Ambe omaa!!

It is time the waters break free from the winter sleep, and it is the time when Anishinaabe-Kwe place water offerings to bodies of water in their respective traditional territories. At Just Waters, we have journeyed through a year of listening to grandmothers share the teachings of respecting water, what is our relationship to water and what are our responsibilities to water– now we come full circle and share the importance of reciprocity. 

Come spend the evening with Grandmother Judy Da Silva, Grandmother Chickadee Richard, and Grandmother Ivy Canard as they share teachings about the water offering and conduct the water offering ceremony at the traditional meeting place which we know as The Forks, at the confluence of the Red and Assiniboine Rivers. 

Offerings are a way of acknowledging and honouring a respectful relationship with the spirit of all living things – people, land, water, and all of Creation. Offerings are given with humility and gratitude, acknowledging that nothing is taken without giving something in return. Offerings carry intention, prayers, sincerity, serving as a bridge between spiritual world and this physical world.

The gathering will also feature an artist talk with KC Adams, Jaimie Isaac, and Val. T. Vint in respect to  Niimaamaa, a 30-foot-tall sculpture located at Niizhoziibean (the pedestrian loop connecting The Forks and St. Boniface and linked to the Tache Promenade). Niimaamaa was created by a collaboration of KC Adams, Jaimie Isaac and Val Vint.

Following the artist talk, we will work together to create posters that can be used on water walks and to advocate for the waters. Stencils, paper and pastels will be provided. All are welcome- whether you consider yourself to be an artist or not, you will be able to create something powerful!

We invite you to bring your hand drums and shakers (rattles), if you have them, to join us in singing the water song. No registration is required and there will be a light supper available. The event will take place in the 2nd Floor Event Space in The Forks Market. If you have any questions, please reach out to sarah.deckert@umanitoba.ca

The event will look something like this:

• 5:30 Water offering teachings & ceremony
• 6:15 Those who are able can walk down to the river to place the offering
• 6:45 Artist talk with Jaimie Isaac and Val T. Vint
• 7:15 Poster making
• 8:30 Closing

About the Speakers

Grandmother Chickadee Richard

Benais Quimiwin Ikwe – Thunder Rain Woman, or Chickadee Richard, is a member of the Sandy Bay First Nation, raised alongside the west side of Lake Manitoba. She is a mother of three biological children and two adopted sons, a Grandmother of seven children, and an aunt or grandmother to many in the Indigenous communities across Turtle Island. She has worked alongside many great grassroots leaders of the Indigenous communities making safe places for our peoples. Chickadee has done a lot of community capacity building in creating and delivering workshops. She is a proud Anishinaabekwe who has dedicated her life for the betterment of the life of our land, our water, and our Indigenous communities. She has been a believer and educator for change and for justice for many years regionally and nationally, by creating awareness and sharing the strength and beauty of our Indigenous culture. She has worked with peoples who are open and willing to change the current ways that still harm our land, waters, and our peoples’ ways of life.

Grandmother Judy Da Silva

Judy Da Silva, a Grassy Narrows community member, is a mother to 5 children.  They help her to have the positive energy to continue to look for justice and for the solution to the mercury poisoning of their river system in Grassy Narrows & Mother Earth.  She recently was awarded the Michael Sattler Peace Prize in Germany and Human Rights Watch Award in Toronto, the Art Manuel Environmental Award & Wilfred Laurier honorary doctorate  in recognition of her lifelong work to advocate for her community members for environmental protection using peaceful, nonviolent direct actions. Judy suffers from the effects of mercury poisoning. She works in the band office of her community as environmental health coordinator.

Grandmother Ivy Canard

I am from Sagkeeng First Nation. I am a water and land protector. I have received my water teachings from Grandmother Florence Paynter. I also am learning the teachings from Judy Da Silva and Chickadee Richard. I am first degree Medewin for 2 years now. I am also a pipe carrier. I go to various communities in Manitoba to share the water teachings and ceremony.

Ramona Milliea

Ramona has two traditional names, Miskoginewawaashiik and Waabishki Mikinak Iskwew. She is third degree Midewiwin and is from the Migizi (Bald Eagle) Clan. Ramona is Anishinaabe, Cree, and Nakoda from the Peguis First Nation within Treaty 1 territory. She has spent most of her career working in roles that protect and uphold the Treaty and Aboriginal Rights of Indigenous peoples, particularly in the development and implementation of policies and programs related to natural resource management and to wholistic healing. Ramona is dedicated to learning and working with traditional medicines, attending ceremonies, and travelling to and dancing at powwows.

