REGINA, Sask. — It was a day of remembrance and reflection on the grounds of First Nations University of Canada on Thursday.
Sept. 24 marked the date for the FNUniv Annual Smudge Walk, which the university said was being held in honour of Indian Residential School Survivors and those who did not make it home.
Participants gathered outside the FNUniv campus building to begin the Smudge Walk, which ultimately made its way around the University of Regina campus and then back to the FNUniv building.
Afterwards, there was a community lunch, followed by the FNUniv Students’ Association – Regina Campus hosting the Late Tony Cote Welcome Back Traditional Powwow.
The day of events at the campus was held in advance of the National Day for Truth and Reconciliation on Sept. 30.
Prior to the Smudge Walk, a Truth and Reconciliation program took place in front of the campus. At that event, Dr. Jacqueline Ottmann, president of First Nations University of Canada, pointed to the day being about remembrance and also resilience.
She pointed to the negative legacy of residential schools and the “tremendous suffering” those who attended had experienced.
Ottmann said their hope was “for healing” and for “systemic change, for schools to be responsive to the harm that was caused and that we're feeling intergenerationally today.”
She pointed to children being taken away from their parents to residential schools and stripped of their identity. “So these are stories that we need to know and we need to share and we need to be responsive to,” said Ottmann.
Ottmann added that the “National Day of Truth and Reconciliation is not, should not — be limited to one day. It is something that should impact our lives in a way that changes our behaviour and how we act, how we interact with each other.”
Dr. Jeff Keshen, president of the University of Regina, also pointed to the importance of remembering the negative legacy of residential schools.
“The Smudge Walk affords the opportunity to honour, to remember the thousands of people — thousands of people who endured torturous experiences in residential schools for more than a century, both those who survived, those who were scarred for life from the traumatic experience and to remember so many who do not return home,” he said.
“The lead-up to National Truth and Reconciliation Day implores all of us to reflect on that fact, to reflect on the mistakes of our past, to learn from that past, to create a better present, to work towards a better future for the benefit of us all.”
