Episode 7 - Reclaiming Land Back

Originator of Land Back and Labrador Land Protector Bryanna Brown joins Reseed host Alice Irene Whittaker to explore reinforcing Indigenous leadership in the climate movement. This conversation examines how Indigenous climate leadership is inherently interconnected to the Land Back movement, and Indigenous sovereignty. Bryanna and Alice Irene explore reconnecting with our own voices while also amplifying the voices of others. 

Bryanna Brown is Inuk and Mi’kmaq from Happy Valley-Goose Bay, Labrador. She is a Labrador Land Protector. She originated Land Back to advocate for sovereignty in Indigenous peoples, as well as Black, Indigenous, and People of Colour (BIPOC) communities, and she is focussed on land ownership as a means of environmental protection. Bryanna is a member of the Steering Committee of Indigenous Climate Action, an organization that reinforces the place of Indigenous Peoples as leaders in climate change discourse. She is an advocate for the rights of women, Indigenous peoples issues, environmental justice, Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls + (MMIWG+), persons living with disabilities, food security among Indigenous communities, anti-human trafficking, and people in the Child Welfare System. Through effective advocacy, her mission is to make spaces for Indigenous peoples to feel safe in society, and to provide insights regarding social justice issues, intergenerational trauma affecting indigenous communities, climate injustice, systemic racism, and cultural revitalization. 

Reclaiming Land Back is an insightful exploration of reclaiming land - and reclaiming voice. 

Show Notes

Wet’suwet’en Protests - Ottawa 2020

Yellowhead Institute Land Back Report 

Ontario Federation of Indigenous Friendship Centres

Truckers Against Trafficking 

Alluriarniq - Tungasuvvingat Inuit

Transcript

Alice Irene Whittaker (intro): Welcome to Reseed, a podcast about repairing our relationship to nature. Reseed tells the stories of a RE generation: the people embracing repair, redesign, reuse, and reduction. The people who are uprooting the extractive status quo and rooting the future in justice, wellbeing, resilience, and care. This is a podcast for those of us who are re-imagining our relationship to the natural world and to each other. I am Alice Irene Whittaker, the host of Reseed. Together, let's plant the seeds that transform us from being takers to caretakers. 

Alice Irene: Happy New Year. I hope that you've had a joyful and gentle transition into 2022. In today's episode, I speak with Bryanna Brown, originator of Land Back and Labrador land protector. Bryanna and I have a conversation about reinforcing Indigenous leadership in the climate movement. We talk about Land Back, Indigenous sovereignty, missing and murdered indigenous women and girls and reconnecting with one's voice while also amplifying the voices of others. 

Bryanna Brown: And when I went outside, the streets were filled completely with people for the protest. And I noticed that people were saying Land Back. It meant everything to me, because it felt like they were saying I should get better kind of thing is what it felt like, hoping for the healing of the land, but also hoping for my healing as well.

Alice Irene: Bryanna is Inuk and Mi’kmaq from Happy Valley-Goose Bay, Labrador. She is a Labrador Land Protector. Bryanna originated Land Back to advocate for sovereignty in Indigenous peoples, as well as Black, Indigenous, and People of Colour (BIPOC) communities, and she is focused on land ownership as a means of environmental protection.

Alice Irene: Bryanna is a member of the Steering Committee of Indigenous Climate Action, an organization that reinforces the place of Indigenous Peoples as leaders in climate change discourse. They articulate their work like this: Indigenous Climate Action is an Indigenous-led organization guided by a diverse group of Indigenous knowledge keepers, water protectors and land defenders from communities and regions across the country. They rightly believe that Indigenous peoples rights and knowledge systems are critical to developing solutions to the climate crisis and achieving climate justice. 

Alice Irene: As an advocate, Bryanna has participated in various conferences, mentorship programs, and round tables focused on a range of critical issues, including renewable and sustainable energy to the over-representation of Indigenous youth who are incarcerated. Through her effective advocacy, her mission is to make spaces for Indigenous peoples to feel safe in society and to provide insights regarding social justice issues, intergenerational trauma, affecting Indigenous communities, climate injustice, systemic racism, and cultural revitalization. You'll hear our conversation in just a few moments.

