Elders Knowledge Circle Society: Archival Research

The Cause

The present proposal aims to build archival capacity in a respected collective of First Nations, Métis, and Inuit Elders; the EKCS. The Elders in turn support their communities, urban Indigenous population in Calgary, and western organizations across Canada.

According to the Steering Committee on Canada’s archives, archives “have perpetuated racist, colonial ideolog[ies] and supported the legislated dispossession, silencing, assimilation, and genocide of First Nations, Inuit, and Métis peoples.” This took many forms: taking pictures without consent, racist labels, complex access protocols, colonial notions of copyright. Ultimately, pictures were taken for purposes that served the colonial state. For example, in residential schools, photographs served to document attendance, to show assimilation, but not to record childhood or empower communities and families in building their own archives.

Elders are the living archives of Indigenous communities. However, because of their age, and intergenerational trauma, Elders are passing on. As Blackfoot Elder Dr. Reg Crowshoe states: “We're at a critical time. We're losing the Indigenous resources. Our Elders are passing on and leaving us with a shortage of human resources to help our young people. So, I think not only do we take the young people and work with them, but we need to teach our own young Elders to become full-fledged Elders and validate it so that they can continue supporting organizations."
Pictures and maps are a powerful way of telling a story, and are needed resources to empower the work that the Elders in the EKCS do with youth, and organizations. These colonial practices have limited Indigenous People access to their historical data.

The project aims to:
Research appropriate digital platforms that protect Elders digital rights, and create Indigenous digital spaces
Search colonial archives for relevant pictures belonging to the Elders
Decolonize descriptions of pictures
Connect pictures with families

The work will be carried out along the principles of respect, relevance, and reciprocity: Respect for Indigenous ways of engaging, knowing; Maintaining relevance of descriptions for the Elders; and Reciprocity by giving back correct descriptions to archives.

This work will be done in partnership with UCalgary, who committed to funding the Position. This grant would serve to support the hard costs associated with this position.

Who Will it Benefit?

The EKCS is a collective of 33 First Nations, Metis, and Inuit Elders who work with Indigenous Communities in Calgary, on-reserve and across Canada, to revitalize Indigenous Knowledge and Ways of Knowing, and, in doing so, supporting urban and Indigenous population, and Western organizations. The concept of the Elders’ Knowledge Circle (EKC) emerged from a long-held desire amongst Indigenous Elders in Calgary and area to establish a centralized place of knowledge and wisdom where Elders from different Nations could become a resource that is
preserved, protected, and shared to benefit both Indigenous and non-Indigenous groups to
advance the spirit and intent of reconciliation.

Reclaiming pictures and maps from colonial archives will enable the Elders to retell their own stories about these pictures, when teaching the institutions they work with. Firstly, this work would directly benefit the communities that Elders in the Elders Knowledge Circle Society work with. As examples, Elders in the EKCS are resident Elders in reserve educational institutions (Old Sun College, Nakoda Elementary School), universities (University of Calgary, University of Lethbridge), social work associations (Trellis, Awo Taan Healing Lodge Society, United Way) (note that this is not a comprehensive list, as the Elders are dedicated their Eldership to supporting Indigenous organizations), as well as traditional societies and clans. Secondly, it would benefit the Western organizations that they have advised (e.g., EY, University of Calgary, Calgary Public Library, Federal and provincial agencies). Finally, it would benefit themselves and their families in healing from residential school, by reclaiming these pictures to their own archives.