Friday’s attack in Paris has fired up people’s fear of the unknown, especially when it comes to recent immigrants and refugees.
On Monday, a timely event in Prince Albert tackled that very topic, and discussed how to break up cultural divides.
The Prince Albert Common Ground pilot project started after research at the University of Saskatchewan found that there’s a rift between First Nations people and Canada’s newcomers.
Muskoday First Nation member Harvey Knight says his own people often see refugees or foreign workers as “others.”
“An example is that they’re coming here to take our jobs. Which is absolutely not true,” he said, pointing to countless other misconceptions that circulate on his Facebook.
“I challenge them every time anybody makes any blanket generalized statements against newcomers,” Knight said.
“Immigrants too, also have misconceptions. They come over to Canada, they’re told certain things about us. Like, we’re lazy, good for nothing Indians,” he said.
Things like this are why Knight joined the Saskatchewan Multicultural Council. In his view, discrimination is rooted in a very normal human emotion – fear.
“Fear is, according to our culture, is the enemy that looms in our lives sometimes and controls our behavior, makes us make irrational decisions and decisions that are so generalized it comes out in a racist kind of way. It comes out in a very groundless kind of way,” Knight said.
The common ground project has held a community round dance in Prince Albert and increased aboriginal visibility at multicultural events like Tapestrama.
It also plans to hold a “speed talking” event, which is kind of like speed dating. People from different nations will talk to each other about their cultural practices.
In the next few months there will also be a workshop where people share their nation’s ways of doing things like beading.