Telling our Healthy Stories

Pho­tographs tell us many things about the past—what our ances­tors looked like; how our cities or towns once appeared; or who was present at impor­tant polit­i­cal events. Peo­ple look to their pho­to­graphic archives for their his­tory. Yet when Abo­rig­i­nal peo­ple look for images of their ances­tors, what their com­mu­ni­ties looked like, or impor­tant his­tor­i­cal events in their lives, the records become scarce. We are more famil­iar with the stereo­types of the Indian chief and squaw, the Eskimo, or Half-breed, than engag­ing with them as real people.

~Jeff Thomas (Iro­quois), in Where are the Chil­dren? Heal­ing the Legacy of the Res­i­den­tial Schools (pub­lished by the Legacy of Hope Foun­da­tion, 2003

For the past sev­eral years, I’ve been immersed in devel­op­ing use­ful health infor­ma­tion for First Nations, Inuit, and Métis peo­ple across Canada. I’m pas­sion­ate about mak­ing sure that Abo­rig­i­nal peo­ple in Canada get infor­ma­tion that empow­ers them to think about achiev­ing good health in their tra­di­tional ways.

My good friend Jack­son and I have an ongo­ing dia­logue about what it means to be healthy (and ulti­mately, happy). While my own per­spec­tive as a mixed-race First Nations woman is unique from Jack’s, our com­mon bond is that we both under­stand first-hand the issues that Abo­rig­i­nal peo­ple are deal­ing with—isolation, poverty, healing.

As an inter-generational sur­vivor of the res­i­den­tial school sys­tem (and the fos­ter care sys­tem, and the six­ties scoop, phew!), I grew up sur­rounded by a lot of anger, guilt, abuse, and mis­trust. As I grew into a young adult, the act of cre­at­ing became very impor­tant for me to deal with all of these emo­tions. Jack­son is a per­son who gets the impor­tance of being cre­ative along the heal­ing jour­ney, and thank­fully, he has often been the impe­tus for my creations.

That’s why I asked Jack­son to join me on my research jour­ney this year. Thanks to a Tril­lium grant, I’ve been look­ing at what we can do to help pre­vent obe­sity in Ontario’s Abo­rig­i­nal com­mu­ni­ties. Peo­ple kept telling me, “We need to see peo­ple who look like us.” So many books and reports that aim to help Abo­rig­i­nal peo­ple actu­ally serve to rein­force many of the stereo­types that aren’t exactly helpful.

I dis­cussed this with Jack. He knows me well, and he knows I’m a stub­born force when I’m work­ing to achieve my visions. I knew he would be able to under­stand, respect, and most impor­tantly, help me to achieve my vision when it came to putting my friends and other peo­ple I love in front of the lens.

We’ve now col­lab­o­rated on sev­eral photo shoots in Toronto and Ottawa for my research. Jackson’s images help me turn my words into some­thing that peo­ple can actu­ally use, some­thing that inspires them. I see faces light up when they see our pho­tos. Jackson’s shots help peo­ple to get an under­stand­ing that as Abo­rig­i­nal peo­ple, we don’t fit into the stereo­types that so many hold about us. Not all of us are brown or red, and some of us even have blonde hair and blue eyes. His images help every­one (includ­ing me!) to ques­tion our ideas about what we think about Abo­rig­i­nal people.

Get­ting this far wasn’t easy. There is no guide­book to pro­duc­ing use­ful images of Abo­rig­i­nal peo­ple in a cul­tur­ally appro­pri­ate way. Most of my friends don’t have han­dlers, and I had no bud­get for light­ing, loca­tions, or much of any­thing else. Jack­son had to get up close and per­sonal with many of the chil­dren, aunties/uncles, par­ents, teach­ers, and grand­par­ents. He couldn’t walk into a room, shoot the chil­dren, and leave. He actu­ally had to engage.

One warm, sum­mer evening I invited Jack­son to meet some of my close friends for the first time, a beau­ti­ful Métis fam­ily that I love dearly. They had arranged a deli­cious feast for all of us to enjoy together. As we sat down for our meal, their 4-year-old was smil­ing wildly and climb­ing all over Jack­son as if he were a jun­gle gym. His par­ents smiled warmly at me, and I was clear on the fact that every­one knew we were safe with Jack. For us, this child’s act spoke volumes—we believe that chil­dren are clos­est to the Cre­ator, and they know when they are safe.

My research isn’t over, and nei­ther is my col­lab­o­ra­tion with Jack. Many peo­ple are excited about this work, so I’m aim­ing to expand it and get us up north to meet the Dene and Métis peo­ple in the North­west Ter­ri­to­ries. It’s sort of self­ish, I guess—having Jack­son around helps me feel safe. It means there is some­one sen­si­ble to lis­ten, give use­ful feed­back, and help me to stay inspired and sane.

For now, I present to you what we have achieved so far. Jackson’s pho­tos pro­vide the beau­ti­ful images for this video, and the back­drop for the research I’ll present at the Our Peo­ple, Our Health con­fer­ence in Ottawa in the com­ing weeks. Stay tuned for more or visit my web­site, beststart.org for more information.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3YnW1793enw

Guest blog entry by Melanie Fer­ris (con­tact: m.ferris@healthnexus.ca)