Knowledge Transfer Project

A collaboration between the Victoria Native Friendship Centre and the University of Victoria

Acknowledgements

The work carried out in this project has taken place on the lands of the Čeqʷəŋín ʔéʔləŋ (CHEKONIEN) family as well as the KOSAMPSEM family of the Lək̓wəŋən peoples, represented today by the Esquimalt and Songhees Nations (Saanich Parks (n.d.); Songhees Nation, 2015).

As settlers, we are only beginning to understand the ancestral rights of the Lək̓wəŋən and W̱SÁNEĆ peoples as well as our responsibilities as uninvited guests on this land. We are very grateful to be involved in the process of situating the invaluable knowledge transfer of many cultures within the local context. We hope to respectfully contribute to the strengthening of all relations between peoples as well as these lands through this project.

We would like to graciously thank the VNFC for welcoming us into the space and allowing us to have this amazing learning experience. Especially the elders and senior for sharing their knowledge with us as well as the youth from the Two-spirit gathering. We would also like to thank Tanya, Maleea and Ken for mentoring us through this process.


Introduction

The Big Picture

The Knowledge Transfer Project is an ongoing program that aims to recognise the importance of ceremony with knowledge transfer, and create space where knowledge for and about urban Indigenous people can be honoured and acknowledged. It was created in response to the generational gap in performing ceremonies which are central to the transfer of knowledge. This gap was forced by genocidal colonial rule and legally upheld by the Indian Act. which prohibited and criminalised Potlatches and forced the displacement of Indigenous children from their family's and communities to place them in Residential Schools.

The objectives of this project include:

  • Create opportunities where knowledge for and about urban Indigenous people is shared in a culturally and contextually respectful and relevant manner to the greater community. 
  • Dismantle barriers for urban Indigenous works of knowledge to be shared. 
  • Host urban ceremonies to celebrate diverse forms of Indigenous knowledge while honouring and respecting traditional knowledge and cultural practices. 

The program is based on a relationship between the VNFC and UVic and supported by UN K4C Salish Sea Hub. It is a part of the larger Bridging Knowledge Cultures program which aims to decolonise knowledge production and promote the co-creation of knowledge through community based and Indigenous-led research training and mentorship.

Our Focus

We are in the first of two project phases, the Development phase which includes the  initial planning, design, and conceptualization of opportunities for ongoing knowledge sharing. This phase will be followed by the Delivery Phase in which knowledge sharing opportunities will be hosted in partnership with the Bruce Parisian Library

Our focus this semester was to facilitate discussion around the following question:

How can we honor the diversity and specificity of urban Indigenous knowledge and ceremony on lək̓ʷəŋən territory?



To do this, we used Community Mapping and discussed potential future directions for the Knowledge Transfer Poster.


Community Mapping

In this project community mapping was used as a tool to draw out and visualise urban Indigenous knowledge relating to the community at the VNFC

Community mapping was employed at two community events: the knowledge transfer event, held at the VNFC on March 7, 2024, and the 2-Spirit Youth Gathering, held on February 7, 2024.

Knowledge Transfer Poster

The Knowledge Transfer Poser was created by a previous cohort of students (UVic Geography Participatory Research Class, Winter 2023), of which one student continued on to this semester's project.

This poster is meant to be a visual representation of community responses to the four questions that border the poster. These responses were collected at an event on June 6th, 2023, as part of the VNFC’s Knowledge Transfer Project. The main themes of Access, Local Knowledge, Diversity, and Culture were identified through the responses, connected and supported by a fifth theme of Relationships. In the river and wind, we have included quotes from responses. The sun holds a chart that shows the ancestral ties of elders and seniors who participated in the Knowledge Transfer Project, revealing the diversity of respondents. The SENĆOŦEN plant names ground us and honour local peoples’ knowledge.

At our two events, we continued to gather feedback from the community on the poster. Our hope is that the Knowledge Transfer Poster continues to evolve and grow as a living record of what knowledge transfer means to the community, this guiding the delivery phase of this project.

2-Spirit Youth Gathering

In preparation for the 2 Spirit Youth Gathering event, we wanted to create a resource for the 2SLGBTQ+ community through the community mapping activity that we would be hosting. We worked to design an activity tailored for the queer community who would be at the event that focused on their personal experiences within Victoria. A few questions about what ceremony means to participants was also provided at our station and gave us an insight into how we would approach our next event in which the significance of ceremony would be the main focus.

At the 2 Spirit Youth Gathering event, we asked participants to tell us about a place that they know of where they personally feel safe as a 2 Spirit or queer person, or a place they know that is 2SLGBTQ+ friendly. Participants could place a sticker on the map to mark the location of their place, and write a description of the place on a separate form. The responses were plotted on the map below and the pop-ups include the participants' descriptions of their place. The intention behind this map is for it to be the start of a resource for 2 Spirit and queer people in the region to share safe spaces, and it can continue to grow and change as more points are added.

VNFC 2 Spirit Gathering Map

Knowledge Transfer Event

Being facilitators for an entire event meant that as a group we wanted to ensure that the activities that we were asking participants to partake in would be engaging and valuable for them and the VNFC. Asking the VNFC community questions about ceremony was our main focus for this event. We spent time creating a range of activities for people to engage with, including a mapping station with maps of Victoria along with question cards and sheets that asked participants about their connection to place in different ways. In wanting to make sure that we took an asset based approach to community mapping, we also set up an arts station and provided recording technology for participants to express themselves at.

Below is a map of these locations and by pressing on the points, the written responses associated with them will pop up. We hope that this online map can continue to be added onto by participants, providing users a chance to view these locations and see their significance to people, whilst also decolonising understandings of ceremony.

VNFC Ceremony Map

Artwork from Knowledge Transfer Event

Art is a powerful way of showing the complex emotions and associations that experiences have for people. Seeing this process happen in person was inspiring, with everybody's creations conveying rich and unique expressions of what ceremony means to them. Having all the art supplies available to us that we did, meant that there was a multitude of different ways that people could convey their feelings such by collaging, painting, and drawing. It was a really positive space to be a part of, with personal expression and enthusiasm all around.

Findings and Reflections from the Two Events

Participants' responses included key themes of the environment and connection to others, both physically and meta-physically. Deeply personal stories and experiences were shared and showed the great significance that these sacred locations have with members of the community. Continued colonization and climate change pose threats to these places of deep connection such as urbanization and logging practices, something that was raised amongst participants responses. We received lots of responses at both events, however at the Knowledge Transfer event there was not a high community turnout. Nonetheless, our efforts helped to contribute to the VNFC's goals of promoting the sharing of urban Indigenous knowledge in a way that respects and honors it.

Being at the VNFC for the Two-Spirit and Knowledge Transfer events gave us opportunities to engage with the community. We came away from both feeling like the work that we were doing was having a positive impact on people, judging by feedback that we received from participants. Our asset based approach to knowledge sharing provided participants the chance to respond to our questions in ways that resonated with them the most. Community mapping in this way which focuses on personal accounts and spiritual connections works to decolonize the mapping space and wider society. The efforts between us and the VNFC this semester have the potential to be continued in the future with further knowledge sharing events, modifications to the knowledge transfer poster, and adding onto the online maps that we made.

Credits

Isabel Hurtado, Zoé Lardiere, Bram Davidson