Gathering the threads of Indigenous culture

Gathering the threads of Indigenous culture

March 3, 2015

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The path that led Armand Ruffo to his position as Queen鈥檚 National Scholar in Indigenous Languages and Literatures didn鈥檛 follow the traditional academic route.

Armand Ruffo is Queen's National Scholar, and teaches in the Department of English Language and Literature and Department of Drama. He was recently featured in . (Photo by Bernard Clark) 

A lifelong passion for creativity has seen Mr. Ruffo produce poetry, plays, biographies and a feature length film, even as he鈥檚 written literary criticism.

鈥淚t鈥檚 always a juggle to work in so many modes,鈥 he says. 鈥淚 have to wrestle to find the time to do it all.鈥

It was just that type of wrestling that led him to produce his most recent work, Norval Morrisseau: Man Changing Into Thunderbird, a biography of the innovative and controversial Ojibway painter. He researched and conducted the interviews for the book over the course of years, finding what time he could from his teaching position at Carleton University and the production of his film, A Windigo Tale.

Driving Mr. Ruffo鈥檚 creativity and productivity is a desire to share the stories and histories of Canada鈥檚 Indigenous peoples.

鈥淚鈥檓 very interested in the idea of Indigenous history being silenced for so long,鈥 he says. 鈥淚ndigenous culture 鈥 the Indigenous thread 鈥 is part of the greater Canadian fabric. Telling those stories is a way of gathering the threads together.鈥

Support to tell those stories is something Mr. Ruffo says he鈥檚 seen great improvements in, especially as the study of Indigenous literature took off at Canadian universities in the 1990s.

鈥淚鈥檝e seen the steps that we鈥檝e had to go through to get to where we are now. I have a long enough view back to see that people have been working on this for a long time,鈥 he says. 鈥淭here are a lot of positive things happening and the fact that I can be here at Queen鈥檚, teaching these Aboriginal literature courses is amazing.鈥

Since starting at Queen鈥檚 in 2014, Mr. Ruffo has continued the multi-disciplinary juggling act that he does so well. He鈥檚 teaching classes in the Department of English Language and Literature and Department of Drama, and has become active with Four Directions Aboriginal Student Centre. At Four Directions he鈥檚 led writing workshops and serves on their Aboriginal Council. He鈥檚 also completed a book of poems inspired by the work of Norval Morrisseau that will come out later this year.

Though Mr. Ruffo wrestles to find the time to do so many different things, he balances the mental challenge of being creative and being a scholar with a simple trick: he doesn鈥檛 think about it.

鈥淚t鈥檚 a different hat that I put on when I鈥檓 working in the creative realm. If I did think about it, I鈥檇 probably stop writing creatively. I do try to bring my creative side to teaching though, along with my interests in Indigenous aesthetics and epistemology. Those things help me,鈥 he says, adding with a laugh, 鈥渂ut, I try not to teach my own work.鈥 

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