Windspeaker Publication

As it turned out, Brandon Montour simply needed a bit more exposure.

Despite being an offensively gifted defenceman who put up some decent numbers, Montour was bypassed by all 30 clubs in both the 2012 and 2013 National Hockey League Entry Drafts.

But for the 20-year-old, who lives in the Six Nations town of Ohsweken, Ont., it was a case of him being third time lucky. He was…

Marie-Anne Gagnon has discovered that Canada’s Centennial cookbooks provide more than recipes.

“By putting everything together, there is an overarching discourse of Aboriginal people being in the past and that modernity is emphasized to legitimize the claim of Euro-Canadians for being in Canada, and this is my interpretation,” said Gagnon.

Her major research paper for her…

Artist Philip Cote wants to educate the country about Indigenous heroes, one school at a time. He’s created a series of 11 posters spanning 350 years as part of his Master’s thesis at Ontario College of Art and Design University in Toronto.

The series starts with Sahgimah, Odawa Chief, described as “the leader most feared by the Iroquois”, and ends with internationally-renowned singer…

“The Reverend” influenced through music, traditional teachings

Percy Tuesday didn’t claim to be an Elder, partly because he thought the spiritual persona conflicted with his earlier, rambunctious days of playing honky tonk bars on Winnipeg’s Main Street.

But perhaps more than anything, he was too humble to assume the title.

“The thing is, everyone called…

Odjick’s Terminal Disease

Former National Hockey League player Gino Odjick is asking for privacy after revealing he has a rare terminal disease. Odjick, an Algonquin who was born in Maniwaki, Que., wrote a letter which was published on the Vancouver Canucks’ website in late June. Odjick wrote that two months earlier he was diagnosed with AL amyloidosis, a disease which…

Compiled by Shari Narine

Locally undertaken report contradicts government’s cancer findings

A report released in early July by the Athabasca Chipewyan and Mikisew Cree First Nations, in collaboration with researchers from the University of Manitoba, draws an association between oil sands produced environmental contaminants and declines in community health and…

What was supposed to have been an easy assignment for Sally Simpson turned into a labour of love and an appreciation of how hard Aboriginal women have had to work – and continue to work – to break into a European-dominated North American society.
In 2012, Simpson, a student at Wilfred Laurier University and enrolled in an Indigenous Women’s course, was working on a class project to honour…

If the information and documentation gathered during the residential schools’ Independent Assessment Process are to be kept, they do not belong with the federal government.

“Why is Canada having so much influence with what happens to these? This is Canada’s holocaust,” said IAP claimant Michael Cachagee, who is also a health support worker.

According to a statement issued by the…

Building bridges between Indigenous peoples and the immigrant community is becoming a priority as Canada welcomes more newcomers to the country.

“When immigrants and newcomers come in, they’re given the view of people’s discriminatory views. They get off on the wrong foot of understanding Aboriginal people and how we’ve come to be,” said Brad Bird, cultural coordinator with Aboriginal…

Now that the Membertou First Nation is able to access money through the First Nations Finance Authority, it will be saving tens of thousands of dollars in bank charges.

“We have two large bank loans at regular banks at much higher rates and much shorter terms. With our borrowing capacity we’re able to borrow enough to pay off these bank loans. By doing that we’re able to save between $…

The Urbane Indian

There are four things in this country that all Native people will be asked or told at some point in their Aboriginal existence:  Do you have a spirit name? I love Tom King/Joseph Boyden/Sherman Alexie/A Tribe Called Red/Robbie Robertson. What the hell do you people want?  And finally, did you or someone in your family go to residential school?

All important,…

Andrew (Shoon) Keewatin, Jr. admits he wasn’t surprised when his nine-year court battle against logging on Grassy Narrows First Nation’s traditional territories was defeated July 11 in the Supreme Court of Canada.

“It was the kind of decision I was expecting,” the trapper and hunter tells Windspeaker, his home full of furs harvested from his extensive traplines. But taking the Ontario…

When B.C. First Nations formally launched a series of nine long-promised constitutional challenges to the federally-approved Enbridge Northern Gateway on July 14, they cited one single court case over and over.

If anything, it bolsters the argument that the Supreme Court of Canada’s unanimous 8-0 ruling on the decades-old Tsilqhot’in nation lawsuit on June 26 truly was as ground-…

As we head to press, the Assembly of First Nations is wrapping up Day Two of its assembly in Halifax, and while there wasn’t the spitting and hissing that marred the May meeting of the organization, tensions were heightened and loins girded for any sign of bullying and abuse.

Still, the business conducted July 15, particularly, was often mired in layer upon layer of confusion over…