KC Adams

KC Adams (Ininnew/Anishinaabe/British) is a registered Fisher River Cree Nation member living in Winnipeg. KC is a relational maker, educator, activist, and mentor who creates work that explores technology in relation to her Indigenous culture. Adams is nationally and internationally known maker with a B.F.A. from Concordia University and an M.A. in Cultural Studies, Curatorial Stream from the University of Winnipeg. KC has had numerous solo and group exhibitions, residencies and biennales. KC was awarded the Winnipeg Arts Council’s Making A Mark Award, Canada’s Senate 150 medal, the Ohpinamake Award, and the Quill & Quire’s 2019 Books of the Year.

Jaimie Isaac

Jaimie Isaac (she/her/hers), Just Waters Research Matriarch, is a curator and interdisciplinary artist, Anishinaabe member of Sagkeeng First Nation and is of British heritage. She was the Chief Curator at the Art Gallery of Greater Victoria from 2021-2023, and advisor 2023-2024.

As the Curator of Contemporary and Indigenous Arts at the Winnipeg Art Gallery 2015-2021, she was awarded the Canadian Museums Association outstanding achievement award in exhibitions category with the Boarder X exhibition. Isaac has a degree in Art History and a Masters of Arts from the University of British Columbia focused on decolonizing gallery/museum practices.

Through academic, curatorial, consulting/advisory, collaborative and artistic projects, Jaimie engages in areas of reconciliation, resistance, decolonization in art and in sport, Indigenous feminism, environmental justice, language and cultural resurgence. Isaac has lectured, curated internationally with research trips and residencies in Norway, Finland, Italy, Australia, New Zealand, Chicago, and New York. Bodies of art commissioned and exhibited take form in film, public art, installation and mixed media. With published work, Isaac has contributed to scholarly collections of writing within textbooks and journals.

Val T. Vint (Deadly Auntie) Rainbow Horse Womyn

Valerie Vint (Rainbow Horse Womyn) is a Red River Métis artist, educator, and cultural worker whose multidisciplinary practice explores identity, blood memory, and ancestral strength. A leader in public art and reconciliation, she co-created Niimaamaa in Winnipeg and leads Healing Forest projects that respond to the TRC’s Calls to Action through art, mentorship, and community leadership.

Join us to learn about “Advances in water management to improve crop yields in the Canadian Prairies,” with Dr. R. Sri Ranjan.

Controlled drainage and irrigation research conducted in fully instrumented fields in southern Manitoba have shown the potential for conserving water and nutrients within the field while increasing productivity. Controlled drainage in clay soils require closely spaced tile drains (4.5 m or 15 ft) which were also found to be effective for use in subirrigation through the tiles. Real-time field data has been used to develop computer models of the agricultural fields to simulate best management practices (BMPs). The computer models are then used with long-term weather data to simulate different BMPs to help the farmer improve yields while maintaining the soil health and water quality.

Register for the Zoom Webinar here: https://umanitoba.zoom.us/meeting/register/m9RqNWBzQcuLsYIfUFlrbg

The Last Drop Water Researchers Speaker Series is co-hosted by Just Waters and the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 6 Impact Hub.

About the Speaker

Dr. R. Sri Ranjan

Dr. (Ranjan) Sri Ranjan is a Professor in the Department of Biosystems Engineering at the University of Manitoba teaching and doing research in water management since 1990. He completed his PhD (1989) and MS (1986) degrees from Colorado State University, USA. He is a registered professional engineer.

Dr. Sri Ranjan has been conducting irrigation and drainage research in fully instrumented fields in Manitoba and helping farmers see the benefits of advanced water management techniques through computer modelling and simulation using long-term weather data. He is a pioneer in testing controlled drainage with subirrigation in his research plots in Manitoba showing the economic and environmental benefits. He has been designing aeroponic systems to promote urban and northern agriculture. He holds many competitive grants, including NSERC, and has published over 140 papers at national and international journals and conference proceedings and made over 30 invited presentations in Canada, the USA, India, China, Bangladesh, and Sri Lanka. He has four patents on electronic instruments that were designed to improve water management at the field level.

Everyone is welcome to come spend the day with Anishinaabe-Kwe as they share ceremony, teachings, and conversations grounded in their sacred relationship with water.

The gathering will feature a water ceremony with water drum along with teachings respecting spiritual connections and water stewardship with Nookomis Hilda Atkinson, Roseau River Anishinaabe First Nation, and her grandchildren. Nookomis Louise Pierre, along with her daughter and granddaughters, will embark in discussions regarding water lineage teachings and the responsibilities they carry. You will hear Anishinaabe grandmothers, mothers and youth offer songs for the water.

