Atikamekw Community Analysis

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This paper has for subject the Atikamekw community of the Nitaskinan, the Atikamekw territory of the Mauricie region in the province of Quebec. I will first address my personal link with this territory, as a personal reflection on the relationship I have with this territory and the Atikamekw culture, followed by the story of Atikamekw people of the Nitaskinan, and finally what is the present situation for them. Although I am a born and raised Montrealer, I did not choose to address the Indigenous community of the metropolis. The territory that was chosen for this essay is the Nitaskinan, a gigantic Atikamekw ancestral territory. This land has a special meaning to me, as I work in a summer camp called Minogami, located right next to the …show more content…

Not only does the camp offers classic camp activities such as rock climbing, hiking, arts and knowledge on natural science, it also uses canoe-camping trips as an excuse for personal development and growth. The expeditions range from 2 to 35 days on rivers and lakes, and it is surrounded by nature that the campers learn about themselves and overcome multiple challenges as they push their physical and mental limits. This close relationship to the land as a pedagogy tool has been historically part of the Atikamekw culture, as the Atikamekw Nehirowisiw (balance and union with nature) is a definition of their identity . As many institutions and camp in Canada, Indigenous heritage is appropriated and transformed, and can be seen in many aspects of most summer camps. At Minogami, camp life is cradled by Indigenous traditions, observed in the legends we tell, the song we sing and the vocabulary we use. Another example of Indigenous-based traditions we hold on to is giving feathers of different colors at the end of the stay to the campers, as a form of reward and acknowledgement of their achievement of different challenges. Moreover, many activities are traditional Indigenous ones, such as canoe and archery. It has been for a long time a great debate at the camp, how to act towards the Indigenous population of the Nitaskinan, and how to decolonize the camp. As I was never a young camper at Minogami …show more content…

Most of the current information we have on Atikamekw’s history is based on religious papers from the French missionaries and reports from the wood industry and the Hudson’s Bay Company’s . Historically, the Atikamekw people have been known to participate in the trade fur with the French colonizers, as many fur trade centers of the Hudson Bay Company were on Atikamekw territory. The Atikamekw people used to be a majority in the Nitaskinan, until the 1870s when a mass of French Canadian lumberjacks moved up North. This mass immigration from colonizers came late after the Europeans discovered Quebec, as the dense wood and harsh winter stop them from going North . The Nitaskinan historically was lust for by the wood industry, but the present situation is similar . The residential schools in the Nitaskinan started to appear in the 1930s and the last one of the area closed in

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