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The Sacred Space of Womanhood: Mothering Across the Generations 1 Mothering… The Sacred Space of Womanhood Mothering Across the Generations A National Showcase on First Nations, Inuit, and Métis Women and Mothering NATIONAL COLLABORATING CENTRE CENTRE DE COLLABORATION NATIONALE FOR ABORIGINAL HEALTH DE LA SANTÉ AUTOCHTONE The Sacred Space of Womanhood: Mothering Across the Generations 1 Mothering… …is fundamental to all beings. …involves nurturing and raising children. …extends far beyond biology and bodies. …is the act and practice of love and the passing on of knowledge. …occurs across multiple times and spaces. …is political. …is life. 1.0 Introduction behavior and establish lifestyle patterns Health Council of Canada, 2011; Ing, that not only determine their children’s 2006; Simpson, 2006). The enforced, large- Mothering involves nurturing and raising future development and capacity for scale removal of Aboriginal children from children. Mothering also includes a health, but shape societies (World Health families and communities, first through complex combination of multifaceted Organization, 2005, p. 7). residential schools then through Child roles and practices that differ between Welfare policies beginning in the 1950s communities and populations of people In Canada, the transmission of language, and continuing today, have fragmented 1 around the globe. The World Health customs, and culture by Aboriginal family relationships and interrupted the Organization report (2005), Make Every women in their role as mothers, transmission of cultural practices across Mother and Child Count, highlights the grandmothers, sisters, aunts, and generations (Anderson, 2011, Ing, 2006). strong connections between mothering daughters has a protective influence on Despite these devastating impacts, the and the health and well-being of children, healthy child development and is a source resiliency of Aboriginal peoples is evident families, communities, and cultures: of strength, resiliency, and transformation in the vital role of women and mothers in (Lavell-Harvard & Lavell, 2006). The Aboriginal societies and in the resurgence Children are the future of society, and transmission of teachings and cultural of traditional and contemporary their mothers are guardians of that practices across generations of women teachings and practices around future. Mothers are much more than has traditionally ensured the strength mothering and child rearing. Strength caregivers and homemakers, undervalued and continuity of Aboriginal societies. to move forward as healthy individuals, as these roles often are. They transmit the However, this transmission has been families and communities is inextricably cultural history of families and deeply disrupted by assimilationist linked to Aboriginal women, mothers, communities along with social norms and colonial policies and interventions in the grandmothers and aunties as the bearers of traditions. Mothers influence early lives of Aboriginal peoples (Cull, 2006; future generations. 1 The term Aboriginal is used to refer to First Nations, Inuit and Métis peoples. These groups are distinct from each other with unique histories, languages and cultures and there is also significant diversity within groups. Due to availability of information, much of the material in this paper relates to First Nations. When possible, Inuit and Métis specific information has been included. 2 Mothering is not limited to relationships ourselves as mothers, models for our 2.0 Contextualizing Aboriginal between a female parent and her biological children how to live as Anishinaabeg Mothering offspring. Mothering, as a relationship and people. I believe the way we mother is the practice, is a social and cultural act that way we inoculate our children against Prior to European contact, Aboriginal occurs between multiple configurations of consumeristic throw-away culture, the women held positions of esteem in people of many generations – individually fear and self-doubt of colonialism, and their communities and were valued for and communally. This is something provide them with the skills, knowledge, their role as life-givers and mothers Indigenous peoples have always known, and courage to bring about this (Bédard, 2006; Cull, 2006; Simpson, celebrating extended families and lauding transformation. Mothering is the way we 2006). Women’s ability to bring life into the wisdom of matriarchs as it applied nurture our children with Indigenous the world was sacred and First Nations and was transmitted to all the younger interpretations of our teachings, and this women were respected as the centre of the generations of a community. Mothering, transformation begins with birth (p. 27). Nation for this reason (Monture-Angus, understood in this way as a complex 1995 in Udel, 2001). Many