0:00 Hi, everyone. Welcome to M & N podcast. I'm your host, Nick Wapachee. 0:04 And I'm your other host, Michael Muzei. 0:06 For this podcast, we will talk about issues that we feel aren't talked about enough and need more attention. 0:11 For our pilot episode, we'll be discussing Indigenous people leaving their mark through their profession in art. We have three guests today. 0:19 Our first speaker is Joshua DePerry. He's also known as Classic Roots and this is his song playing in the background called Knights Guy. We will talk about his inspiration with Indigenous dance and techno music. 0:33 I just love being around with people that are creating that positive vibes. 0:39 We have Amanda Thompson, who will be joining us today about importance of arts and crafts for Indigenous students. 0:45 For us for doing Indigenous support, or trying to support the whole student, 0:49 Jen Harper, the founder of Cheekbone Beauty Cosmetics will be joining us to talk about the education gap in the Indigenous communities. 0:57 My own home community of the Niagara region, we're not aware that this 30 to 50% funding gap exists. 1:07 Let's get started. I would like to direct this question to Joshua DePerry. 1:11 So what inspired you to create music? 1:13 What mainly really be inspired from just hanging out with people that are really into electronic music. They encourage me to get into it, where I see a lot of people being very happy and having a good time where they can see it's actually a healing. When it comes to music or dance, or even creating music itself I just love being around with people that are creating that positive vibes. Where they wanted to create music or where they wanted to dance or, or even just listening to good music. 1:51 That's very interesting. I'm going to ask this question to Amanda. Just to give you a little background, she works at the Ryerson Aboriginal Student Services. What do you think art is so important for student? 2:02 Crafting gives them a way to kind of tap into other sides of their brain, creative sides, or like different types of analyticals so beading, for example. You have to actually be thinking about things, you're thinking about math and geometry while you're doing beading and how it all lines up. But you're also being creative in that way. And it gives the students a different kind of outlet to access. So I think it's really important just to to give them a sense of balance. I also think it's really important to give students a chance to do something and finish something that they might feel good about. Because those really tough times of years, sometimes the work that they're doing takes a really long time. And so give them something that they can do in an hour or even half an hour that they can finish and feel good about will help them study and help them go that extra mile later on that day. So sometimes it's a trade off, you give us a half an hour to do something that makes you feel good and maybe you get an extra couple hours of resiliency out of that to keep going with the hard stuff. 3:00 This next question is directed towards Jen. How was makeup personally helped you thus far in your career? 3:06 Makeup is helped me in in a sense that some days when we have to face this world, which can be very, very hard. And if if you've ever struggled with any sort of maybe emotional issues or addictions, which is, in my background. I personally built this business after overcoming an addiction and some of those days during addiction all I could do was put on lipstick to go out and try to do my job and try to be a mom while I was going through that battle. So it is this kind of interesting, powerful tool cosmetics that can help us get through some some tough times. And the young ladies that have these skills, I'm totally blown away, like absolutely amazed. And they're they're popping up across the country across North America. As you as you said you'd noticed on Instagram they are and they're just using their creative ability and putting it into makeup it's it's amazing. 4:07 Just to give you a context before I move on to the next question. According to Don Drummond former chief economist says that First Nations children living on reserve receive at least 30% less funding for their education. In simple terms for every dollar that the province would spend on education, First Nation schools were only receiving 70 cents. 4:30 Why do you think it's important for your company to show that there's an education gap between the indigenous and non indigenous communities? 4:37 Quite honestly, most Canadians have no idea. Over the last year I've had the privilege of speaking to different groups non-Indigenous specifically, and lots of people in my own circles and in my own home community of the Niagara region were not aware that this 30 to 50% funding gap exists. So I am literally using lipstick as a platform to talk about the social and justices that have gone on in the past, and the ones that still exist to this day. And just to create an awareness, and then actually use that awareness to make people think maybe about their purchases in the future of any industry, we now as consumers are so educated, and we can decide what businesses we want to support at the checkout. 5:22 While we're on the same subject of education. I would like to direct the next question to Amanda. What is your role at RAS in terms of Indigenous students on campus. 5:31 So for us, part of my role here is to provide students support from a more holistic way. Part of being in school is that people end up doing a lot of academic work, and a lot of focus on their heads. And so for us for doing Indigenous student support, we're trying to support the whole student. And that means engaging the student from their families socially, you know, trying to support them physically as much as we can with meals occasionally. And then the other part is finding different ways to be at school. So far, students, part of that is bringing it crafting and things that they might be talented with, that give them a break from school, but also give them a chance to share something that they might do successfully or learn a new skill that's cultural. So it's a combination of cultural and also doing students support in different ways. 6:14 Joshua, why do you think it's important to intertwine your identity in techno music? 6:19 When it comes to like, people encounter me hearing my music and, and, and knowing that it's something that's, that just triggers them in a way of like, like, this is so cool. Where music is integrating with Indigenous sounds into electronic music, and they think it's very fascinating. Which I think is very fascinating, because it just shows that who I am as a person showing 50% of Indigenous, 50%, contemporary. I just feel like it's so awesome that everyone is listening to it, even if it's even if that person isn't an Indigenous. 6:58 Thank you, Joshua, Amanda and Jen for joining us today, I'm going to ask this last question to all of you. Why do you think it's important to express yourself artistically? 7:08 From what I know and I'm not an expert, I'll preface that with that is that Indigenous people have always been very creative and art has always been a part of our culture. Sadly, I personally don't call myself a creative and and then people argue with me now and say, no, yes, you are, look at everything you've done and built. And it takes creativity to be able to do that. But watching these young women from communities in even like remote areas, and then they're practicing and playing with cosmetics and makeup, and doing amazing things. Like I saw one young lady even like do a dance, or let's like a jingle dress, right around her eye using like all these different liquids and so it is incredible. And it is an art and it's a total form of expression. 7:56 I feel like it's necessary for me to express through through the arts, and especially growing up with strong native roots, where I feel like it's awesome to bring Indigenous sounds into electronic music on into the table. Where people will see it's such a really unique way where you can add different vocals, different sounds, different drums, war cries, you know, you name it. It's just it just feels so authentic where it comes to showing that you have so much passion into the music. 8:30 Tapping into that artistic side is actually really important to help them remember why they do certain things. So if they're making crafts, they might remember their family. Or they might, we may, we may dream catchers yesterday that may help them to remember why they're doing what they're doing. And so I think that it's important just for for motivation, and to to help build their skills and resilience. 8:56 We want to thank again, our guests for joining us today. So Nick, what did you think about what we heard today? 9:01 I think it's an interesting conversation. It's important to continue these types of conversation to really connect with the Indigenous community and the Toronto region. 9:10 The way they're doing it, is ther 9:18 You know, being an Indigenous person myself, it's fascinating to understand to see other cultures expressing themselves to leave their mark. I know my culture, I speak my own language, and there's a lot of nations in Canada. 9:30 While being a settler myself, I think it's important to have conversations like this and not be afraid. This is an issue that needs reconciliation and more attention. 9:40 Well, that's all for today's episode. Join us next week for a discussion on the state of Canadian politics and how we can better cover it. 9:47 We hope you enjoyed this pilot episode and look forward to seeing you next time. 9:51 For now we are signing off. I'm Nick Wapachee. 9:54 And I'm Michael Mazei. Thanks for listening to the M & N. Have a good day.