The Conversation: Winnipeg and virtual film series reflects the beauty of Indigenous worldviews
As written in The Conversation by Jocelyn Thorpe, Associate Professsor, Women’s and Gender Studies, History, University of Manitoba, and Kaila Johnston, Supervisor of Education, Outreach, and Public Programming, National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation, University of Manitoba
Decolonizing Lens is a film and discussion series based in Winnipeg that brings together Indigenous filmmakers, their films and audiences as a form of public education.
We began the series in 2016 after the publication of the Final Report of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) of Canada and a gathering of Indigenous and non-Indigenous students facilitated by a youth-driven movement, the 4Rs. The 4Rs engages young people in cross-cultural dialogue toward reconciliation. We helped co-ordinate the gathering at the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation (NCTR) at the University of Manitoba.
As educators, we share a commitment to Call to Action 65 of the TRC, which focuses on the roles of universities and the national centre in advancing understandings of reconciliation.
Participants at the gathering said they wanted to keep learning about Indigenous history, and about colonialism in Canada and its effects on Indigenous peoples and lands. They said they had not learned very much about these topics in elementary or high school.
Film screenings we have since organized, followed by discussions, aim to continue the conversation and help it grow.
Read more about this film series on The Conversation