Author's powerful message

Photo: Kerry Gilbert

Every lecture seat was filled at Okanagan College's Vernon campus Wednesday night as all walks of life came to hear author Tanya Talaga speak. 

In 2009, Talaga, working for the Toronto Star, went to Thunder Bay to meet First Nation elders and find out why voter turnout was disproportionately low. It’s a story she has yet to finish.

Instead, she investigated the untimely death of youths sent away from small communities to the big city to get a high school education.

“We’re all here on Turtle Mountain together, now. We have to work together to change things," said Talaga. "Our youth are arming themselves with knowledge. As Senator Murray Sinclair said, ‘Education is what got us into this mess … but education is the key to reconciliation.’”

Talaga’s research went deep, putting her on a first-name basis with the wounded families of seven lost youths. The loss was so profound, she wrote two books on the subject: Seven Fallen Feathers, and All Our Relations.

And she’s not done yet, as deaths continue to mount.

The lecture began with Okanagan Indian Band elder Patsy Gregoire offering a prayer, pleased that indigenous people such as Talaga are using their pens to amplify aboriginal culture and issues.

Student Dawn Naas sang and drummed a Lillooet welcome song. 

Her books are potent enough for English professor Kerry Gilbert to incorporate them into her Canadian Literature course at the college.

“It’s the layers of all the reasons, the context, which makes it so powerful,” Gilbert said.

– Cindy Rhyason