Alice Irene: First, I'll let you know that I released another episode today called Beautiful Forms of Resistance with Erica Violet Lee. Erica is a two-spirit nehiyaw writer, scholar, and community organizer from inner-city Saskatoon and Thunderchild Cree Nation, and she is also a Steering Committee member of Indigenous Climate Action like Bryanna. 

Alice Irene: Erica and I discussed the pursuit of Indigenous feminist freedoms, lessons learned from the Black liberation movement, and the power of rest and radical community care. The conversation with Erica is rich and riveting, and I hope you'll take a listen. If you're enjoying these conversations, leave a review on Apple podcasts. I enjoy reading your impressions of what I'm creating and it's helpful in these early weeks of Reseed. If you want to tell me what you think of this or any other episode visit Reseed.ca. Okay. Here is my conversation with Bryanna Brown.

Alice Irene: I always like to take a deep breath first, you know? Hi Bryanna. Thanks so much for joining me today. 

Bryanna: Thank you so much for having me. 

Alice Irene Whittaker: I would love to start with asking you a little bit about your relationship to the natural world as a child and what that relationship was like. 

Bryanna: Thinking back of when I was a child, I used to live in Happy Valley-Goose Bay, Labrador, and I like to call it Nunatsiavut, which means our beautiful land. And that is the Inuit land claims area that I am from. Growing up, my mom, she would teach me as much as she could about our culture. Even though both of my grandparents had been to residential schools. She didn't know her language growing up, but she would teach me everything that she knew about protecting the environment.

Bryanna: Growing up, I would have material things or toys or things like that and I would never ever be able or be allowed to waste it. I had to make sure I didn't waste anything at all. And I guess that even goes back to my grandmother when colonization was becoming more rampant, I suppose, or more people were coming up to Main and Labrador where my grandmother was from.

Bryanna: She had tried oranges for the first time when she was younger and she would only have them maybe once a year. So I guess that just speaks to the amount of things coming into the communities. So there wasn't much, and my Grandma she would try to use everything that she had. Even if she got a gift, she would use the wrapping paper. She would take it apart. She even does to this day takes apart her presents, like the wrapping paper on the presents very carefully so that she can reuse all of that wrapping paper. Every little thing is really important to protect the environment.

Bryanna: It's really important to make each object, have a purpose within Inuit cultures. That was something that I really took away from watching my mom and my grandmother growing up and the way that they use material things as a way to respect the environment and that particular thing, because in Inuit culture, all things do have a spirit.

Bryanna: And I think, oftentimes I think about that because when we pass away all of our bodies just turn to dust again, we all become a skeleton and decompose and we all return to death. So then we do become other things. Like if we're in the ground, then there's organisms eating our body - that’s bad to say. It's all a circle, we're all just going back into that circle.

Bryanna: So it's really important to understand that the things around you might once have been another thing or another part and the whole circle of things, just respecting things. It was really, really important growing up. And I would go ice fishing a lot with my family. My father and grandfather have a cabin that's two hours out into the woods and there is no reception, no plumbing, no electricity. And it's very, very peaceful there. So we would go there very, very, very often growing up. And I remember going fishing there. I remember learning to hunt with my dad for partridges, learning to also have to use every part of the animal and respect that animal's life as well. When you do take it as food, like I mostly grew up on eating caribou and moose. I had a really strong connection to the land.

Bryanna: Now that I live in a city, I reflect on growing up there and how clean the air was and the water. Even my grandmother, when we did go to that cabin, that was a good two hour drive away from the town. I remember just like walking up a hill and there's nobody else around. Cause it was just so far in the woods and she just would take a cup and put it down into the water. I mean, in this hole of grass and then there was the river and the water would be underneath the hole. And she’d put a bottle down into the running water and take it up, back out of the hole and we’d drink it. It was just always very clean and beautiful. That's what I often think about.

