2. Women's Perspectives - Christian Aboriginal Infrastructure ...

S. Woman has had a traditional role as Centre, maintaining the fire — the fire which is at
the centre of our beliefs. She is the Keeper of the Culture. She has been able to play that
role even in a home divided….She has maintained her role despite intermarriage which
caused her to be cut off from her roots, both legislatively and sometimes
physically….Her home is divided as a result of….I don't know how many more ways you
can divide her house and she'll continue to maintain that fire — but she will!
O. In addition to all the responsibilities already talked about, perhaps the most daunting
for woman, is her responsibility for the men — how they conduct themselves, how they
behave, how they treat her. She has to remind them of their responsibilities and she has to
know when and how to correct them when they stray from those. At the beginning, when
the 'others' first came here, we held our rightful positions in our societies, and held the
respect due us by the men, because that's the way things were then, when we were
following our ways. At that time, the European woman was considered an appendage to
her husband, his possession. Contact with that…and the imposition of his ways on our
people, resulted in our being assimilated into those ways. We forgot our women's
responsibilities and the men forgot theirs. 7
These views are supported by Winona Stevenson, who suggests that "the deconstruction
of our colonization will shed considerable light on why our communities are so troubled
today and why Aboriginal women are at the bottom of Canada's socio-economic
ladder….[O]ur re-education will serve to bring more people home, to encourage our
youth and lost ones to safely reconnect with their pasts and communities." She concludes,
"Once our beliefs become founded on more secure bases, individual confidence, selfesteem
and pride will grow." 8
During our public hearings, Aboriginal women spoke of a time when these systems and
forms of social organization were strong:
We believe that true Aboriginal government must reflect the values which our pre-contact
governments were based upon. We point out that, according to traditional teachings, the
lodge is divided equally between women and men, and that every member has equal if
different rights and responsibilities within the lodge. Historically, the lodge was a
political as well as a spiritual centre of our societies. In the context of political theory,
there was no division between church and state. The lodge governed our relationship with
each other, with other nations, and with the Creator and all of Creation.
Marilyn Fontaine
Aboriginal Women's Unity Coalition
Winnipeg, Manitoba, 23 April 1992
Inuit women remembered what it was like:
When I was a young girl, people used to work together, together in communities. My
father at that time, he was the Chief Elder and he was responsible for the communities
and for their well-being…in regard to hunting, hunting caribou, fishing and helping older
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