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Have you ever stopped to think about what happens when you turn on the tap? University of Calgary researcher Kerry Black certainly has—and is keenly aware of how that access to clean, dependable water separates her from many First Nations families.

Cohosts Jessica Vandenberghe and George Lee sit down with the engineer and settler to discuss the great water divide and how it connects to persistent and destructive colonial constructs.

"If I can turn on the tap, and I can leave right now, and I can keep it on for the next 48 or 72 hours, no one's going to come to the door and go, are you OK? By the way, you're seriously wasting some water," says Kerry.

"They're just going to send you a bill (and say), do you have a leak in your faucet? There's no urgency to that. And that, to me, is the definition of water privilege."

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Ian Smith, director of business development with the University of Alberta's Faculty of Engineering, talks about personal actions and impactful programs that tie into his own truth and conciliation journey.

Cohosts Jessica Vandenberghe and George Lee talk with Ian about

• moments of revelation
• effective approaches, big and small, to truth and conciliation
• learning to be a musician, responding to criticism and trying again (Ian has a master's degree in music performance from Arizona State University)
• the need for more genuine initiatives and less box ticking
• and much more.

If you're looking for a simple entry point to your own truth and conciliation journey, Ian has a recommendation: "Go get some books. Read Indigenous authors. Read their perspectives. And that helps you understand more truth."

Also, if you've got a spare zero dollars to spend, take the University of Alberta's online Indigenous Canada course, he says.

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unsettledjourneys@gmail.com

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John Desjarlais, a professional engineer who grew up in Cumberland House, Sask., explores the values-based teachings of Indigenous peoples and his own Métis upbringing for pathways into more representative codes of ethics for professional bodies.

A proponent of practical approaches to engraining truth and reconcilation (or conciliation or reciprocity) in the lives of all Canadians, Desjarlais speaks with hosts Jessica Vandenberghe and George Lee about community wealth, role-modelling, the need for representation of Indigenous communities and peoples among decision-makers and policy-makers, and much more.

"When I looked at the Cree code of ethics, I was, like, wow. It's all virtues. It's values. It's ways of being," says Dejarlais, a past president of the Association of Professional Engineers and Geoscientists of Saskatchewan. Non-Indigenous codes of ethics tend to focus on duty, he said — and would benefit from expanding into values that accent things like humility, respect and relationships.

Support the show

Join our Facebook community: www.facebook.com/UnsettledJourneys/

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Questions, comments, suggestions, offers to volunteer:
unsettledjourneys@gmail.com