Bryanna: And now when I go back, I'm very interested in the trees and the sap from the trees. I know there's a name for it in Inuktitut that I forget right now. it might be like pitsuk or pitsik. I don't know. The sap from the trees, they help you. I don't know exactly what the teaching is, but it helps your gums or keep your teeth clean, something like that. Or it helps you if you’re sick on wounds or something like that. My family knows more about that. And then I remember getting Labrador tea leaves there. Just picking them by the side of my house. And it's my family's house and I pick them up and then if I go back, I'll put it in a pot and boil it and then drink the tea.

Bryanna: And I remember the first time I did that, I drank way too much. And my grandma said that I could pass out if I do that. It's good in small amounts. But if I drink way too much, I pass out. I did feel like passing out after that. But I just thought it was funny because even though I'm wanting to learn more traditional knowledge from them. I really have to make sure that I ask and that I follow their guidance, you know? 

Alice Irene: Right. The listening part of learning. I loved hearing about that draw to the sap and the trees. What about that called out to you? Is it something that your grandmother and mother showed you or was that something that came from in you?

Bryanna: I remember two years ago, I went to Labrador to visit there and we were picking berries, me and my mom and my dad. I was just poking out a tree on the inside those saps, or it'll just pop open. And these little bubbles on the tree. And my mom was telling me about it after that, because it'll get stuck to your clothes and you just it's so sticky, you can't get it off. And so she was just telling me about it and I started chewing on it and she was telling me the reasons it's good for you. But I forget now.

Alice Irene: I love that the visual of the water, reaching in and pulling out that water from the river and drinking it. You really painted a picture that I can see in my head while you're talking. 

Bryanna: Thank you. Yeah. It's different there. It’s really, really peaceful. And because there's so little activity, there's no people around, roads or buildings, it's really, really peaceful. And then the animals there are really cool. You'll see partridges on the side of the road. And then there's porcupines. There's black bears and wolves. Sometimes there'd be wolves tracks in behind the cabin. Like in the winter, you could see their prints in the snow. There'd be blue jays. They're really pretty. Snow birds, owls. So it was just really nice to be amongst all of that. And it feels really peaceful because you just know that they're in their element in the woods and not being harmed by everyday society with people and buildings and all this stuff going on. 

Alice Irene: I've been seeing blue jays everywhere recently, which is, you know, part of the season, but also I've been reading about it and learning about them as finding your voice, which is a connection that's really resonated with me. And I've just been paying attention to them more. Maybe even seeing them recently. What's different in you or in your body or your mind when you're in the city versus when you go home?

Bryanna: I think when I go home, I'm really grateful to the land because I just feel very safe there. Like I felt really protected. Like I'm supposed to be there. Like I belong there. Not in terms of the people, I find growing up, I had a really, really hard time growing up there. I was bullied a lot, but just because I'm a really, really different type of person. I feel like, and I think very outside sometimes of what other people might expect you to think. Or I might be a little more rebellious maybe. 

Bryanna: So growing up that was hard. In terms of just being there with the land and then my family who was there, I’ve got a big family. It's really, really nice. It feels safe. Also lately I've been wanting to connect more spiritually because I realized I'm not really satisfied with a 3D plane of consciousness. Where I'm here and always in the material world and thinking of things that you can see right in front of you. Connecting more spiritually is also a way of, I think, connecting to culture.

Bryanna: So I find when I'm in a lot of quiet space, like at home, I am able to receive more downloads of messages in a spiritual way. I don't know if that makes any sense, 

Alice Irene: That makes a lot of sense. 

Bryanna: I find that have more direction in that way. And I do like to meditate, to find peace of mind. So I find there it’s much easier for me to focus because there's a lot of quietness. 

Alice Irene: That makes a lot of sense to me. I'm interested to hear a bit about Indigenous Climate Action, which you're on the Steering Committee for, the Board of Directors. Reinforcing Indigenous leadership in the climate movement is central to the work that you're involved with there. Can you paint a picture for me about what this looks like and what you're working to create? Like what it would look like with climate movement, having Indigenous leadership firmly centered and embedded in the movement? 

