Weechi metuwe mitotan: playing games of presence with Indigenous youth in Saskatchewan, Canada

ABSTRACT

This article explores the role of play and how the integration of play in the arts contributes to supporting holistic well-being in Indigenous youth. We specifically focus on ‘Games of Presence’ (Gee, personal communication, August 25, 2015) which are theatre games often categorized as warm-ups, energizers and exercises in applied theatre programmes. We draw on interviews with youth participants in our workshops and adult facilitators who have told us that these games are not just fun – they have a greater significance, in that they build trust, enabling the development of voice, positive relationships and the sharing of power. Play also connects youth to elders and cultural practices; they told us that these connections were also ways to learn about themselves. Our hope is that this article will point to the need for further research on play and youth in different cultural contexts.

KEYWORDS:

• Indigenous youth
• theatre games
• well-being
• risky play

Acknowledgements

The authors are honoured to acknowledge the youth in the high schools and Tipi Camps who participated in the programmes described here. They are thankful for the reviewers and editors for their comments and feedback on this article. They give special thanks for our colleague and director of the Indigenous Peoples Health Research Centre, Dr Jo Ann Episkenew, who suddenly passed into the spirit world in February 2016. She was integral to the work of the wider research project this programme was a part of.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes on contributors

Warren Linds’ area of expertise is applying arts-based research and applied theatre to address issues of social justice. He was a Principal Investigator on the research team in the Canadian Institutes for Health Research and the Saskatchewan Health Research Foundation funded project Acting Out! But in a Good Way, which linked well-being and the arts with Indigenous youth in Saskatchewan, Canada. He is the co-editor of Playing in a Hall of Mirrors. Applied Theatre as Reflective Practice (Sense Publishers, 2015), Emancipatory practices: Adult/youth engagement for social and environmental justice (Sense Publishers, 2010) and Unfolding bodymind: Exploring possibility through education (Holistic Education Publishers, 2004).

Megan Hyslop is a Ph.D. student at Concordia University (Montréal). She holds a B.A. in Latin American poetry and an Individualized Masters which helped initiate a green alley project in Montréal. Inspired by her relationship with the natural world and an invitation to embody joy as a healing practice, her work has focused on playful therapeutic theatre, land-based performance and nature as a world view. Her current research is an autoethnographic experiential inquiry into Clown and Mask theatre and land connection as a settler/woman of mixed European ancestry. She is also a singer, energy worker and learning herbalist.

Dr Linda Goulet is a professor of Indigenous education at the First Nations University of Canada where she teaches Indigenous pedagogies, health and arts education. Her research with First Nations youth using the arts to explore social issues of health grew out of her interest in exploring effective teaching with Indigenous youth. In addition to many other publications, she recently co-authored a book with Keith Goulet by UBC Press entitled Teaching each other: Nehinuw concepts and Indigenous pedagogies.

Victor Eduardo Jasso Juárez was a student researcher in the summer of 2015 with the project documented in this article. He has a B.A. in International Relations and has dedicated his research about the social role of fashion towards the empowerment of indigenous communities in México. He is the leader of the social enterprise Segunda Piel, which is dedicated to co-create with master-handcraft women clothing and accessories. The profit of the brand will finance a fashion design programme for the communities of artisans so they become the creative directors of the brand. He is also the coordinator of the Net of Foster homes of Querétaro, where he is in charge of the management of projects related to the strengthening of the institutions.

Notes

1 For background see the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada final report (2015). It ‘spent six years travelling to all parts of Canada to hear from the Aboriginal people who had been taken from their families as children, forcibly if necessary, and placed for much of their childhoods in residential schools’.

2 http://actingout.iphrc.ca.

3 Cree words used in the article are in the dialect of Keith Goulet who is a fluent Nehinuw (Cree) speaker and scholar from the ‘N’ dialect speaking community of Cumberland House, Saskatchewan.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by Canadian Institutes of Health Research [grant number 131597] and Saskatchewan Health Research Foundation [grant number 2782].