National Indigenous Peoples History Month Reflecting on the 60s Scoop

6/27/2023

Get To Know Christine Miskonoodinkwe Smith

Christine Miskonoodinkwe Smith is the editor of Silence to Strength: Writings and Reflections on the Sixties Scoop which was published by Kegedonce Press and today we're going to get to know her.

Christine Miskonoodinkwe Smith is a Saulteaux woman from Peguis First Nation. She is an editor, writer and journalist who graduated from the University of Toronto with a specialization in Aboriginal Studies in June 2011 and went on to receive her Master’s in Education in Social Justice in June 2017.

Her first non-fiction story “Choosing the Path to Healing” appeared in the 2006 anthology Growing Up Girl: An Anthology of Voices from Marginalized Spaces. She has written for the Native Canadian, Anishinabek News, Windspeaker, FNH Magazine, New Tribe Magazine, Muskrat Magazine and the Piker Press. She has also co-edited the anthology Bawaajigan with fellow Indigenous writer Nathan Niigan Noodin Adler.

The Story Behind Silence to Strength

From the 1960s through the 1980s the Canadian Children’s Aid Society engaged in a large-scale program of taking First Nations children from their families and communities and adopting them out to non-Indigenous families. This systemic abduction of untold thousands of children came to be known as the Sixties Scoop. Stories of the intergenerational disruption from loss of family and culture are shared in this collection, as are stories of strength and survivance.

In Silence to Strength: Writings and Reflections on the 60s Scoop, editor Christine Miskonoodinkwe Smith gathers together contributions from seventeen Sixties Scoop survivors from across the territories of Canada. These courageous writings show there is strength in telling story, and power in ending the silences of the past.

The contributors to Silence to Strength are: Anna Croxen, Vonda Knipfel, Shaun LaDue, Alice McKay, Denise Mcleod, Christine Miskonoodinkwe Smith, David Mortimer, Arlene Noskye, Karen Orser, Doreen Parenteau, Shane Pement, Tyler Pennock, Cathy Phannenhour, Elizabeth Redsky, Terry Swan, Melissa Thomas (Sigvaldason), and Lisa Wilder.

Watch Christine discuss this incredible book that EVERY Canadian should read. I was very moved by these courageous survivor stories.