GDI Curriculum & Publishing

Overview of the Curriculum and Publishing Department

Click here to see the description in the Programs & Colleges section of the site.

Publications and Resources

GDI is committed to the publication and development of Métis-specific literary and secondary and post-secondary educational resources for Métis children, youth, adults and the non-Aboriginal community. The Institute is also concerned with producing cultural and Michif-language resources for the K-12 system and the Métis community.

Recent Publications and Resources

Back to Batoche Interactive Website

After two years of hard work from many people, The Back to Batoche Interactive Website is now online at www.virtualmuseum.ca!  The website, developed in partnership with The Virtual Museum of Canada (VMC), is Gabriel Dumont Institute’s newest resource and is located in English at:

www.virtualmuseum.ca/Exhibitions/Batoche/html/about/index.php  

and in French at:

www.museevirtuel.ca/Exhibitions/Batoche/html/about/fr_index.php

Don Freed's The Valley of Green and Blue

This collection of songs by Don Freed is rich with history, passion and the essence of what it means to be a proud Metis. Don takes us on a journey through hope and despair, resistance and renewal, and celebration. "The Valley of Green and Blue" is sure to become an important legacy to Metis history and culture. As a Metis artist, Don Freed has made a contribution that will be cherished for generations to come.

Karon Shmon : Gabriel Dumont Institute.


Please Visit Don's official website at www.donfreed.com

Andrea Menard: Simple Steps

Simple Steps is Andrea's second album, following the success of Velvet Devil (2003). The album features 12 original songs, co-written by Andrea Menard and Robert Walsh (producer), her collaborator on Velvet Devil. "The songs all come from my experience and reflection of my place in the world as a proud Métis woman. Robert Walsh helped mine the songs from my soul. We are a great team and it's been wonderful to work with him again on this album." The album was released in conjunction with the Gabriel Dumont Institute 25th Anniversary Celebration.

Visit Andrea's official website at www.andreamenard.com

The Métis Alphabet Book

The Metis Alphabet Book is a unique addition to the creative genre of children's alphabet books. Author Joseph Jean Fauchon highlights historical figures, significant events, places of interest and other aspects of being Metis to take youthful readers beyond the alphabet to explore the richness of Metis History and culture. Sheldon Mauvieux's softly coloured images, inspired by illustrations and photos, provide an engaging compliment to the text. The Metis Alphabet Book strengthens Metis pride and identity while providing young readers with an informative reference book about the essence of being Metis.

Howard Adams: OTAPAWY!

Visceral, passionate and engaging, HOWARD ADAMS: OTAPAWY! will be an immense contribution to our knowledge of modern Metis political consciousness and activism. This revealing book--which includes a fictionalized autobiography with parallel and alternate outcomes--is Howard Adams' last account of his life and important work. In addition, numerous friends, colleagues and scholars provide the reader with candid and touching assessments of what Howard Adams meant to them as a friend, colleague, mentor, activist, political leader, teacher and scholar. Finally, an interactive CD-ROM containing dozens of photographs and documents relating to Howard Adams' life and work is included with this innovative tome. The late Howard Adams was a Metis icon. He will forever be remembered for developing Indigenous colonization theory for a Canadian context and for challenging how Canadian society perceives its relationship with Aboriginal peoples. To date, his books and essays are perhaps the most searing indictment of Canada's failed colonial policy toward its First Peoples.

The Beaver's Big House, by Joanne Panas and Olive Whitford

Joanne Panas' and Olive Whitford's first book, The Beaver's Big House , is a full colour illustrated children's book that tells the story of a forest fire and how two beavers – Baptiste and Betsy – rally the other forest animals to help fight it. The book teaches children valuable lessons such as the need for cooperation and preparedness. In addition, The Beaver's Big House will be translated into Michif and will include a narration component in both English and Michif.

