Grant: Travel Awards - Institute Community Support

This oral presentation will use the Indigenous tradition of image-based storytelling. Paintings will be presented to share Indigenous experience, perspectives and identity as it relates to land through image-based stories. Image-based storytelling is a teaching tool that introduces clinicians to Indigenous perspectives of wellness related to movement on the land. Sharing images engages clinicians in dialogue about the connection of Indigenous and Western worldviews related to movement and movement rehabilitation. This paper accompanying this oral presentation aims to share knowledge of the nature and meaning of movement from an Indigenous perspective of land-based wellness and to illustrate the disabling effects of colonialism. Through the process of colonialism Canada, as among many countries around the world has deliberately separated Indigenous peoples from their identity, and removed them from their traditional lands and territories. Indigenous peoples' health and wellness is directly determined by their ability to have access to and mobility on traditional lands and territories. Therefore, land-based wellness impeded by colonialism. Movement rehabilitation takes place from a western (colonial) perspective and clinicians engage with Indigenous patients without an understanding of the disabling effects of colonialism. Consequently, this creates a clinical barrier between clinician and Indigenous patient. Clinical practitioners require knowledge of colonialism to develop and strengthen clinical relationships with Indigenous patients.