“By knowing where you’ve been, you have a greater understanding of where you’re going”: Building Anishinaabe Futures Through Cultural Revitalization in the Lac du Flambeau Public School

Over the last four decades, the Waaswaaganing Anishinaabeg (Lac du Flambeau, Wisconsin) have experienced a cultural renaissance, with resurgent interest in language, traditional arts, culture, and traditional harvests. This reengagement with traditional culture has occurred partially in the public school system, which has embraced curricular Indigenization and culturally-situated pedagogies. This artist’s talk, with Anishinaabe artist and educator Mino-giizhig (Wayne) Valliere, explores aspects of cultural revitalization that have worked well in Waaswaaganing, from birchbark canoe building to the revitalization of traditional Anishinaabe games formerly banned by missionaries. These stories serve as testimony to the centrality of culture in improving young people’s well-being, and the need for deeper integration of culture into our systems of education, health care, and environmental stewardship.

This event is open to the general public and does not require registration (but please note that our seating is limited). Coffee and tea will be served in the Piano Lounge at 4:30 pm, and the event will be followed by a reception in the Piano Lounge, Graham House. 

Mino-Giizhig (Wayne) Valliere (Waaswaaganing; Lac du Flambeau, Wisconsin) is an internationally acclaimed Anishinaabe artist and educator, a National Heritage Fellow (the highest award for traditional artists in the United States), a recipient of the prestigious
Luce Indigenous Knowledge Fellowship, and a respected cultural leader throughout the Western Great Lakes region. Valliere has dedicated his life to the preservation of Anishinaabe culture and language, not only mastering scores of art forms but working intensively with youth to transmit traditional knowledge to the next generation. Valliere has constructed dozens of birchbark canoes, revitalized traditional games and sports throughout the region, and taught Anishinaabemowin to hundreds of students in the public school.