For this project, full-colour illustrations and English narration were provided by Joanne Panas, photographs by Dennis Chamberlain and Michif translation and narration by Norman Fleury.

Expressing Our Heritage: Métis Artistic Designs

With funding from through the Government of Canada's Privy Council's Office and Saskatchewan Learning, GDI was able to produce Expressing Our Heritage: Métis Artistic Designs, a collection of 50 gallery-quality Study Prints and accompanying Resource Manual, which has allowed the public to see the diversity and quality of Métis artistic expression through time and space. Showcasing the ageless beauty of traditional Métis clothing and accessories, Expressing Our Heritage demonstrates how this artistic tradition, long ignored in the historical record, was an integral component of Métis identity and cultural expression which continues into the present. Authored by Cheryl Troupe and assisted by a diverse range of academics and community people, Expressing Our Heritage is the first synthesis of traditional Métis clothing to date. Containing dozens of rare photographs of artifacts from collections in Europe and North America, the 50 full-colour double-sided Study Prints cover 28 topics and outline the traditional clothing, accessories and adornment of the Métis, while the Resource Manual contains numerous maps, a glossary, biographies, further background reading, and extended bibliography and activities for further review making this resource an excellent aid for teachers, librarians, community programs.

In November 2003, Expressing Our Heritage: Métis Artistic Designs won two Saskatchewan Book Awards in the Publishing in Education and First Peoples Publishing categories.

The Bulrush Helps the Pond

Ken Carriere's The Bulrush Helps the Pond is an elegantly written book in Swampy Cree and English. Written in the standard Roman Orthography, this book provides readers of all ages with a better appreciation of the diversity and fragility of the Prairie wetland ecosystem, while amply demonstrating that traditional Aboriginal culture is parallel to the dominant paradigm of Western Science. As the narrative unravels, the reader is left with an appreciation of the fragile Prairie wetland ecosystem and the interplay of the pond animals with the replenishing bulrush, Ken wrote The Bulrush Helps the Pond in Swampy Cree, his first language in order to "preserve the Swampy Cree's oldest generation's terminology and knowledge of the marshland ecology. I strongly feel it necessary for those of us who have the writing skills to preserve in print as much as we can from our Elder's knowledge base."

The book includes illustrations by Joanne Panas and photographs by Dennis Chamberlain. In November 2002, The Bulrush Helps the Pond won a Saskatchewan Book Award in the First Peoples Publishing Category.

Upcoming Publications and Resources

Coming Soon

Past Publications and Resources

2003 - The Métis Women's Traditional Arts Series

To showcase and celebrate the artistic talents of Métis women, GDI has recently developed an instructional video series entitled The Métis Women's Traditional Art Series . This three part series provides in-depth instruction and direction in the production of various forms of Métis cultural expression including rag rug hooking, silk embroidery and fingerweaving. These videos instruct, entertain and inform the viewer on the diversity of Métis traditional art forms as practiced by many Métis women.

Part One in the series, Aen kroshay aen tapee avec mi gineey: Métis Hooked Rugs highlights the tradition of rag rug hooking as practiced by Métis women in the Qu'Appelle Valley in southeastern Saskatchewan . Margaret Harrison, originally from the Qu'Appelle Valley was taught this traditional art form by her mother Adeline Pelletier dit Racette who, along with other women in the community, once made and sold these decorative rugs, supplementing the family income.

Part Two in the series, Mashnikwawshikun avec la sway di fil: Métis Silk Embroidery , highlights the artistic and decorative tradition of silk thread embroidery. Featuring Margaret Harrison, this video teaches the basic stitches used in embroidery and discusses the history of this art form as practiced by Métis women in the Qu'Appelle Valley and across the Métis Homeland.

Part Three, En saencheur flechey: Métis Fingerweaving , provides instruction in the art of Métis fingerweaving. Featuring, Métis teacher Penny Condon, this video discusses the history and use of the Métis sash as a cultural identity marker and provides instruction in the basic techniques used in fingerweaving. This video, developed for classroom use, features Penny instructing a group of students from St. Francis School in Saskatoon , Saskatchewan in Métis fingerweaving.

