of the longhouse “religion” that has kept our language and culture alive in the face of five hundred years of pressure to
assimilate. And still others would choose 1924, when the Canadian government outlawed the traditional chiefs and—at gunpoint—installed an elected band council, creating a rift that has plagued our community to this day.

All of these were pivotal moments in our history, it's true. But all of them involve our interactions with so-called “white people.” They were not about
us
. Most of them involve things that happened
to
us. They have helped determine where and how we live but they have not determined how we think or what we believe. The event that determined those things, that determined our true nature, the event that defined us as a people without reference to others, occurred a very long time ago.

But it wasn't, as some might think, the founding of the Iroquois Confederacy. Even though that event predates European contact and certainly was a defining moment in our history, it is not about our true self. We created the Confederacy as a reaction to a crisis we were facing. At that time the nations of the Iroquois were warring with one another in an endless and devastating cycle of blood feuds. So, we are told, the Creator sent a messenger to the earth who persuaded our ancestors to stop all the killing and accept a life of peace. This man, known in English as the Peacemaker, also brought with him a set of laws that laid out how the nations would work together in a confederacy based on consensus. When he had finished, the Peacemaker had restored the world to a life of peace and harmony, the way it was at the time of Creation.

And it was
that
time—the moment of Creation—that was
the
defining moment in our history. That was when our character as a people was determined. That was when we were given the gift of speech and, with it, a unique way of looking at and understanding the world. That was when we were given the sacred responsibilities that shape our lives. That was the moment that shaped how we think and what we believe.

The
First Words

The woman took a quick breath, opened her eyes, sat up, and looked around. She was sitting on a riverbank, surrounded by flowers and an abundance of plant life. Every variety of bird and animal stood, perched, or floated nearby, watching her. She was young, she was beautiful, and she was naked.

Hundreds of pairs of eyes silently watched her as she struggled to absorb everything in sight. Everything
—everything
—was entirely new to her and she was overwhelmed by the beauty and the wonder of it all. Every one of the creatures and plant forms, she noticed, was so different from every other and, as she looked down at herself, so different from her as well.

And then she noticed that one pair of eyes watched her with greater interest and intensity than all the others. They belonged to a creature whose life form was much like her own. She sensed a kinship with this being whose body glowed softly from within.

“Ónhka ní:se?” she asked at last. “Who are you?”

“Konya'tíson ní:'i,” the being replied. “I am the one who made you.”

“Ónhka ní:'i?” she asked. “Who am I?”

“Sónkwe ní:se,” came the reply. “You are a human being.”

“Oh ní:yoht takya'tíson?” she asked. “How did you make me?”

“Enkonna'tónhahse,” the being replied. “I'll show you.”

With a few quick movements, the glowing being reached down, scooped up a handful of clay from the riverbank, and shaped it into the doll-like form of a man. The being then laid the doll-like figure on the riverbank next to the woman and gently blew into its mouth. Instantly, the clay doll was transformed into a human being. Hair grew out of its head, skin covered its body, and facial features appeared. The man took a quick breath, opened his eyes, sat up, and looked around.

Like the woman, the man sat silently at first, awestruck and struggling to comprehend everything before him. The woman and the glowing being waited, saying nothing. Finally, the man began focusing his attention on the woman. He noticed that he did not have the breasts or the shape of the woman. Instead, he had the same muscles and form as the glowing figure. In spite of his physical resemblance to the glowing man he felt a greater kinship with the woman. And it was to her he spoke.

“Ónhka ní:se?”he asked. “Who are you?”

“Kónkwe … tenon … tenónkwe,” she replied hesitantly. “I … we … we're human beings.”

“Ónhka ne raónha?” the man asked. “Who is he?”

“Shonkwaya'tíson,” she answered. “He is the one who made us.”

“Ka' nítewe's?” he then asked. “Where are we? What is this place?”

The woman, not knowing what to say, looked to the glowing being.

“Tsyatahonhsí:yohst, keniyént'a,”
he said. “Listen well, my children.” He then settled himself on the ground before them and continued. “Enkenikaratónhahse. I will now tell you the story of this place and how you've come to be here. It's a long story and you must listen well.”

The man and woman quickly nodded agreement and the glowing man began.

“È:neken tsyatkáhtho,” he said. “Look up, into the sky.”

The man and woman then tilted their heads back and scanned the sky.

“You see the flying creatures, the clouds and the sun, do you not?” he asked.

“Hén:'en,” the humans responded. “Yes. We see all those things and it is all so beautiful.”

“It is not within your power to see beyond the deepest part of the sky,” the glowing man continued, “but I want you to know there is another world above this one, a sky-world. It is a special and beautiful place, just like here. And there are beings who live in the sky-world. They look much like you and me. And one day you and I, and many others, will all live together there.”

The human beings did not know how to respond and sat there, silent, and the glowing manlike being continued.

“In the sky-world, there are manlike beings and womanlike beings. After they live together for a time, the womanlike being will bear a child. This, too, will happen to you one day.”

The man and the woman looked at each other, bewildered, but said nothing.

“Many, many days ago, there was a womanlike being in the sky-world whose stomach grew bigger and bigger, a sign that she would soon bear a child.