Held on the last Tuesday of every month, 6:30 pm - 8:30 pm, with facilitator Hope Engel.
The Circle will meet monthly and provide a space for local indigenous community members of Guelph & Kitchener Waterloo & the surrounding area to explore intersectional identity & voice.
Indigenous creative ‘“Write Relations” circle examines the identity formation & creative writing process for indigenous participants using Cree-Metis author Kim Anderson’s medicine wheel: Resist (Who Am I Not?), Reclaim (Where Have I Come From?), Construct (Where Am I Going?) & Act (What Are My Responsibilities?).
It introduces community members to indigenous writers – poets, philosophers, novelists, & sci-fi & fantasy authors, such as Fyre Jean Graveline CircleWorks, Chrystos, Kim Anderson, Vine Deloria Jr., Paula Gunn Allen, Thomas King, Calvin Morriseau, Daniel Heath Justice, Cherie Dimaline, Leanne Simpson, Red Skins, & White Masks.
Activities explore identity & develop creativity by looking at race, gender, class, ability, who we are for ourselves and others “in-relation-to-creation”, & medicine wheel journaling & collaging our creative vision/stories & multiple relational identities. It is an opportunity to share our stories & writing with each other, and by supporting each other in this conversation, be inspired to share and develop our creative writing voices.
It will be facilitated by Hope Engel, who is Turtle Clan, mixed ancestry Oklahoma Choctaw, Chickasaw & Cherokee, two-spirit & multiple-disabled.
She is co-founder of Plume Writers & Artists Circle, which has hosted creative writing workshops, and edited & published a local indigenous anthology in 2006, called River Bundles. Her writing has been published in The Peak, and she has performed in When the Rainbow Ain’t Enough Toronto Spoken Word. She is a University of Guelph Honours BA English & Gender Studies graduate & a Brock University Honours BEd Indigenous Adult Education graduate.
The Indigenous Creative Writing Circle begins January 2021 online via zoom. This writing circle is specifically for North American Indigenous Peoples.
Email Hope to join and get the zoom link at: hopemagic7@gmail.com.
We hope to see you there. The collective in this meeting will choose how often we meet, ground rules, structure, content, and activities we’d like to cover to empower participants’ connection, community, and voices, and inspire creative writing & spoken word.
Thanks to funders Guelph Spoken Word & City of Guelph.
