Children and Cultural Survival
Like other agencies for aboriginal child protection world-wide, Weechi-it-te-win is focused on the protection of children within a modern aboriginal and also bi-cultural context. "The mission of Weechi-it-te-win is to preserve Indian (Anishinaabe) culture and identity among our people; to strengthen and maintain Indian (Anishinaabe) families and through them our communities; and to assure the growth, support and development of all children within our families and communities." This mission must be understood in the context of a history of both the systemic use of aboriginal child protection for genocidal purposes and the participation of Anishinaabe communities in mainstream society in Canada. Denying a people the right to raise its own children is a method for culturally extinguishing it.
Read more about this topic: Weechi-it-te-win Family Services
Famous quotes containing the words children, cultural and/or survival:
“Being a parent is such serious business that we dare not take it too seriously. Children are inherently funny. So are parents. We all are at our funniest when we are desperately struggling to appear to be in control of a new situation.”
—Lawrence Kutner (20th century)
“To recover the fatherhood idea, we must fashion a new cultural story of fatherhood. The moral of today’s story is that fatherhood is superfluous. The moral of the new story must be that fatherhood is essential.”
—David Blankenhorn (20th century)
“We hold on to hopes for next year every year in western Dakota: hoping that droughts will end; hoping that our crops won’t be hailed out in the few rainstorms that come; hoping that it won’t be too windy on the day we harvest, blowing away five bushels an acre; hoping ... that if we get a fair crop, we’ll be able to get a fair price for it. Sometimes survival is the only blessing that the terrifying angel of the Plains bestows.”
—Kathleen Norris (b. 1947)