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“We need to remember our journeys, stories, and songs; and recognize we are those sacred spiritual beings who descended from the Sky World to work on this spiritual journey.”
These are the words of Cayuga Elder Norma Jacobs from her book Ǫ da gaho dḛ:s: Reflecting on our Journeys that I helped with as Editor, and I wanted to start my introduction with them as a reminder of the roots from which my work arises. I was born along the great river that my French Canadien ancestors renamed, in that colonial way, St. Lawrence, and I currently live with my wife and two children in Toronto, the meeting place of the Mississauga, Seneca and Wendat. These lands and waters centre much of the work I have been doing for three decades, ever since my first social work job in a northern Indigenous community had me work out of a Roman Catholic Mission. That experience highlighted for me the ongoing position of social work in colonial missions, as well as my family’s ancestral position in these missions.
In the context of our climate of change, I am trying to imagine what could have been, what it is to be small “c” canadien, to be a family and community who lives Two Row relations in the spirit of peace, friendship and respect. This identity connects me in the fullest way to my ancestors, particularly those that begin with the French-speaking coureur de bois and habitants who lived along the St. Lawrence River and came to be called canadien in the 1600s. I am learning the spiritual responsibilities of what it is to be “canadien”, and I am trying to live and work that the best way I can. This is the spiritual vision that I now understand brought me into relationship with the sacred meeting place on the Two Row of Ǫ da gaho dḛ:s.
After completing a MSW at the University of Toronto I worked in the area of anti-violence and then in Indigenous communities on issues related to Canadian colonialism, including youth solvent abuse, high suicide rates, and family violence. Those experiences led to a PhD in Environmental Studies that allowed me to consider the relation of land and climate to colonial histories, justice, and holistic healing.The primary focus of my scholarship is creative land-based writing (as research) about Canadian/canadien ancestral issues in relation to our present climate of change, as represented in my books Climate, Culture, Change: Inuit and Western Dialogues with a Warming North (University of Ottawa Press, short-listed for 2012 Canada Prize in the Social Sciences), and the more recent A Canadian Climate of Mind: Passages from Fur to Energy and Beyond (McGill-Queens University Press, 2016). This book is centered around particular lands along the Great Lakes-St. Lawrence River corridor and what their historically changing relations tell us about healing land relations. I have also worked as Editor on the book by Gae Ho Hwako Norma Jacobs that is on renewing Two Row wampum relations and is called Ǫ da gaho dḛ:s: Reflecting on our Journeys (MQUP 2022). My current book project is focused on recovering holistic healing responses to the colonial disease that is at the core of ongoing Canadian colonial missions and our climate of change.
I have advised/supervised PhD and Masters students in the areas of environmental/social justice, place-based education/healing, land-based approaches to truth and reconciliation, and eco-spirituality. I have supported the writing and publication of both undergraduate and graduate students, including the inclusion of chapters by students in book projects. Here is a brief sample of graduate student topics that I have been involved as supervisor or committee member:
Best Practices for Social Workers Engaging with Spiritual/Religious Clients
Ecological Ethics and Social Work Therapy Practice
Environmental Justice and Land-Based Healing with Racialized Youth
Community and Arts-Integrated Approaches to Gardening and Experiences of Ecological Grief
Eco-Social Work in Climates of Change
Changing Social Work for Climatic Futures
Relational Accountability