Raven saw:  Tradition, transition, and transformation in a northern Aboriginal community [Ontario].
Published: 2004
Language: eng
Number of pages: 277
Description: This research introduces a phenomenon which I have entitled "an explosion of community" and suggests that youth have found a way, albeit unconsciously, to re-create and perpetuate "traditional forms of culture and community interaction and response" through the taking of their own lives. The sacrifice of their lives so that others might live and experience "community" and spiritual renewal can be seen as a cry for acknowledgment and instruction from their parents and grandparents. In other words, these children are dying to be heard.This research examines the internal and external influences affecting community health and well-being across northern Ontario and the many factors that have contributed to increasing youth suicide. The devastating effects of close to twenty years of youth suicide have culturally and socially impacted Nishnawbe-Aski Nation (NAN) communities. This dissertation seeks to identify factors that contribute to and exacerbate the act of suicide as a solution to increasing community breakdown and cultural loss among the young people. This project explores the breakdown of important social mechanisms and traditions, which in turn, have prompted a transition, and contemporary transformation for the Oji-Cree. The transitioning has left their children, bereft of intimate knowledge and personal experience of traditional Oji-Cree lifeways and language.Findings of this research indicate that much of what is happening throughout the north in regards to the suicide epidemic can be directly related to spiritual malaise and the loss of practice of traditional values, language, and on the land experiences for children and youth. There are the "usual" problems in relation to the external impacts of modernity through television, political changes, sedentary behaviours, inactivity and unemployment, all of which have contributed to youthful boredom and a growing apathy. Then there are the more obvious problems associated with alcoholism, domestic violence, and declining health and wellness that plague the adults. More significantly, there is a very serious and mostly hidden plague of sexual abuse and denial that is devastating the children and blocking the vision of a healthy future.Findings further indicate that the extensive impacts of historic external and then contemporary internal change has allowed the Oji-Cree people to lose touch with their children and to discontinue the daily teaching experiences that would connect their children to the land. The children, in desperation, have unconsciously found that the aftermath of suicide creates the link to traditional activities that they have otherwise been denied.Following James Waldram (1997) I have endeavoured to make this dissertation narrative accessible and interesting to the Aboriginal community, while making every effort to satisfy the rigorous academic requirements of a doctoral thesis for the University Toronto.
Notes: Adviser:  Richard B. Lee.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Toronto, 2004.

Includes bibliographical references.

Electronic version licensed for access by U. of T. users.

Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 65-10, Section: A, page: 3889.