The Role of the Witness
You are invited to choose your path to the berry patch by identifying and sourcing the resources and pathways that will help your specific community ecosystem flourish, for safer campuses for everyone.
In the next video, Jewell considers what it means to be a witness to the potlatch, a sacred ceremony of the Kwakwaka’wakw Nation and other West Coast and Northern British Columbia Nations. Creating safer spaces at post-secondary institutions for First Nations, Métis, and Inuit survivors of sexualized violence requires the same reverence and responsibility as being a potlatch witness.
Reflection Questions
- Who has been a witness to your life stories and experiences? What has this meant to you?
- If you are a survivor of sexualized violence, who has been there to receive your disclosure or been a witness to support you and your journey through it? How has having a witness affected you, your story, and any healing?
- How have you been a witness to others’ experiences and disclosures?
- What lessons have you learned from being a witness?
- What hopes and fears do you have about being a witness and specifically receiving disclosures of sexualized violence?
- What steps can you take to deepen your knowledge and skills around being a witness?