In the afternoon, Dr. Tasha Beeds will speak about her experiences participating in water walks across Canada and the United States and raising awareness about the condition of our water systems. We will close the day with storytelling shared by Taylor Galvin and Kookum Nameo.

REGISTRATION FOR THIS EVENT IS NOW FULL.

For information on getting to the University of Manitoba, visit https://umanitoba.ca/about-um/our-campuses/getting-here. For more information, please email sarah.deckert@umanitoba.ca. Please leave extra time to find parking.

About the Presenters

Nookomis Hilda Atkinson

Mizhakoduk indizhiniikaaz, Mikinaak dodaim.

Hilda Atkinson is a Fourth Degree Midewiwin of the Three Fires Lodge and Minweyweywigaan Lodge in Roseau River.

Since 2006, she has participated in sacred water walks around Lake Ontario, Lake Erie, Lake Michigan, and Lake Superior alongside her family and her adopted mother, the late Josephine Mandamin. She also walked in the 2011 Four Directions Water Walk from Churchill, Manitoba to Bad River, Wisconsin, and has continued to support the Anishinaabe Migration Water Walk.

Hilda carries the Little Boy Water Drum and has been entrusted with sacred water songs passed down through her family. She continues to uphold the responsibility of caring for the water and sharing its teachings.

Nookomis Louise Pierre

Boozhoo, Dabasasheek Indizhinikaz, Mikinak Dodaim, Niizhing gi biindigah Midewiganing, Midewahnikwe Indow, Bagwaniskoozibiing Indoonjiba. My English name is Louise Pierre, I am from the Turtle Clan, I have entered the Midiwiwin Lodge twice. I was raised as Grandmother of the Three Fires Midiwiwin Lodge Water Line along with my daughter, Belinda Johnson and two grand-daughters Trinity and Paige. We are from Roseau River Anishinabe First Nation. Along with my sisters, Hilda, Joanne and Barb and our sons and our grandsons and grand-daughters, we have walked with our adopted mom/grandmother, the Late Josephine Mandamin around the Great Lakes in Ontario as she raised awareness for the state of the waters.

Dr. Tasha Beeds

Dr. Tasha Beeds is a Black‑Indigenous scholar of nêhiyaw, Scottish‑Metis, and mixed Bajan ancestry from the Treaty 6 Territories of Saskatchewan. She moves through the world in the layered fullness of those lineages. She lives her work through many intertwined roles: mother, kôhkom, Aunty, creative artist, poet, Water Walker, and Midewiwin woman from Minweyweywigaan Lodge, grounded in the territories of Roseau River First Nation and Wiikwemkoong Unceded Territory. 

 Internationally recognized for her research and Water protection work, Tasha has been supported by the Bibliographic Society of America, NdN Collective, and Na’ah Illahee, and has held various roles with the University of Saskatchewan, University of Windsor, Carleton University, Queen’s University, and Kenjgewin Teg. 

Carrying Water Walk teachings from the late Josephine Mandamin‑Ba, Elder Shirley Williams‑Ba, and Liz Osawamick, Tasha has Walked for the Water for 16 years around the Kawartha Lakes, Otonabee River, the Great Lakes, Junction Creek, and the Saskatchewan River.

Her academic, creative, and life’s work honours the brilliance and sovereignty of Indigenous nations, carrying forward the memories, teachings, and responsibilities entrusted by her Ancestors for the future generations. 

Taylor Galvin

Taylor Galvin Ozaawi Mashkode-Bizhiki (Brown Buffalo) is a proud Anishinaabe woman from Brokenhead Ojibway Nation and a member of the Sturgeon Clan. She is a graduate student at the University of Manitoba, where her Master’s thesis explores Lake Sturgeon conservation through Indigenous science, oral storytelling, and community-based knowledge. She is also one of the lead plaintiffs and knowledge keepers in the Lake Winnipeg personhood case, advancing Indigenous water governance on the legal stage.

Taylor served as the Brokenhead Wetland Ecological Reserve Chair and is the community coordinator for an Indigenous-led environmental monitoring project in Tataskweyak Cree Nation. She is a lifelong student of many Elders and Knowledge Keepers across Manitoba. She walks in both worlds, using Western and Indigenous sciences to guide her work in land guardianship, ceremony, and environmental protection.

Taylor’s advocacy centers Indigenous youth, especially young women, whom she mentors through teachings on plants, medicines, and ceremony. She brings them into spaces of leadership to see themselves reflected in this work. Taylor has shared Indigenous knowledge internationally – from the Netherlands to Belize to World Water Week in Sweden to the United Nations in New York City – and attributes every opportunity to the strength of her people, the power of ceremony, and the resilience of community teachings.