Langara College course pairing students up with Indigenous elders to write memoirs

This fall, Vancouver’s Langara College is offering a two-semester course in which students are paired-up with Indigenous elders to compose a memoir.

Writing Lives is a two-semester course in which students are paired-up with Indigenous elders to help them write a memoir.

Instructor Jill Goldberg says the response has been tremendous.

“They didn’t know or did not know a lot about residential school. They really felt like it just blew open their understanding of Canada of colonization, the history of contact and it created in them a sense of compassion and urgency to become or maintain their activism.”

She says some of the most heartwarming feedback has been from the elders themselves, as many said the process made them feel seen and heard for the first time.

“One of them, in particular, said that she didn’t realize the importance of her story, and she didn’t realize the gravity of it and the capacity of her story to be instructive and educational,” Goldberg told CityNews.

“As citizens of ‘Canada’ and settlers on Turtle Island, we have a moral duty to remember the real history of this place,” said former student Anita Shen. “We have the privilege of knowing what has happened here, and we have the privilege of still having witnesses and survivors alive with us. The stories of our Elders deserve to be remembered. We must honour Indigenous truths just as we honour colonial ones.”

The course is being offered in partnership with the Indian Residential School Survivors Society for the second time in September 2022.