From Mont Louis to Sharbot Lake, with love, music, and the spirit of truth and reconciliation

Jeff Green | Sep 30, 2020

Amidst all the concerns about school reopening, class sizes and protocols, Granite Ridge Education Centre (GREC) took on another project over the last couple of weeks.

The school organised a welcoming ceremony for a grandmother drum that was made for the school by Henry Junior Wilson, a Mi'kmaq elder who lives in Mont Louis, on the St. Lawrence River, Gaspesie, Quebec.

The ceremony took place on Tuesday afternoon (September 29). Danka Brewer, of Tichborne, who has worked as an Indigenous knowledge facilitator for the Limestone and 4 other school boards in the region for many years, has a special relationship with Granite Ridge.

“I consider Granite Ridge my community school. My children went therel, my grandchildren will go here. Henry Junior Wilson is my adopted brother from Mont Louis, where I have been going for about 15 years each summer, to spend time at the teaching lodge and sweat lodge, and where I was adopted into the community. I have been talking to Junior for 7 years about a big drum for the school, and last year he started building one,” she said, in a telephone interview on the morning of the ceremony.

About ten years ago, there was a ceremony at Sharbot Lake High School (the precursor to Granite Ridge) to awaken hand drums that had been built by students at the school with help from Danka and some other traditional elders from the community.

A year ago, Junior asked Danka how big a drum she was looking for. She told him it needed to be big in order for 6 students to sit around it. He decided to build the drum, a process that starts with a moose harvest, followed by scraping the flesh off the hide and preparing and tanning the hide. The drum itself is made of aspen, and the stand is made of pine and cedar on the bottom. The drum is suspended within the frame, held onto the frame with straps. It cost $750 in materials, which was provided by the school council, and Junior did not charge for his labour. When it came time to assemble the drum, he was joined by Rene Bouchard, Helene Voyeur and Manon, two men and two women. The assembly took a day. The drum arrived in August, and was brought to the school when the students arrived in September.

Danka Brewer says that the drum will be a unifying force at GREC.

“When the big drum is played the vibrations of the drum go through everything. The purpose of the drum is to heal the community, and bring everybody to a good place. When I talk to the kids about reconciliation, it is about rebuilding, renewing and re-establishing friendly relations. When we are drumming, all the kids get together, it is not about class or wealth, it is about all the kids. It is both a teaching drum and a healing drum and that is what we are going to celebrate today.”

The dedication ceremony was held in front of the school, with limited attendance because of COVID19 protocols. Some of the high school students seated around the drum, and others were on an adjacent staircase with hand drums. Principal Emily Yanch said “music has always played a role in connecting us all. It truly is a universal language, with an ability to unite us all. With the gift of the grandmother drum, we can further learn about the past and how we arrived here today.”

Student Dakota Johnson presented the land acknowledgement, “saying there can be no better time as allies of the Indigenous community here, and as stewards of this land, to acknowledge the ongoing teachings of our knowledge keeper, to listen to each other and to respect this living, breathing land.”

Krishna Burra, who was the board’s liaison for Indigenous programming before taking on the role of Director of Education this past summer, presented gifts from the board to the knowledge keepers in attendance: Candace Lloyd of the Highland Waters Metis Community Council (whose headquarters is in Northbrook) and to Danka Brewer.

He then prefaced his remarks by talking about his own education in both the old Frontenac County Board of Education and in the faculty of history at Queen’s University.

“I have to admit that my formal education did not provide much information, let alone any depth about Indigenous people and their history … my learning, like many Canadians, has only been in the last few years. This general lack of knowledge among non-Indigenous people, highlights the historical divide and distortion in what non-Indigenous people learned about Indigenous people. This educational experience, or lack thereof, must be contrasted with the educational experience that too many Indigenous people endured for many generations, Indigenous children were pulled out of their homes and communities to attend residential schools, while residential schools tried to remove all semblance of culture and language from Indigenous people, non-Indigenous people did not learn accurate information about the traditions, history and understanding of this land. The history has included cultural genocide as it relates to Indigenous people.”

He then said that while education has been part of what has gotten us into “this mess, it also must be part of the solution, and reconciliation, moving forward.”

He then quoted Wab Kinew, who said “reconciliation is not something that occurs on a grand level, when a prime minister and national chief shake hands. It takes place at a much more individual level. It is realised when two people come together and understand that what they share unites them, and that what is different about them needs to be respected.”

That is how he characterises the “work that is being done here at Granite Ridge.”

Amrit Kaillon said “today we receive the gift of a grandmother drum,” and said it makes her think about her grandmother and mother, and all of the women who came before me. I think on the “lessons that they taught to their sons and daughters, and the lessons that their daughters eventually taught to me.”

She pointed out that the dedication of the grandmother drum calls us to “plainly remember that these lands were taken from, not given by, the Algonquin people … as a member of this community I am humbled by our Algonquin friends, who have extended this gift in the name of remembrance and reconciliation.”

Vice Principal Kristin Stewart introduced Danka Brewer, who recounted the story of the making of the drum. She delivered a message from Junior Henry Wilson and a message from the drum itself.

“I am mother earth’s heartbeat and the sacred gift of creation. I am the universal heartbeat of the secular and supernatural worlds. I help you to reconnect to your ancestors … I help ground you in the truth of your existence. I put you in touch with creation itself. I speak to all people equally and peacefully … I am a powerful, non-verbal form of peaceful communication … my top represents the sky, my bottom represents the earth, my stitching connects the two and represents the warriors of peace who play me.”

In the ceremony that followed, yellow, red, black, and white hand prints were applied to the drum. The students each applied a thumb print on the drum with paint, which is what all graduation students at GREC will do in the future.

The students then performed three songs on the drum and with their hand drums before the ceremony ended, followed, in the Algonquin tradition, with a feast.

Because of social distancing rules, the student body at GREC could not witness the ceremony in person, but it was live-streamed to each of the classrooms in the school.