2018 Short Hills Educational Workshops – organized by the Supporters of Haudenosaunee Right to Hunt – Supporters of Haudenosaunee Right to Hunt

All workshops are free. Everyone is welcome to attend our workshops, regardless of position on the harvest. Let’s come together to learn in a good way. All workshops are located at Short Hills Provincial Park, Pelham Road park entrance (except where noted).

This is an outdoor event: please bring a lawn chair and dress in warm clothing. You may also want to bring a blanket.

Peace Food Table, Fireside Community Dialogue, Music and Celebration: on-going, every day of the harvest.

Everyone is welcome to share vegan and non-vegan food together. By providing food for everyone (including the supporters, hunters, Ministry of Natural Resources staff, police, anti-hunt protesters and the community at large) we come together in peace and friendship. Food donations or cash donations, to put toward the food table, are gratefully accepted. Please clearly label all food provided for the table.

Informal community dialogue and visit hosted at the fire. All community members interested in bringing an open mind to share and learn in an atmosphere of peaceful dialogue are most welcome. Join us as we honour the harvesters through song & drumming while they exit the park. Drums & shakers welcome.

Saturday, November 3

2:00 pm – Missing Stories

This fireside workshop, led by Dr. Jennifer Brant, centers Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls in Canada. We share stories of the missing, and connect the exploitation of Indigenous women’s bodies to the exploitation of land. We also explore how MMIWG is connected to the devaluing of Indigenous worldview and culture.

Jennifer belongs to the Mohawk Nation with family ties to Six Nations of the Grand River Territory and Tyendinaga Mohawk Territory and is an Assistant Professor at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, University of Toronto. For Jennifer, Writing Forever Loved: Exposing the Hidden Crises of Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls in Canada with Dr. Memee Lavell Harvard was an opportunity to become part of a national dialogue advancing the call for justice and speaking out against racialized, sexualized, and colonial violence. Through the fireside chat Jennifer will encourage participants to also become part of the ongoing dialogue for justice. She will consider national responses as well as grassroots and community work that calls for awareness and action. By weaving Indigenous women’s stories, emphasis will be placed on Indigenous literature as a counternarrative that humanizes Indigenous peoples through multiple calls for justice, accountability and ultimately an end to racialized and sexualized violence.

Facebook Event Page: https://www.facebook.com/events/179395272938443/

4:00 pm – The Eagle and the Condor

This interactive art action brings together North American and South American Indigenous ceremonies, the Day of the Dead side by side with Haudenosaunee Culture, as we honour the hunt and the spirits of the animals. Community Note: Please bring offerings for the spirits of the animals such as food, tobacco, water, small gifts.

Dr. Maria del Carmen Suescun Pozas (she/her) is trained as a visual artist (B.F.A Concordia 1993) and art historian (M.A. McGill University, 2006), with a joint PhD in History and Art History (McGill, 2005). Maria held a Postdoctoral position at Université de Montreal (Department d’histoire, 2005-2007) before moving into a tenure-track position on Latin American history in the Department of History at Brock University (ON) in 2007 where she works as a cultural historian.

Celeste Smith (she/her) is Haudenosaunee, Oneida of the Six Nations of the Grand River Territory. She is an Indigenous Human Rights activist who is involved in multiple community projects and the co-founder of the Indigenous Solidarity Coalition @ Brock. Her passion for her work has most recently led her to Columbia University (NYC) to take part in the Indigenous Studies Summer Program on Indigenous Human Rights and Policy. Celeste is the co-organizer of the Supporters of Haudenosaunee Right to Hunt.

Facebook Event Page: https://www.facebook.com/events/575172629568476/

Sunday, November 4

12 noon – From Turtle Island to Palestine

This workshop offers discussion about apartheid, stolen land and direct action. Presenters will compare the structure of settler-colonialism between Occupied Palestine and Canada. We will dialogue about next steps and what else is possible.

Rachelle Friesen (she/her) is the Canada Coordinator for Christian Peacemaker Teams (CPT). CPT is a peace and human rights organization that stand in solidarity with Indigenous groups around the world. This is the third year Rachelle is taking part in supporting the Deer Hunt at Short Hills. Previously, she spent 5 years living and working for human rights in Palestine.

