The Chair in Indigenous Healing Knowledges aspires to enhance the understanding of
Indigenous worldview and epistemology in relation to healing and well-being. Our work aims
to decolonize healing and educational practices, at Concordia University and in the larger
community, promoting culturally-attuned, dignity-centred practices. This includes working in
circle, centring Indigenous and marginalised knowledges and perspectives, and exploring how
we can advance to the recommendations of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. Our
research and community-based projects are aimed at creating belonging and affirming identity
for Indigenous people, with a focus on youth, Two-Spirit, Indigiqueer and identity diverse
people. We aim to create culturally safe spaces and opportunities where participants may express
themselves, receive support, share stories and practices for resisting oppression.
Our principles include that:
- Healing is culturally rooted, socially embedded & promoted by just responses. Healing is not a universal or purely biomedical process—its meaning is shaped by culture, worldview, and community. For example, Indigenous understandings of wellness extend far
beyond the Western notion of being “illness-free.” - Wellbeing is holistic. An Indigenous understanding encompasses “a thanksgiving approach” and appreciation for all our relations. This includes relationships to food, animals and plants, the elements, the land, being in “right relationship” with others and the world, the ancestors, the spirit world and non-human kin. This reflects a relational, ecological, and spiritual approach to health.
- Healing can incorporate the Cree concept of Mamatowisowin. Mamatowisowin refers to the life force inherent in all beings. Healing involves calling forth this life force through spirituality, energy work, cultural teachings, deep emotional engagement and connection to one’s own power and dignity. It is a process of energy transmutation—moving from blockage to release.
- Dignity, justice, and care are central to healing. Healing is inseparable from dignity, justice, ethical relations, recognition and care. In this worldview, healing occurs when a person is treated with profound respect and when their experience is understood within social, historical, and political contexts.
- Emotional release emerges through facing fears with support. Transformation happens when individuals are able to face fears, sorrows, losses and past harms, especially in the presence of a compassionate, attuned listener. Emotional responses are seen as understandable given the context and situation. “Refusing to be contented” may be one way Indigenous people resist oppression.
- Response-Based Practice recognizes agency and resistance. Rather than pathologizing people, response-based work identifies resistance to violence, emphasizes contextualized understanding, highlights what individuals did to preserve dignity and safety and rejects victim-blaming frameworks. This restores power and counters colonial narratives of deficit.
- Stress can be transmuted into life-giving energy. Through guided conversations that contextualize violence, a person can convert stress into forward movement, creativity, growth, renewed purpose and energy for chosen life projects
- Connection to land and natural world enhances wellbeing. Healing incorporates land-based practices,
cultural rituals, working with animals, plants, and elements. These relationships provide grounding, meaning, and restoration. - Positive social responses are among the most powerful healing forces. We emphasize that the quality of social response profoundly affects healing outcomes. Positive responses include love, care, compassionate listening, cultural ceremony and community support.
- Like the medicine wheel, representing children, youth, adults and elders, everyone is important. Bringing the generations together, like youth in conversation with Elders and Knowledge keepers, allows for the transmission of intergenerational knowledges including forms of healing.
These are “the best medicines”—they restore dignity and rebalance relationships.