Episode 4.10: Living Relations
Part 2
Part 2
Tuna / tyawerón:ko / eel artwork elements by Kasey King (née Skipper) from Wairoa, Aotearoa. Kasey affiliates to Wairewa Rūnanga.
Host
Peter Andrée
Professor, Department of Political Science, Carleton University
HOST
Tehya Quachegan
Master’s Student, Environmental Studies at Lakehead University
Guest
John Reid
Professor, Environmental Systems and Indigenous Knowledge, Ngāi Tahu Research Centre, University of Canterbury
Additional Pedagogical Resources
Guest Bios
Tehya Quachegan is from Moose Cree First Nation and Thunder Bay, Ontario. She is a student researcher and advocate, committed to supporting the involvement of northern First Nations youth in Indigenous food initiatives. She is currently pursuing a Master of Environmental Studies at Lakehead University, building on an Honours Bachelor’s degree in Psychology and Indigenous Studies from Western University. As a Research Assistant with the Living Relations Project, Tehya helps to share stories gathered through conversations among participants from Canada and Aotearoa New Zealand.
Dr. John Reid is the co-director of the Living Relations Project and a specialist in Indigenous economic development, with a particular focus on land, freshwater, and ocean sustainability. He is of Māori heritage and a registered member of Ngāti Pikiao.
He was recently appointed Professor of Environmental Systems and Indigenous Knowledge at the Ngāi Tahu Research Centre, University of Canterbury. In this role, he works across the Faculty of Engineering and alongside Māori hapū (subtribes) and iwi (tribes) to design and implement new environmental technologies.
Prior to this appointment, John spent 19 years as both a consultant and academic, developing businesses and pioneering novel economic development approaches with Māori iwi in Aotearoa New Zealand. He has led several national research programmes at the intersection of sustainable resource use, Indigenous knowledge, and economic development, and is widely published across these fields.
John’s work has been recognised nationally, including the Auckland University Umanga Whanaungatanga Māori Business Recognition Award for the business Ngāi Tahu Pounamu. He is also a TEDx alumnus and serves as an associate editor of the Journal of the Royal Society of New Zealand.
Participant Bios
Tayohseron:tye Nikki Auten is a Kanyen’keha:ka (Mohawk) woman and born turtle clan. She currently resides in her home community of Tyendinaga. She is the proud mother of three adult children and the grandmother of one incredible human. You can often find Nikki engaged in one of her hobbies, including painting, growing food and saving seeds, learning languages, and sewing. Nikki has worked as an instructor at both the college and university levels and is currently employed with First Nations Technical Institute as the Program Manager for the Indigenous Sustainable Food Systems program. She actively volunteers in her community with the Mohawk Agricultural Fair and the Kenhte:ke Seed Sanctuary and Learning Centre. She is also involved with the urban Indigenous community in Kingston through her work with the Hwy 15 Indigenous Food Sovereignty Garden.
Elizabeth Macpherson is a Pākehā (New Zealander of European-settler descent) Professor of Law and Rutherford Discovery Fellow (RDF) at the University of Canterbury. She researches comparative environmental, natural resources, and constitutional law, and leads the RDF programme Blue Carbon Futures in Aotearoa New Zealand: Law, Climate, Resilience.
Mary Laronde is a member of the Temagami First Nation (TFN) and past Director of Land Stewardshi. Temagami First Nation represents the Indigenous People of N’Dakimenan (Our Land), comprising 4000 square miles of land in what is now called Northeastern Ontario.
Kristen Lowitt is an Assistant Professor in the School of Environmental Studies at Queen’s University. Her research goals are directed towards working with communities to build just and sustainable food systems in rural and coastal settings. She brings expertise in the role of small-scale fisheries in sustainable food systems to the RC. Lowitt has developed partnerships with First Nations communities at the intersections of fisheries governance, and brings networks across the Great Lakes watershed.
Martha Stiegman is an Associate Professor at York University's Faculty of Environmental & Urban Change; a white settler of mixed French ancestry, from Mi’kma’ki/Nova Scotia. Her community-based research and collaborative video work examine Indigenous/settler treaty relations in their historic and contemporary manifestations, with particular attention to food sovereignty and justice; as well as video-based decolonizing research methods. She has worked in partnership with numerous First Nations for over 15 years in using community-based video production to explore issues related to food systems, treaty rights, traditional law, land stewardship, and sustainable harvesting.
Fiona Wiremu is from the New Zealand tribes of Tūhoe (Ngāti Hāmua, Te Mahurehure, Ngāti Koura) and Ngāti Ranginui (Ngai Tamarāwaho). Her areas of research include Mātauranga Māori (Māori knowledge) inclusive of language, culture and identity; Whai Rawa (Māori economies); Te Tai Ao (The Natural Environment); Mauri Ora (Human Flourishing); and Māori community self-development initiatives inclusive of food sovereignty research. She is an educator of Indigenous Business teaching at an indigenous-university (Te Whare Wānanga o Awanuiārangi), in Aotearoa New Zealand. Fiona holds a number of governance roles across the health, social and employment sectors with these intersecting to reduce the ongoing effects of colonization.