Aboriginal web of relational practices, was and is Despite the diversity of experiences societies were matrilineal or egalitarian fundamental to life. This is perhaps of Aboriginal motherhood, there is a (Cull, 2006) and “[w]omen were also why mothering has often been so shared reality of being different from the honoured and respected by our nations threatened while simultaneously holding dominant culture: “Aboriginal people for our contributions, for our power and the potential for (re)building the inherent generally, and Aboriginal mothers for our responsibilities as nourishers” strengths in our communities. specifically, are distinguished from other (Simpson, 2006, p. 27). Although in many Canadians by particular legal statuses and Aboriginal societies women contributed Aboriginal mothering is recognized as historical, social, and cultural experiences” heavily to subsistence food gathering, extending beyond the biological act of (Lavell-Harvard and Lavell, 2006, p. 2). child rearing, household work and care giving birth and involving a multitude This experience of being distinct from of elderly, the gendered division of labour of roles and relationships across times, the dominant culture “has a significant was equally valued and flexible (Fiske, spaces and generations. Nevertheless, as impact on our ability to mother as we 1992; Royal Commission on Aboriginal editors of a book on Aboriginal mothering see fit, according to our own values, and Peoples [RCAP], 1996b). Mothering roles Lavell-Harvard and Lavell (2006) traditions” (Ibid, p. 2). were central to women’s social position contend, despite their years of experience and women who “successfully raised their as Aboriginal mothers, articulating This paper provides background and families and provided care and nurturing an adequate definition of “Aboriginal context on Aboriginal mothering for a to the needy became influential as family Mothering” remains difficult. For them, two-day national showcase, The Sacred spokespersons” (Fiske, 1992, p. 202). this is in part because of the challenge of Space of Womanhood: Mothering Across describing the multiplicity of experiences the Generations, hosted by the National With colonization came complex changes of Aboriginal mothers through a non- Collaborating Centre on Aboriginal to women’s roles within Aboriginal Aboriginal language that is inherently Health taking place January 24-25, 2012 communities (Cull, 2006; Fiske, inadequate in capturing Aboriginal in Ottawa, Ontario. The paper begins by 1992; Lavell-Harvard & Lavell, 2006). worldviews and values (Lavell-Harvard contextualizing Aboriginal mothering, Catholicism undermined and eroded & Lavell, 2006). For Bédard (2006), followed by a description of teachings Indigenous women’s healing practices, daughter of an Anishinaabe mother and and practices related to mothering and perceptions of menstrual powers, and French Canadian father, and a scholar, how these have been transmitted across birth rituals (Fiske, 1992). Western painter and craftswoman, “being a generations of women. This section follows patriarchal ideals of motherhood include mother and grandmother is about family, the different stages of becoming and being the ideas that “only biological mothers spirituality, and relationships” (p. 74), and a mother including: family planning, can properly care for children; mothering Anishinaabe mothering and motherhood pregnancy, birth, caring for infants, and is a 24 hour a day, seven days a week “includes concepts of lifegiving, parenting children. This is followed by a commitment; a child’s needs come before fostering, adoption, raising-up, aunties, brief overview of some of the issues facing the mother’s; (and) mothers must rely on and grannies” (p. 67). Simpson (2006) Aboriginal mothers today, including the experts for advice…” (Gosselin, 2006, articulates the wide reaching impact that decisions about early childhood programs p. 198). This ideal is unattainable for most mothering can have on children’s identity and their utility to mothering. The paper caucasian, middle-class, heterosexual and their ability to resist the influences of concludes with some considerations and women; those who do not fit these western culture when she says that: strategies for building on community socionormative parameters find their strengths to support Aboriginal mothering [T]he way we mother is incredibly mothering under additional and constant in contemporary society. important, because the way we conduct scrutiny and regulation (Gosselin, 2006, The Sacred Space of Womanhood: Mothering Across the Generations 3 Cull, 2006). These values and ideals experiences of poverty, mental health a sacred purpose. It is inherent in and give little credence to the historical issues, addictions, and domestic violence connected
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