Tenille Campbell is a Dene-Métis photographer and writer from the English River First Nation in Saskatchewan. She is based in Saskatoon.
Last week, when I first heard about the mass burial where 215 children were found at the Kamloops Indian Residential School in B.C., I skimmed the article, taking note of who and where, how and when. I sighed deeply, shaking my head, and then read the next story.
That sounds callous and I hesitate to even mention it, but trauma is not new to Indigenous people, and sometimes it?s hard to endure yet another story. This is our reality.
But as the news was picked up, appearing in hundreds and thousands of social feeds, I realized I would have to talk with my daughter?again?about a trauma that she would hear about, be it from a misinformed classmate or on the news. I picked up Aerie from a sleepover Sunday morning, and we sat in the car. I told her about the 215 children found, and what that meant. I told her about the many residential schools that operated in Canada, and how the last one only closed in 1996. I told her about the residential school that was on our reserve, and how her Papa had attended, and when it had been torn down.
I told her about the first time I heard stories of unmarked graves, of babies being buried, and how I didn?t believe it. I was quite young, younger than her. I was ignorant, then. And I didn?t want her to grow up ignorant in this world, so even though these stories are hard to hear, hard to feel, it?s important w...