Wendy Goldsmith (she/her) is a mother, a social worker and a human rights activist. She is very active in the Palestinian Human Rights movement and holds positions on local, national and international committees dedicated to the human rights of all Palestinians. Wendy is a person born in Canada with deep settler roots.

Facebook Event Page: https://www.facebook.com/events/338166366937398/

2:00 pm – The Two Row Wampum

This educational workshop explores our ethical obligations as guests in this Indigenous Territory.

Dr. Robyn Bourgeois (she/her), Laughing Otter Caring Woman, is a mixed-race Cree woman born and raised in Syilx and Splats’in territories of British Columbia, and is connected through marriage and her three children to the Six Nations of the Grand River. She is an assistant professor in the Centre for Women’s and Gender Studies at Brock University.

Facebook Event Page: https://www.facebook.com/events/314994375962427/

4:00 pm – Animal Liberation and Indigenous Justice

This workshop will discuss the perspectives of animal activists who support the Haudenosaunee right to hunt, and how this perspective fits with the animal movement more generally.

Dael Horhota (They/ Them) is an activist based in Hamilton, on the traditional land of the Anishinaabe and Haudenosaune peoples. Dael upholds socialist evolution, anti-racism, decolonization, and animal liberation. They strive to fight oppression and injustice, and hope to live to see a better world.

Rose McCormick (she/her) is a Niagara based artist and activist who graduated from Brock University with n B.A. (Hons) in Sociology and Women’s and Gender Studies. She is interested in exploring how different oppressions intersect and enforce one another and wants to work in solidarity with others to dismantle oppressive social conditions. Her work focuses heavily on issues of food security and environmental rights.

Stephanie Piovesan (she/her), was born in the treaty 7 Blackfoot territory (Calgary). Her interest in the oppression of non-human animals prompted her to move across the country to take critical animal studies at Brock University. She now focuses her activism on challenging the oppressive nature of some forms of animal activism.

Taylor Telford (she/her) is a St. Catharines-based artist and a graduate of sociology at Brock University. Critical animal studies was her area of focus in post-secondary and her current work deals with how human activities impact cetaceans.

Facebook Event Page: https://www.facebook.com/events/565449190556353/

Saturday, November 17

1:30 pm – Canadian Mining and Indigenous Rights

By using a case study of Barrick Gold’s ‘Pueblo Viejo’ mine in the Dominican Republic, this workshop will address the perpetuation of environmental racism and neocolonialism through Canadian mining.

Klaire Gain (she/her) is a settler-ally who works in solidarity with communities impacted by Canadian mining companies. MA Social Justice Equity Studies, Brock University.

Facebook Event Page: https://www.facebook.com/events/2059904847364527/

3:00 pm – Faith Communities Consider Reconciliation

You are invited to participate in a spiritual panel conversation asking “how is your community working to improve settler-Indigenous relationships?” This event is being conducted in the spirit of our Truth and Reconciliation process. Related questions include, how is the situation at Short Hills a settler issue? What are settler responsibilities toward helping to move forward in our relationships with Indigenous Peoples? What connections do you see between what is happening at the Short Hills and larger / other factors in Settler-Indigenous relations?

Venerable Valerie Kerr (she/her) is a Mohawk woman of the Wolf Clan. She is a widow, a mother, mother-in-law, grandmother and great grandmother. She is part of the Iroquois Confederacy Mohawk Nation, Wolf Clan originally from Tyendinaga, which is east of Belleville and she now lives in St. David’s (Niagara Region). Valerie is the Archdeacon for Truth, Reconciliation and Indigenous Ministry. Her role is to assist Bishop Susan Bell to implement the Anglican Church of Canada’s commitment to truth and reconciliation in the Diocese of Niagara. This ministry will include teaching, building relationships and fostering healing and reconciliation between indigenous and non-indigenous peoples.

Henriette Thomson (she/her) served as National Director of the Anglican Church of Canadas Social and Ecological Justice Work. This included serving for 6 years as the Anglican liaison to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada.

Josie Winterfeld (she/her) works in the area of Missions, Peace & Justice and Outreach, at Stirling Avenue Mennonite Church in Kitchener, where living into reconciliation and the TRC’s Calls to Action is an important priority.