Bryanna: Well one thing that really stood out to me when I was in the COP26 in Scotland, the Indigenous Climate Action team that had gone. We all stayed in Airbnbs. I stayed in the Airbnb with the Executive Director. Because of that, we would have team meetings in our Airbnb, and it was always very important that we have collective decision-making for the organization. It was just something I really, really enjoy. I think that's a way that they uphold the type of leadership.

Bryanna: Like it's really, really important that we all collectively come to decisions for everything that we do. When people are working there it's important that they take on that mentality within all the work that they're doing to be a part of the team. So that's what I really liked. 

Bryanna: Also, before I knew about Indigenous Climate Action, I went to a protest in 2019 with a conference called Power Shift Young and Rising, and it was here in Ottawa. And I was living in Newfoundland at the time, but I came here for the conference and we were in front of the Suncor building doing an action. And I met with, I think, Nigel who was on the Indigenous Climate Action Steering Committee at the time. And what I noticed is when they want to include more youth in their action and their organization, they will hand a microphone to a youth around to amplify their voices if they would like to speak.

Bryanna: So that's what I like about what they do in actions as well, because that's how I became involved with them. At the time that was my first protest or action that I've ever been to. And then someone just gave me a microphone. And then just at that time, I just started speaking candidly out of protest. And I found that I liked that. So then that gave me more leadership ability, just being able to speak in front of people because I was a really shy person and I never, ever would speak in front of people before, like I would just always hide or feel sick if I had to speak publicly. That really opened up a lot of doors for me I feel like. 

Alice Irene: What a transformative experience, just from someone making that decision to hand the mic, right? Instead of holding onto it. 

Bryanna: Yeah for sure.

Alice Irene: Indigenous Climate Action is grounded in four main pathways: gatherings, resources, and tools, amplifying voices, which we just heard one example of in your own life and supporting Indigenous sovereignty. Can you give me a bird's eye view of these pathways or if there's one that you're particularly passionate about that you could tell me more about? 

Bryanna: Because of the amplification of voices and the fact that they had helped me do that. Something that I really wanted when I started working with them in 2019 was to tell more people about my story in relation to climate change. So at the time I was very isolated and living in a shelter. It was because I was hit by a car and having difficulty getting healthcare and access to healthcare due to racism. So when I did start working with them, I was just in a not okay place. But because of that isolation that I found in my studying that isolation is one of the main causes of missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls.

Bryanna: So I was just really trying to figure out how to come out of that. And at the time I was also, because of being hit by the car, I had an infection in my jaw, in a bolt that was in my jaw from previous surgery. So I was very, very weak and needed a surgery, like an emergency surgery. So I was just hanging out in the shelter because I couldn't really move or take out the trash or anything.

Bryanna: So that's why working with them has actually been really, really helpful to me. And actually the amplification of the voices was really important because I could barely talk when I actually started working with them because of needing that surgery. So that was one thing, but because now years later I can communicate what it is that I feel like youth land defenders need, or people who really need healthcare, or might've been in a similar place as me.

Bryanna: I find like being able to voice that based on my previous experiences and reflecting on how that's related to environmental racism and environmental displacement. I find that's really, really healing. Having that voice provides me more independence because I'm able to voice what is needed and just to bring awareness on certain things. I think that's really important for the self-sovereignty part and supporting Indigenous sovereignty. And I'm still kind of coming into that, coming into myself as a young woman and learning a lot. 

Alice Irene: That's really powerful, Bryanna. 

Bryanna: Thank you. 

Alice Irene: It's a little bit like before we started recording, talking about this lifelong work. These journeys that we're on, that are going to take our whole lifetimes to dismantle certain things and rebuild other things.

Bryanna: Yeah, that's pretty fun. And lately building my consultation business while trying to go to school. So I'm just trying to find my way with a lot of that. What they had done and in being just a part of my work and life. It's just really, really, really helpful because they really inspired that and always been a really big supporter of my healing too. That's really, really good.