2002 - Kitaskinaw i pi Kiskinohamakoya: The Land Gives Us Our Knowledge

In 2002, GDI released Kitaskinaw i pi Kiskinohamakoya: The Land Gives Us Our Knowledge a documentary video discussing the 225 year history of the Métis community of Ile a la Crosse. For years, Ile a la Crosse has been a vibrant Michif-speaking Métis community with strong ties to the land and the fur-trade. In the Michif language, with English subtitles, this video discusses the history of the community from the perspective of its citizens. Through stories of living on the land and pursuing traditional hunting and gathering activities, these Elders stress their respect for the land and share with us the knowledge, stories, history and culture of their community.

Wayne Morin, originally from Ile a la Crosse, served as language translator, interviewer, researcher and narrator for this project. For the video, extensive interviews with community members were undertaken from 1999-2001. These interviews have since been added to GDI's growing archival oral history collection.

2002 - The Story of the Crescent Lake Métis : Our Life on the Road Allowance

In 2002, GDI released The Story of the Crescent Lake Métis: Our Life on the Road Allowance, a documentary film on the Michif-speaking road allowance community of Crescent Lake . Gilbert Pelletier, originally from Crescent Lake, and Maria Campbell played leading roles in the development of the video documentary which tells the story of the Crescent Lake road allowance community from the perspective of its Elders and former residents. They are a people whose pride and strength inspire younger generations of Métis to be proud of their heritage and the Michif language. This is a remarkable story of dispossession, relocation, survival and profound reflection, for these Elders also show us that Crescent Lake once had a rich cultural and social life.

2002 - Richard Lafferty: The Muskeg Fiddler

Richard Lafferty is one of the most accomplished Métis fiddlers in the Northwest Territories . This video documentary chronicles his life and music, his efforts to preserve the unique northern Métis fiddling tradition, as well as providing a history of northern Métis fiddling.

2002 - Our Shared Inheritance: A Tradition of Métis Beadwork

This video documentary discusses the Métis beading tradition of Cumberland House, an old Métis community located in northeastern Saskatchewan . The video centres on Isabelle Impey, who was born and raised in Cumberland House, and her efforts to preserve Métis beadwork. Fluent in Swampy Cree, Isabelle was taught to bead by her mother Cecilia, aunts Helen, Anne and Mariah Dorion as well as by other women in the community such as Agnes Dussion and Margaret McAuley. Isabelle feels that these women instilled in her the desire to practice and preserve the artistic traditions and heritage of previous generations of Métis women. Isabelle recalls that, traditionally, Métis women practiced beadwork in small social groups, and that this was the environment in which she learned to bead. To honor these traditions, GDI held a highly successful Métis Beadwork Preservation Workshop in November 2001, which is featured in the video. The intent of this workshop was to teach younger generations traditional skills and techniques used in beading and making moccasins to ensure the survival of this vibrant artistic tradition.

2001- 2002 - Drops of Brandy and Other Traditional Métis Tunes

Drops of Brandy and Other Traditional Métis Tunes is perhaps the most ambitious traditional Métis fiddling anthology to date. This project's vision is both to recognize the importance of fiddling to Métis culture and the spirit that fiddle players have brought to Métis families and communities. This four compact disc set features accomplished traditional Métis fiddlers from across the Métis Homeland, including: Mel Bedard, Frederick Genthon, Emile Lavallée, Gary Lepine, John Arcand, Albert 'Hap' Boyer, Henry Gardipy, Gilbert Anderson, Richard Calihoo, Homer Poitras, Richard Lafferty and Edward Lafferty and is accompanied by Trent Bruner. Each of these master fiddle players have contributed their own unique personal and community styles to this timely anthology. In addition to having many popular traditional Métis fiddle tunes, this compilation also includes many previously unrecorded rare jigs and reels. The accompanying book contains biographies, archival and contemporary photographs, sheet music and stories about the fiddle and a history of each fiddle tune used in the anthology.

