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Indigenous Law & Idle No More

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Indigenous Law & Idle No More Justice as Healing A Newsletter on Aboriginal Concepts of Justice • 2015 • Vol.20, No.1 • Native Law Centre 1 Indigenous Law & Idle No INDIGENOUS LAW More & 2015 CanLIIDocs 257 • • • • • Justice as Healing is published by the Native Law Centre, University IDLE NO MORE of Saskatchewan. We welcome and About the Author: Sylvia McAdam (Saysewahum) is a nêhiyaw woman, a citizen of the nehiyaw invite your submissions, comments Nation. Her father is a hereditary okimâw (chief/leader) from the Stony Lake (Delaronde) lands. and ideas. Newsletter submissions Her mother is registered under the Indian Act with Whitefish Lake Reserve #118 (Big River First can be made via email sent to: Nation). Her father, without his consent, is registered under the same lands with his wife. Sylvia Justice as Healing Newsletter is a direct descendant of Treaty peoples; a mix of nêhiyaw and nakawê (Saulteaux) peoples. Native Law Centre Sylvia has her Juris Doctorate (LL.B.) from the University of Saskatchewan and a Bachelor of University of Saskatchewan Human Justice (B.H.J.) degree from the University of Regina. She is a recipient of the Carol Geller 160 Law Building Human Rights Award, Foreign Policy’s Top 100 Global Thinkers Award, Social Justice Award, 15 Campus Drive 2014 Global Citizen Award and received several eagle feathers from Indigenous communities. Saskatoon SK S7N 5A6 Sylvia is co-founder of a global grassroots Indigenous led resistance called “Idle No More (www. Canada idlenomore.ca). http://www.usask.ca/nativelaw/ Sylvia is a mother, grandmother, sister, and a passionate protector and defender of all lands, publications/jah.php waters, and animals. Her greatest solace and joy is being on her peoples’ land and waters. Telephone: (306) 966-6196 Fax: (306) 966-6207 The following are excerpts from Sylvia McAdam’s new book, Nationhood Interrupted: Revitalizing Email: [email protected] nêhiyaw Legal Systems.* • • • • • Chapter One: Introduction giving permission for all who are attending ahâw … pîhtokwêk the event, ceremony, or activity to come Aboriginal (Indigenous) Hunters in. It is the sacred “helpers,” male and always speak as if the keepers of female, who lead the way for any nêhiyaw the spirits of nature are in control of the gathering, event, or ceremony. So it is hunt. The hunters do not believe that their for this book. All that is contained here awareness or skills have any controlling ideally would have been shared and taught authority in their hunt. They say the to all nêhiyaw people, and all who share forces of nature are watching them, know in their circle. So this spirit of sharing everything on their minds, and what and and transferring informs the knowledge how they behave in the hunt. The spiritual provided for readers. For as long as the forces decide which animals will be made collective memory of the nêhiyawak available and caught, thus determining (Crees) can recall, their sacred ceremonies the success of the hunt. The creation of have existed with the oskâpêwis (helper) this book followed this pattern, with the leading each way. The term oskâpêwis many spirits and forces controlling its carries profound obligations and production and contents. responsibilities guided by nêhiyaw laws, - Sa’ke’j Henderson protocols, and methodologies – task and “AHÂW … PÎHTOKWÊK” IS AN a role not easily met. Each role, each ANCIENT CALL from the oskâpêwis teaching, each learning is believed to heal 2 Justice as Healing • 2015 • Vol.20, No.1 and nurture the soulflame of each human soulflame is a gift from the Creator with the creations are called manitow being. When a ceremonial song calls out and with it comes pimâtisiwin (life). wiyinikêwina, meaning Creator’s laws; the spirits keepers of nêhiyaw laws, the This life carries many obligations and however, for the human laws, they are vibrations are felt through the generations: responsibilities. Prior to the arrival of called nêhiyaw wiyasiwêwina. At the time a connection binding all the Creator’s the Europeans, a nêhiyaw child would of treaty making in Treaty 6 territory, these children and creations. have been taken into a ceremony, a form laws guided the process. When treaties The nêhiyaw kêhtê-ayak have of welcoming him/her into the nation. became binding, it became a ceremonial historically been wary of writing down This ceremony is performed for every covenant of adoption between two the laws of their nations. child with prayer and with wâhkôhtowin families. “kiciwâminawak, our cousins: (kinship). wâhkôhtowin is constantly that is what my elders said to call you.” In affirmed and enforced throughout the nêhiyaw law, the treaties were adoptions The languages and child’s life. Since European contact, the of one nation by another. At Treaty 6 the traditions of the Indigenous