Alice Irene: That's really, really good. You mentioned there and I've read that you have a focus on the national crisis concerning missing, and murdered Indigenous women and girls. In your life you've been working to make spaces for Indigenous peoples to feel and be safe in society. And just heard a little bit about that story, I'm wondering if you have any insights that you're able to share into that work and how do you help to make those spaces where Indigenous peoples are rightly safe feeling? 

Bryanna: Thank you. That’s a good question. Well, I do work with the Climate Justice Organizing hub as well. And my consultation work. And the other night I had provided a list of ways that people can support and operationalizing allyship. So people can actually partake in being an ally to Indigenous people. 

Bryanna: So it was a list of 13 different things that people can do. And I think just bringing awareness, because one of the points was to read the national action plan for the missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls and two-spirit peoples crisis. That was one of the points in my ways to be an ally and actionable allyship. One of those was to read that national action plan. I find when I am doing consultations or my work, I always try to find ways to bring more awareness to different things if people are interested in being an ally or supporting Indigenous peoples in these various social injustice issues and struggles and human rights issues.

Bryanna: Sometimes I will do, I'm very shy to speak about the work I do because it can be dangerous, but I do work in anti-human trafficking as well. That's I feel like another way I can bring more awareness to the issues of missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls in relation to the environment and the land because the environment is where our culture stems from - it's one in the same.

Bryanna: So I find it really healing for me to speak about that. I will provide presentations with different organizations. I had done an anti-human trafficking presentation with the Ontario Federation of Friendship Centers and one in the US for Truckers Against Trafficking. And also I work with project High Rise. These are just different things I've done in the past and I'm currently doing, and I'm working with or I have worked with Tungasuvvingat Inuit in their Alluriarniq program, which is their anti-human trafficking department. 

Alice Irene: You seem to weave so many pieces together. And we do such a disservice to ourselves when we look at these struggles as distinct and separate from each other. You've articulated really well how they're connected. Thanks for that. You had mentioned land defenders and I was in awe to read that you had, maybe you can tell me more about this, come up with the idea to promote Land Back to advocate for sovereignty and Indigenous peoples as well as BIPOC communities and land ownership as a means of environmental protection. Can you tell me more about land back and how land ownership, Indigenous sovereignty and environmental protection interweave? 

Bryanna: I think I need to explain that a bit better and write more about that. I have always been shy to, but I'm the originator of the Land Back movement. I didn't realize it would become a big movement or a global movement. I just thought at the time it was just something I wrote this simple way just to put it on a sign when I was with the Labrador land protectors. We were protesting against mega-dams and it was around June 10, 2019. So I was living in Calgary at the time, but then I came over, I fundraised money, to come to Ottawa to do the protest.

Bryanna: And at the time I was still waiting for the emergency surgery on my jaw for the infection. So it was hard for me to speak and do work, but I feel like the easiest thing I could do was at the time, just be there in my presence and show up in person. We were protesting against the mega-dams, all along the Churchill River, starting in Manitoba, running all the way to the east coast and Labrador where I’m from.

Bryanna: So there's a big hydro project there. And we were protesting against that because it has been starting to flood the communities that I grew up in or the nearby places and cause methylmercury poisoning. So that's poisoning the whole food chain from which we get our food and hunt and our clothing. So that's something really, really difficult to deal with.

Bryanna: So that's where the whole Land Back movement had originated. When I found out that I guess it was in February 2020 when I was coming out of the shelter after getting my surgery in that 2019, December 2019, getting that surgery and recovering, I came out for the Wet’suwet’en protest here in Ottawa. 

Bryanna: I came out of the shelter for like one of the first times because I was feeling better. So I haven't really participated in anything from around September until that February. And when I went outside, the streets were filled completely with people for the action or protest. I noticed that people were saying Land Back and I didn't think that had caught on or was a thing. So then I was really surprised and I felt really, really happy because it felt like even though people didn't know, because I couldn't really communicate that I was the one who was the originator of the Land Back. I didn't really want to tell people, or I was also really too sick. I didn't want attention at the time because I just felt really ashamed of being who I was, but I came out.