In November 2002, Drops of Brandy, an Anthology of Métis Fiddle Music was short-listed for two 2002 Saskatchewan Book Award in the First Peoples Publishing and Publishing in Education categories.

2001 - John Arcand and his Métis Fiddle

John Arcand is one of Canada 's leading Métis fiddle players and has made important, if not historic, contributions to the preservation of Métis music and dance. John Arcand and his Métis Fiddle is a 60-minute documentary video about John's life and music, in addition to being a history of Métis fiddling and dancing. Interviewees such as Calvin Vollrath, Gilbert Anderson, Ray Isbister, Trent Bruner and Emma Arcand share their memories and thoughts about John and his music.

In 2003, John Arcand received a National Aboriginal Achievement Award for his contributions to Métis fiddle music.

2001 - Metis Legacy

The most ambitious annotated bibliography of Métis history and culture to date, Métis Legacy contains an extensive collection of Métis material culture and the largest collection of previously unpublished Métis articles ever assembled. A joint Millennium Project of GDI, the Louis Riel Institute and the Government of Canada, this valuable contribution to the historiography outlines Métis history and culture in the Prairies, the Northwest Territories and the northern and Midwestern United States. Renowned Métis Studies specialists such as Diane Payment, Peter Bakker, Tanis Thorne, Morgan Baillargeon and Lynn Whidden analyze various aspects of Métis history and culture. Metis Legacy was compiled by Lawrence J. Barkwell, Leah Dorion and Darren Prefontaine. In 2002, Métis Legacy won a Saskatchewan Book Award in the Publishing in Education Category.

2001 - My Family

Written and illustrated by Penny Condon, My Family tells the story of a Métis family gathering for a feast. Told from the perspective of a young Métis girl named Kona, My Family discusses about the roles of all the different family members while they prepare to have the feast. In the story, readers meet Kona's grandparents, parents, siblings, uncles, aunts and cousins as they each contribute to the family gathering.

2000 - Changes

Written and illustrated by Métis artist and author Penny Condon, Changes tells the story of a young Métis child named Kona who asks the Gathering Spirit a number of questions about the changing seasons. Changes was nominated in 2000 for a Saskatchewan Book Award in the First Peoples Publishing category.

1999 - The Metis: Our People, Our Story

The Metis: Our People, Our Story , is an original, comprehensive, multi-disciplinary CD-ROM, which greatly enhances awareness of Métis culture among young and adult learners. This encyclopedic CD-ROM discusses the gambit of Métis history and culture, from fur trade days to the present, from a Métis perspective. With hundreds of screens of information and thousands of visual images, biographies, video clips, music bites, maps and charts, The Metis: Our People, Our Story is the most comprehensive multimedia analysis of Métis culture available. This CD-ROM also provides a holistic view of Métis history and culture and is divided into community, social, economic and political life sections. The Metis: Our People, Our Story was compiled by Leah Dorion, Todd Paquin and Darren Prefontaine.

1997 - Remembrances: Interviews with Métis Veterans

An oral history about the experiences of Métis veterans in WWI, WWII, and the Korean War, this book contains over 40 black and white photos and interviews with 33 Métis Veterans. In 1997, Remembrances: Interviews with Métis Veterans was nominated for a Saskatchewan Book Award in the First Peoples Publishing Category.

1991 - The Flower Beadwork People

A vibrantly illustrated social history of the Métis by artist Sherry Farrell-Racette, this book was originally produced as a special project to commemorate the one hundredth anniversary of the 1885 resistance. Complete with a glossary, it can be used as a class text, a storybook, or for independent reading for nine and ten year old children. This book is also suitable for use in studying Canada 's Aboriginal people.

