While serving as a Member of Parliament from Winnipeg, Ouellette attended the funeral service of a young Indigenous soldier who took his own life while on a training exercise. It was a tragedy that compelled Ouellette to think about ways to support belonging, especially for young recruits from First Nations.
The experience inspired him to submit an official request to form an Indigenous drum group. It took time, but Ouellette’s initiative eventually grew into something meaningful.
“The goal of the drum group was not just to sing Indigenous songs and do traditional activities, though those things are important. It was also to provide opportunities to share and to build community. A few privates, corporals, and even two sergeants joined in. It’s become a great source of pride for many of them,” Ouellette explains.
“One member was so proud to have been gifted a drum that he brought it every time we went on exercise. This was an infantry unit, so these soldiers were already carrying lots of gear. He would take that drum everywhere. I’d ask, ‘do you have your drum with you?’ and he’d say, ‘Oh yeah, it’s in my bag.’”
Becoming an Indigenous Knowledge Keeper
It was the spiritual aspect of the drumming group and conversations with chaplains that prompted Ouellette to explore the possibility of a new direction for his military service.
“They had never had an Indigenous chaplain before, so I put in my application,” he says.
His PhD in anthropology, and its components on Indigenous spirituality and education, along with years of participating in ceremonies, training with First Nations Elders, and working with the drum group, combined to become the life and professional experiences that helped shape his journey to the chaplaincy. The CAF eventually settled on the title of “Indigenous Knowledge Keeper” and created an eagle feather symbol to wear on his uniform.
“People were very proud when we did the ceremony,” he said about receiving the official designation and being promoted to the rank of captain. “Though not everyone participated in the smudging, I had a soldier come up and say, ‘Thank you very much. I was very proud to participate in this act of reconciliation as a witness.’”
“These were the tough of the tough. These were infantry soldiers. They were touched,” Ouellette adds.
Looking towards future generations
Ouellette regards his appointment to the Indigenous Knowledge Keeper role as evidence that large, traditional institutions can evolve.
“If you think back to the [Canadian] Indian Act, any activity related to Indigenous spirituality was against the law. This was banned for decades in Canada. You could lose your children, you could be sent to prison, you could lose rations. This occurred up until the 1950s, which is within the lifetime of many people still alive today in Canada,” he says.
Now Ouellette is working on more ways to incorporate Indigenous perspectives into his military service and university teaching.
“I’m currently writing about human security. We often look at security as people-centric and based on conflicts, but in affirming Indigenous perspectives, we might think about the Grandfather teachings or about the Earth and all my relations. It’s a holistic perspective, in which we would consider the impact over seven generations of what we’re doing in difficult situations around the world,” he explains.
“Historically, faculties of education across the country were training many of the teachers who ended up running the residential schools for decades. What if we had been doing things differently 100 years ago? What would Canada be today? The role of teachers is so, so important because they don’t just impact one year, they impact generations,” he adds.
About Robert-Falcon Ouellette
Robert-Falcon Ouellette is from Red Pheasant Cree Nation in Saskatchewan. He is an associate professor in the Faculty of Education, a dedicated community organizer, and an anthropologist doing research in the areas of Indigenous education, military ethics, and political science.