Keira Mann (she/her) works for Canadian Friends Service Committee, the peace and social justice agency representing Canadian Quakers, the Religious Society of Friends. She has engaged in Indigenous Peoples’ human rights initiatives on behalf of Quakers related to the TRC and the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.

More TBA.

Facebook Event Page: https://www.facebook.com/events/515971142252205/

Sunday, November 18

2:00 pm – Live Podcast Taping: Medicine for the Resistance (M4R)

In a special live recording at Short Hills Provincial Park, M4R takes a look at what it means to live in good relation with all our relatives and the importance of food sovereignty. The podcast ‘Medicine for the Resistance’ has been described as an unapologetic dose of black and Indigenous womanism that explores the ways in which traditional knowledge can support and encourage those who are living today, pushing back against colonial ways of living and building a new future.

Patty Krawec is an Anishnaabe woman with roots in Lac Seul First Nation and the Ukraine.

Kerry Goring is an Afromystic living and working in Niagara and Toronto.

Facebook Event Page: https://www.facebook.com/events/283788672264451/

4:00 pm – Be the Change! Anti-Racism and Decolonization as Best Practices

This workshop will discuss anti-racism and decolonization thought. By highlighting these intersections, we unpack how decolonization can be practiced. Touching on ideas of global colonialism, current activist practices, and intersectionality, this workshops asks how the two can be practiced when colonialism is still active in present society.

Kattawe Henry (she / her) is an educator, author and researcher with an MA (Hons) from McMaster University in Gender Studies and Feminist Research, and a BA (Hons) in Sociology from Brock University.

Facebook Event Page: https://www.facebook.com/events/2316978304982506/

Thursday, November 29

3:00 pm – Discussing the Treaties

A fireside dialogue about Haudenosaunee perspectives on treaty making in Niagara, led by Celeste Smith with support from Elder Alan Jamieson Sr.

Celeste Smith (she/her) is Haudenosaunee, Oneida of the Six Nations of the Grand River Territory. She is an Indigenous Human Rights activist who is involved in multiple community projects and the co-founder and co-chair of the Indigenous Solidarity Coalition @ Brock. Her passion for her work has most recently led her to Columbia University (NYC) to take part in the Indigenous Studies Summer Program on Indigenous Human Rights and Policy.

Allan Jamieson Sr, Elder of the Cayuga Nation, Wolf Clan, Haudenosaunee Six Nations. Director of the NHO, Neto Hatinakwe Onkwehowe (U.S.).

Facebook Event Page: https://www.facebook.com/events/546196089138916/

Friday, November 30

3:00 pm – The Clothing of our Grandmothers

Indigenous women have long clothed themselves with local and trade items. From the hide strap dress to the contemporary ribbon skirt we have made use of available materials to create clothing that is practical, communicative, and beautiful. In this workshop Patty Krawec, an Anishnaabe woman, will talk about the clothing our grandmothers wore and how we honour them today.

Patty Krawec (she/her) Anishnaabe woman with roots in Lac Seul First Nation and the Ukraine. Host of the podcast: Medicine for the Resistance.

Facebook Event Page: https://www.facebook.com/events/2213800198860847/

Saturday, December 1

1:00 pm – Community Feast and Film Screening: “Angry Inuk”

**Please note: this is the only event not held at the Short Hills. The location of this event is Rodman Hall, 109 St Paul Crescent, St. Catharines, ON L2S 1M3

All are welcome to join us in the final event of the 2018 harvest season! We begin with a traditional feast featuring Indigenous foods.

The feast is followed by a film screening of the ground-breaking Indigenous film “The Angry Inuk” with the director Alethea Arnaquq-Baril. The director will be skyping-in from Iqaluit to speak about the film and the connections between the Haudenosaunee deer hunt and the Inuit seal hunt.

Alethea Arnaquq-Baril MSC is an Inuk filmmaker, known for her work on Inuit life and culture. She is the owner of Unikkaat Studios, a production company in Iqaluit, which produces Inuktitut-language films. She was awarded the Canadian Meritorious Service Cross MSC, in 2017 in recognition of her work as an activist and filmmaker. She currently works part-time at the Qanak Collective, a social project which supports Inuit empowerment initiatives.