To Arrive Speaking': Voices From the Bidwewidam Indigenous Masculinities Project

Excerpt from Chapter, Page 283-284:

"Bidwewidam, an Anishinaabe word meaning “to arrive speaking,” is a fittting title for the last chapter of this book, as it is the name of the Indigenous masculinities research project that led to this collection, and ultimately represents the intention of the book—to encourage dialogue about Indigenous men and masculinities. The concept of Bidwewidam came from Anishinaabe artist Rene Meshake, who, in the course of working with the Bidwewidam Indigenous Masculinities (BIM) project stated: “Picture yourself in the forest, and as you sit still, you hear voices becoming clearer and clearer as they come near to you. Bidwewidam describes the way Indigenous masculinities, identities, and mino-bimaadiziwin (the good life) come speaking as one voice.”[2] 

The intention of the BIM project was to develop a network of researchers, program, and policy workers and community members who could contribute to voicing and identifying needs and future directions for work in Indigenous masculinities. As researchers working in partnership with the Ontario Federation of Indigenous Friendship Centres (OFIFC) and the Native Youth Sexual Health Network (NYSHN), we spent three years gathering voices through interviews, focus groups, and now writing. These voices assisted us in beginning the process that Cree Elder Albert McLeod calls for: “to sound out an ecology that will nurture and sustain the Indigenous male spirit.” 

In this chapter, we will contribute to this exploration by sharing findings from focus groups we conducted across Canada with various communities of Indigenous men, women, queer/Two-Spirited peoples, and youth. These voices parallel many of the themes found in previous chapters, including identifying the impact of white heteropatriarchal, colonial, and hegemonic masculinities on Indigenous peoples; exploring issues of identity and representation; giving voice to the particular struggles of Indigenous men; and reclaiming culture-based masculine identities in all their expressions. Whereas there is no such thing as one voice, our findings demonstrate that there is a cohesiveness in the collective vision that emerges: Indigenous men and masculinities are embedded within a web of relations—human, animal, land, and spirit—that continue to define the many articulations of masculinities in Indigenous contexts. There is power in this recognition; a sacred returning that we hope will inspire. Ultimately, we take inspiration from the fact that Indigenous men came and were willing to speak about what Indigenous masculinity means to them, and that we can now share it here." (283-284).