St. Albert residents can learn more about their city’s Métis roots this month through a free conversation circle at their community library.
The St. Albert Public Library has partnered with the Rupertsland Institute to offer a weekly Métis learning circle from Nov. 7 to Dec. 5. The circle will let guests discuss material from the institute’s five-part Métis Foundational Knowledge Themes course with the help of St. Albert-area Métis cultural advisers, some of whom helped write the course.
Library public services manager Stephanie Foremsky said she heard about this course last summer and thought it would be an improvement over the library’s usual offerings during Métis Week, which runs from Nov. 14 to 20.
Foremsky said this free online course served as an introduction to the history, culture, language, and governance of the Alberta Métis, and was written with the help of Michif Cultural Connections and St. Albert-area historians. Guests can take the course and come to the learning circle to discuss what they learned with knowledge holder Krista Leddy, historian Christina Hardie, and Alberta RCMP Métis community liaison Vernon Hagen.
Hardie, who works for Arts and Heritage St. Albert and is one of the authors of the course, said it is aimed at teachers but valuable to anyone with an interest in Métis culture and history.
“St. Albert has historically been a Métis settlement,” she noted.
“We’ve been a Métis community for over 200 years, and exploring that history is a great step on your own personal reconciliation path.”
Deep roots
Records show that the Métis have been around Big Lake and St. Albert since at least the 1820s, Hardie said.
“St. Albert was in the 1820s a bedroom community to Fort Edmonton,” she said, and home of the “horse guard” — the Métis who took care of the horses used by fur traders at the fort.
As written in The Black Robe’s Vision, the Métis made up the vast majority of St. Albert’s population when it was first established, and drafted the community’s first bylaws. They also formed the vast majority of the town’s first militia during the North-West Resistance. St. Albert was host to the first meeting of the Métis Famous Five, who would go on to form the Métis Nation of Alberta, and was for many years home to Thelma Chalifoux, the first Métis woman to serve in Canada’s Senate and founder of what is now Michif Cultural Connections.
Hardie said there were distinct cultural differences amongst Alberta’s Métis communities, as that identity was tied closely to the land. The St. Albert Métis tended to work with horses, for example, while ones from Jasper tended to be guides. These differences could be seen in Métis beadwork, which typically reflected the flora and fauna of where it was made.
Hardie said this was an exciting time for the Métis in Alberta, as they will vote this November on the Otipemisiwak Métis Government Constitution — a document which, if ratified, would help the Métis Nation of Alberta be recognized as an equal order of government in Canada and give the Métis more authority to negotiate rights and claims.
“Métis history isn’t something that just happened long ago,” Hardie said.
“It’s continuing today.”
The learning circle meets Mondays at 6:15 p.m. in Forsyth Hall from Nov. 7 to Dec. 5. Visit sapl.libcal.com/event/3695757 for details.