birth has been disrupted, and nêhiyawak adopted the Queen and her Indigenous peoples much of the teachings that are involved children. We became relatives. When were illegalized through the Indian Act, your ancestors came to this territory, are disappearing along with the ceremonies. kiciwâminawak, our law applied. These 2015 CanLIIDocs 257 at a heartbreaking The ancient echoes of nêhiyaw laws kinship relationships were active choices, rate... can still be heard in the languages, lands, a state of relatedness or connection by and cultures of the Treaty 6 nêhiyawak. adoption. Indigenous laws, specifically When the Europeans arrived in Canada, nêhiyaw (Cree) laws, were the vehicle that Indigenous nations lived in diverse, drove the process and the signing. Many and, with this in mind, the following vibrant, and structured societies. It is of these laws have not been recorded or statement gives concession to begin likely that all the Indigenous nations understood; however, they are imperative writing down nêhiyaw laws. But the had their own laws and legal systems in treaty understanding and negotiations. spiritual laws can never be written down: which guided and directed the people It is these same laws that became hidden They need to be taught both ways in in their daily interactions with families, through the processes of colonialism and respect. When I hear “What are we going communities, and other nations. Treaty must now be revitalized for the wellbeing to do?” as I heard here today, perhaps, 6 is created on the foundations of the of the nêhiyaw Nation. we now have to seriously rely on the nêhiyaw laws and legal systems from the The women’s teachings are the knowledgeable elders and how things understanding of the nêhiyaw people. educational system of the nêhiyaw Nation. should be properly written on paper. I said Everything in creation has laws and There existed a group of women called that today, certain oral knowledge has to these are called manitow wiyinikêwina. okihcitâwiskwêwak whose role was to be written on paper. We have to call on The human laws are called nêhiyaw provide the legal “system” of the nêhiyaw our elders, the ones that know how things wiyasiwêwina. people. These women invoked the laws were conducted and how they observed, and provided remedies on a case-by- listened and properly learned this vital The Indigenous case basis, depending on the situation or information. We need to go to these things people are not a circumstances before them. As well, the and use them as protection for the future. lawless people; the women are the first to carry each child We have to teach our youth these things. born into the nation. Each human being has a profound Creator’s laws are Children are expected to assist in and sacred beginning. This beginning strict and inform braiding hair, but most importantly, our is believed to come from a sacred place every part of a mother earth’s hair. Mother earth’s hair is where the Creator resides. The Indigenous person’s life. the sweetgrass (wîhkaskwa). Sweetgrass human birth teaching is shared on the is integral and essential in any nêhiyaw understanding that, when we are born into ceremony; it is difficult to conduct a our humanity, we are born into our nation’s It is these laws that governed and guided ceremony without this sacred item. obligations and responsibilities. The first in the days when Europeans did not walk The picking and braiding of sweetgrass human being’s arrival was prepared when the territories of Indigenous people. These is a ceremony in itself, and requires the Creator gathered together all manner laws still exist and can be revitalized. knowledge and patience on the part of of animals from all over the world. After nêhiyaw laws are in the songs, the picker. Our mother earth’s teachings the earth preparations were done, the the ceremonies, and in all the sacred and the women’s teachings cannot be told Creator prepared in the spirit world. sites. The land is intertwined in a most without one or the other because they are In the spirit world, a flame was profound manner, so to separate the two interconnected. prepared: this flame would be called would mean death to many aspects of The gift of language, ahcahk iskotêw, the soulflame. The nêhiyaw culture. All the laws combined kinêhiyawêwininaw, is a powerful and Justice as Healing • 2015 • Vol.20, No.1 3 sacred gift a parent can give a child. This are diverse and unique. In this, iyiniw Reserve #118. I was about nine years old same gift has been given to the human miyikowisiwin are the First Nations at the time when I asked her, “Why do beings by the Creator. The nêhiyawak laws, First Nations understandings of you like gopher soup nohkom?” She said, have been given this language, which is Creation and sacred relationships with “When we were not allowed to leave the heard all across much of Treaty 6 territory.
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