My daughter, River-Jaxsen, is just two years old, but her connection to her homeland is already strong and steady. I credit that, in part, to our decision to raise her on the reservation.
She was born at the Royal University Hospital, on the traditional homelands of the Nehiyaw, Lakota, Dakota, Nakota, Dene, and Saulteaux Indigenous peoples, which settlers stole and renamed Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. She’s growing up on her father?s homelands, Poundmaker Cree Nation of Treaty 6 territory, close to North Battleford, Saskatchewan. This is where generations of her ancestors grew, played, resisted and practised their livelihoods.
Due to forced relocations and land dispossession, many reservations do not encompass or represent the original, traditional territories of Indigenous peoples. Reservations were created by the Crown to unlawfully make space for settlers. Indigenous peoples were forcefully placed on small parcels of land, with a variety of broken promises. Many of them lacked agricultural support, often leaving communities, and whole nations, to suffer. Indigenous peoples were only allowed to leave their reservations to hunt and gather for their nations with a permit from their Indian agent, and many times the permit was denied. Despite all the disparity and struggle, our relationship to the land?no matter where we live?is vital to our identity. And my partner and I do our best to teach, and ingrain that knowledge, in our daughter.
For us, ?rez life? is not what you...