Bryanna: Even though people didn't know that. And they were saying Land Back, it meant the world to me because it felt like they were trying to, or like saying I should get better kind of thing is what it felt like. Hoping for the healing of the land but also in a way it was kind of my healing as well.

Alice Irene: And aren't they so connected, right? 

Bryanna: Yeah. So that's something that really stood out to me. And I was really, my heart was all warm at the time and I found that to be healing because oftentimes because of the work I do, I'm also socially anxious as well. I get nervous just because it's kind of dangerous if I run into the wrong people who are opposed to the work I do. So that was really nice. Like it was a good, positive experience I think.

Alice Irene: My heart is warm, just listening. And I'm literally struggling over here, not to interrupt you constantly telling you how in awe I am of you like this is incredible. What a seed to plant and then see flourish in the years since then, right? Like what has that been like seeing this thing that you created gather momentum and support and come out of all of these voices from around the globe. What's that been like? 

Bryanna: It makes me really, really happy to see a lot of different dialogue happening because of course, I think like a movement requires many, many, many people and not just me, one person. And that's another reason why I never wanted to say I was the originator or anything like that, just because it's this ongoing movement created by so many people in different organizations. And I read a report on it from the Yellow Hat Institute at Ryerson University called the Land Back report. So I'm just always finding new things and even social media posts and finding that people have it beaded onto their earrings, or I have a mask that I bought and it says Land Back.

Bryanna: So I'm just really amazed by everything that's happening. And I'm so surprised that it's still continuing. I learn a lot from people from reading what they write about. It opens my eyes and teaches me so much. So it makes me really, really, really happy to always see that. And to also know that I don't own the land and no one really should or things like that, because it's in the same way that I don't own a movement or anything. It's just there to protect. The land is there to protect and to grow and to bring life to and heal. I feel like in that type of movement, the same way with the land, I feel like that might be happening with the movement if that makes any sense. 

Alice Irene: I think it's happening too. I think it's happening to. I don't know how I got to be so lucky to talk to you today. I'm really grateful.

Bryanna: I’m lucky to talk to you too. 

Alice Irene: Thanks, Bryanna. I always close these conversations with a question about ancestors. I'd appreciate it if you could tell me more about your relationship with generations, however that calls you to answer. So whether it's that your ancestors or being an ancestor, I'd love to hear about generations and your work, yourself. 

Bryanna: Earlier, you asked about when I'm on the land. And I said I like to just pray. And I feel like a lot of downloads come to me, messages come to me. If I intuitively, I feel like ask the question, I feel like I'm very spiritually connected and connected with my ancestors. That's something that's really there. I often do pray to them and I should more.

Bryanna: I pray to my ancestors and I feel like we've been through a lot of generational pain and I let them know that because I'm the result of all my ancestors. So I have a connection and I feel like speak to them or intuitively speak to them. And I feel like a lot of people don't talk about that because that could that could I guess be interpreted in a harmful, colonial way, like as mental illness or something like that.

Bryanna: So that's something like we often don't speak about, but I know that due to intergenerational trauma and things like that, there's been a lot of pain within my ancestors lives. And I ask for their support. We need to go forward and we need to close that chapter of pain. And I need their support and just having the strength to keep going forward to close that and to have just a better life and have more healing and everything from all of the intergenerational trauma. So I feel like there's a lot of support and a spiritual way. I always feel like I'm being supported and watched over like that. I like that.

Alice Irene: It's really beautiful. And I read that your vision is to be a good role model for your community. And I feel like you've been a beautiful role model to me today, and I'm sure many listeners when they hear this. It's such an honor to talk to you and to meet you in this way and connect with you and I am extremely grateful.

Bryanna: Thank you, me too. I really, really appreciate it. Thank you for asking me all the questions you did and amplifying my voice as well. It means a lot. Thank you.

Alice Irene: That was today's episode of Reseed. I'd love to hear what you thought about our conversation. Reseed is created on unceded Algonquin land. Thank you to this place. Thank you to Rebecca Ryvola for podcast cover art and Teghan Acres for being an outside eye. Thank you for listening. Together, let's plant the seeds that transform us from being takers to caretakers.

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