Sask. Polytechnic raises a flag for Riel

On Monday, students and staff at Saskatchewan Polytechnic took time out of their studies to focus on Métis culture.

They raise a Métis flag each year to commemorate the day leader of the 1885 Rebellion Louis Riel was sentenced to death and  hanged for treason.

“It means different things for different people. He was hung because he was [a] ‘traitor’ but that’s not what the Métis people think about that,” said aboriginal student advisor Shelly Belhumeur.

Another wording choice she said Métis people take issue with is the Riel “Rebellion.” Instead, she considers it a “resistance.”

“It was our Métis people working towards their rights and their freedom and being the people who they are, the community they belong to… We were resisting being taken over, I guess, by the Canadian government,” Belhumeur explained.

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As an advisor, she works to keep aboriginal students on their educational path. As a Métis woman, Belhumeur also teaches students about her culture.

One lesson is in the duality of being Métis, which is represented in the flag.

“[It] represents the coming together of the two different groups of people, our First Nations people who were already here and the Europeans that came over. And the infinity sign is of two circles coming together and the joining of those two cultures. Also, the infinity sign means our culture is going to last forever,” Belhumeur said.

Family celebrations, attending Batoche each year, and wearing her sash are a few ways she keeps her Métis heritage alive.

The flag, which replaced the Saskatchewan flag for the full day, can pique people’s curiosity about it as they pass by, she said.

“I think the more visualization or the more people can see things, they’ll ask questions. When you ask questions you learn, when you get educated there’s less problems, less racism.”

The Prince Albert campus has the largest aboriginal population, varying between 47 and 53 per cent, she said.

Flag raisings took place at Saskatchewan Polytechnic’s three other campuses on Monday as well.

claskowski@panow.com

On Twitter: @chelsealaskowsk