Current and Ongoing Initiatives

The Virtual Museum of Métis History and Culture

On May 30, 2003 the Gabriel Dumont Institute - in partnership with the University of Saskatchewan Division of Media and Technology, Multimedia Unit - released The Virtual Museum of Métis History and Culture to the public.

The culmination of years of research gathering and resource production, the Virtual Museum is based on the Institute's resolute desire to ensure that the Métis have their own stories told in a medium, which is user-friendly, free and accessible to all those interested in Métis history and culture. For this project, GDI acknowledges the funding support of Saskatchewan Learning, the Department of Canadian Heritage's Canadian Culture Online Program, the Canada Council for the Arts, SaskCulture and the Government of Canada.

For further information see www.metismuseum.ca

Oral History Project

One of our ongoing projects is the Métis Oral History Project, which was started with developmental funds from the Métis Cultural Centre Initiative through the Privy Council's Office of the Government of Canada. The goal of this project is make a unique and important contribution to the historiography through the development of the first comprehensive oral history of the Saskatchewan Métis.

This project will allow Canadians to better understand the history and culture of the Prairie Métis from 1885 to the present . This book will give marginalized Métis a historical voice, which again meets an integral aspect of GDI's mandate.

Currently, GDI has approximately 800 interviews in our archival collection. These interviews will form the basis of the book to be published in Summer 2004. Despite this deadline, interviews with Métis community members are continually being conducted. If you, or someone you know is interested in contributing to this project please contact the GDI Publishing Department.

Michif Curriculum

The Department strives to produce Michif resources for the community and schools. To this end, we have worked with numerous Michif speakers, language translators and validators. We also continue to identify and interview Michif speakers. One of the ways in which Michif speakers are identified is through our online registration at www.gdins.org . As well, we have produced Michif-based resources which include:

Kitaskinaw i pi Kiskinohamakoya: The Land Gives Us Our Knowledge , a documentary video in Michif with English subtitles

The Story of the Crescent Lake Métis: Our Life on the Road Allowance , a documentary video in Michif with English subtitles

Michif: The Language of Our Families - Li Michif: Kakee-Payshee-Peekishkwaywuk-Oma, a video documentary that includes an overview of the Michif language, and interviews with Michif speakers largely from southeast Saskatchewan .

The Alfred Reading Series , a series of five children's books written in English, Cree, French and Michif, complete with Come Read With Us a narration component for the Alfred Reading Series in all four languages

Expressing Our Heritage: Métis Artistic Designs Resource Manual includes a Michif component in the Teacher's Resources Section of the manual. Commonly used Michif words relating to clothing and material culture are listed in two dialects of Michif-Cree.

The Virtual Museum of Métis History and Culture has a large amount of Michif content in video, and audio and print forms, including an historical overview of the language and detailed bibiliography.

View Michif resources on www.metismuseum.ca

Museum and Archives/Artifact Repatriation Program

To ensure the repatriation, preservation and promotion of traditional Métis art forms, GDI has developed what is perhaps the largest Métis artifact collection held by a Métis organization. This collection of artifacts, which includes numerous fine examples of Métis artistic expression, can now be viewed by the public in our new museum located at 2 - 604 22 nd Street West , Saskatoon . A large portion of this collection can also be viewed at www.metismuseum.ca

Community Involvement

The Publishing Department prides itself on its active community involvement. We continue to participate in committees that support our publishing program and GDI's mandate. These committees include the Saskatchewan Publishers Group, the SAB, and the Museums Association of Saskatchewan.

The Publishing Department believes that its success is due to being a community-based publisher. This has led us to increase the amount of time and energy that we spend within Métis communities and at community events. We sincerely believe, through the support we receive, that we often serve as a liaison for the Métis community. To date, the Publishing Department has had a presence at over seventy Métis cultural events across Saskatchewan, Manitoba and Alberta .