SIAST has set up an anti-racism campaign in three cities in Saskatchewan.
Anti-racism author Tim Wise will speak on the topic in Saskatoon and Regina this month, and Prince Albert next month.
SIAST spokesperson Elizabeth Duret says talks like this are badly needed.
She says racism is experienced even in her own home:
“I’m an Aboriginal woman, and I have two kids — one is Caucasian-looking, one is Aboriginal-looking — and they’ve both had very different experiences. So from a personal point of view, I’m very much driven by the fact that I live with it, it exists within my own home, and it’s very real. And a lot of people kind of ignore it, and they don’t want to think that it’s real or that it’s happening.”
Duret says in order for Saskatchewan to reach its economic potential, the province needs to deal with racism and challenge its assumptions about other cultures.
She says organizations can be structured so that it’s difficult for people of certain cultures to do well, and be promoted:
“It’s not intentional all the time — and so, people don’t recognize what they don’t know, and I think that’s where Tim really brings to light our blind spots and how we’re not being maybe inclusive in our policy setting, our educational curriculum . . . and even our holidays — things that affect a dominant worldview society in Canada, that it affects only a certain group but it’s not as inclusive as it could be.”
More than 35 organizations are supporting this series of lectures.
A similar campaign was held last year.