Not hearing Ojibway as a kid was something I didn?t give much thought to?probably because I didn?t know any different. No one spoke the language in my home.
My mother, a former student of several residential schools, was ashamed of being Indigenous. In fact, she would sometimes tell people she was French. I grew up unsure of my identity, too?not because it wasn?t talked about in our home but because of the negative interactions I had with mainstream society. Being called a ?dirty Indian? is something I?ll never forget. I had Indigenous friends growing up and we stuck together, but it was all about having sleepovers, listening to Prince and playing outdoors until sunset.
It wasn?t until I took my first Ojibway class in high school that I realized what I was missing. I wasn?t alone: The class was full of young Indigenous students clumsily learning their mother tongue. We were a bunch of insecure kids all lumped together?it was a clash of rez meets urban kids?but we all had a common goal: learning Ojibway. On some days I felt awkward, but it was also a lot of fun and we had many laughs together. The class made me feel at home?I felt like I belonged. And so, from that day forward, I sought out language classes whenever I could and in whatever city I found myself. During my 20s and onward, I also started to attend cultural ceremonies, which helped me immerse myself in the language. That thirst to speak my mother tongue only intensified when I became a mother. I suddenly felt an ...