Impact case study database

Long-standing research on transnational feminism and the arts led Arnold and Meskimmon to establish the Lens of Empowerment network. The Lens network extended the global reach of their insights into gender, nation, citizenship and photographies [R2, R3, R4] and developed pathways to impact. University of the Fraser Valley (UFV) network members, in partnership with Stó:lō elders, applied these insights in the development of a ground-breaking undergraduate programme (also called Lens of Empowerment) that combined Indigenous learning with feminist arts pedagogies. The programme ran at UFV in 2011-12 and again in 2014-15. Its success in empowering Indigenous women in unceded Stó:lō territory to tell their stories of nation and belonging through documentary film and photography led to the following impacts.

1. Influenced national education policy in Canada

Following Canada’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s Calls to Action in 2015 [S3], Universities Canada, the most prominent national organization of Higher Education Institutions in the country, recognised Indigenous student education as one of its seven core priorities, calling for universities to ‘embrace indigenization’, and acknowledging the central role of the Liberal Arts to ‘Indigenizing the Academy’ (ITA) [S3]. UFV was an early champion of ITA [S4], coming to national prominence in 2012 by convening the conference S’iwes Toti:It Q’ep (Teaching and Learning Together) [S3]. Widely hailed as ‘the first of its kind’ [S4], the event attracted over 275 delegates from 33 leading Canadian post-secondary institutions to UFV and showcased the success of the inaugural Lens programme and its student cohort as an exemplary instance of ITA, firmly placing the significance of Indigenous women’s leadership and the arts on the agenda.

The early impact of UFV’s Lens programme on national-level indigenization debates was continued and extended following the programme’s second run in 2014-15, when it focused on ‘reconciliation’. In 2016, as Canadian education policy at national level turned towards reconciliation, UFV was again seen to be ahead of the pack. UFV’s Senior Advisor on Indigenous Affairs and member of the Lens network, reported at the Post-Secondary Truth and Reconciliation Summit convened by the British Columbia Ministry for Advanced Education in Vancouver, that every programme at UFV had an Indigenous focus. [S4] In 2018, Universities Canada featured women’s documentary production at UFV on their Indigenous Education pages as a leading example of reconciliation through storytelling in Stó:lō territory. [S4] By 2019, when UFV hosted a special session on Indigenizing the Academy at the fifth annual National Building Reconciliation Forum in Ontario, changes made in the wake of the Lens programme and S’iwes Toti:It Q’ep event were cited as a turning point for UFV – from integrating Indigenous students into the University, to transforming the University to incorporate Indigenous ways of knowing. [S4]

The success of the Lens programme connected women’s leadership with the visual arts, especially documentary filmmaking, and fostered a deep commitment to Indigenous empowerment. [S4] Four women at UFV played key roles in developing the inaugural Lens curriculum as partners within Loughborough’s Lens research network: The Dean of Arts, the Senior Advisor on Indigenous Affairs, and two instructors in documentary film and photography. When the programme was extended in 2014-15, the initial team were joined by two additional women scholars, one an expert in the field of Indigenous storytelling and the second, the inaugural academic appointment in Indigenous Studies at UFV. Later in the same year, UFV installed its first Indigenous woman Chancellor, whose story had featured in her daughter’s film, made during the Lens programme’s second run in 2014-15.

The impact of the Lens programme on Stó:lō, other Indigenous, and non-Indigenous women leading the wider indigenization strategy at UFV was palpable. As its first documentary film instructor wrote of the programme: ‘UFV’s Lens Project was an extraordinary experience in bringing us together for a common purpose; we looked at our role as educators and our teaching methods with fresh eyes…’ [S2] The Dean of Arts further articulated the programme’s effects on indigenization at UFV as ‘helping to form community both in and out of the classroom… faculty and students became co-learners in collective dialogue and reflection.’ [S2]

Loughborough’s transnational feminist arts research was a catalyst for indigenization at UFV, providing a distinctive research focus for the curriculum that established the clear and articulate presence of women’s leadership, cross-cultural storytelling [R1] and the visual arts within the national ITA policy agenda. As UFV’s Senior Advisor on Indigenous Affairs wrote of the legacy of the Lens programme:

The stories of every woman in Stó:lō territory have an impact on nation. The telling of

these stories through photography and video strengthens connections and nurtures

awareness for coming generations because storytelling connects us to the land, and

to each other’ [S2]

2. Enabled Stó:lō and other marginalised Indigenous women to enhance their personal empowerment and community leadership

Through the Lens network, Loughborough’s long-standing transnational feminist arts research on women, nation and citizenship addressed deep issues concerning the marginalization of Indigenous women in Canada. UFV was, and is, well-placed in this endeavour: at 5.3%, UFV’s Indigenous student population mirrors that of Canada (4.9% nationally; 5.9% in British Columbia); by contrast, BC’s oldest University, the University of British Columbia, reported 2.7% in the same period, and nationally, only 11% of Indigenous Canadians hold University degrees. UFV’s pedagogical innovation, based on the research insights of the Lens network and strong partnerships with Stó:lō elders, created an arts programme that reached Stó:lō and other Indigenous women, empowered them to tell their stories of nation and belonging through film and photography, and enabled them to become leaders of social change and action through community organisations, hubs and socially-engaged art practices, as demonstrated in the following examples.

Lens students produced documentary films and photography that articulated Indigenous women’s personal narratives - stories of racism, poverty and status cards, suicide, missing and murdered women, but also of community, land, matrilineal sovereignty and women’s knowledge. Students’ testimonies of development through the Lens programme are striking, many attesting to its empowering impact:

*…when the [Lens] project began, my whole world changed. …After years of *

questioning where my true roots lay and my identity as an individual, the discovery of

my Aboriginal heritage has been an empowering journey. [S2]

Personal empowerment encouraged social mobility and engagement: “I signed up for Lens of Empowerment as a woman struggling to position myself within the feminist movement and greater social justice issues in Stó:lō territory…The program was truly transformative and has shaped my life and work significantly over the past ten years.” [S2] In the decade following the Lens programme, this former student attained an MA in Actionable Postcolonial Studies in Experiential Education (2016), developed an international profile in creative education and social justice, and worked for three years in settler/Indigenous community education in New Zealand before returning to Canada in 2020 to join Simon Fraser University’s social innovation hub, RADIUS. [S2]

Telling Indigenous women’s stories through documentary film led many students from the second cohort to community leadership roles. One who used her Lens film to examine her late mother’s devastating experience in the Indian Residential school system, became a counsellor with the Stó:lō Aboriginal Support and Critical Incident Response Team (ASCIRT), dealing with the effects of suicide on the Indigenous community. Another, whose Lens project explored matrilineal learning and women’s self-governance in Stó:lō territory, later became Director of the Fraser Valley Aboriginal Children and Family Services Society (FVACFSS). [S1, S2] For one feminist filmmaker, known for her work with young Indigenous women at risk, the Lens programme marked a change of direction from psychology to the arts:

I chose film production after taking an introductory program called Lens of

Empowerment at UFV. I was… aiming to work with Indigenous youth in the school

system. I ended up making my first short documentary and I fell in love with the art

form. [S1, S2]

Long-standing feminist research from Loughborough forged the Lens of Empowerment network; network partners at UFV used it to create the Lens teaching programme. The programme’s success in telling Indigenous women’s stories through film and photography has empowered individuals, benefited communities and influenced national education policy in Canada.