Julia Peterson
Saskatoon StarPhoenix
Teacher. Storyteller. Elder. Doctor. Dad.
For Norman Fleury, all of life’s greatest joys and achievements are rooted in his Métis identity and Michif language, culture and heritage.
“I speak seven languages, but I’m always thinking as a Michif,” said the 75-year-old grandfather. “And I always live as a Michif, in everything I do. When I’m cooking, when I’m baking, if I’m out there on the land, I’m there as a Michif. I am that person, that nation, that inheritance from my ancestors, not anything else.”
Earlier this year, in recognition of a lifetime spent preserving, teaching and developing the Michif language, Fleury received an honorary doctorate from Brandon University in Manitoba.
“(He is) a key figure in the preservation and the revitalization of the Michif language ,” the university said, noting that Fleury introduced the first accredited Michif language course in Canada at Brandon University.
Throughout his career, Fleury has continued to teach, advocate and develop curriculum for Gabriel Dumont Institute, the Saskatchewan Urban Native Teachers Education Program, Louis Riel Institute, Rupertsland Institute and the University of Saskatchewan, among many others.
He worked with international researchers to map out the history of Michif language development, worked on developing a writing system for the primarily-oral language, and has translated everything from government documents to children’s books into Michif.
After so many decades of hard work, Fleury said he can now see these efforts paying off.
“Recently, it has been very, very much overwhelming — for myself and my family — to see us coming together after all these years of building our Michif language and culture,” he said. “At one time, there was talk that our language, the Michif language, was an endangered species.
“At one time we thought, how will we do this, when we’re losing speakers all the time and it’s not in the community anymore? But in the last 35 years, there has been a lot of work done. So now, I can say — it’s safe for me to say — that the language is going to remain with us and continue for more generations to come.”
Fleury grew up speaking Michif with all his family members at home. His grandmother was speaking Michif when she delivered him, and “that was all we ever spoke in our home. It has always been part of the family,” he said.
Being a Michif speaker — a Michif person — has always been the core of his sense of self, he added.
“Being a Michif, you have to have pride. I learned that when I was a child. And now, at 75 years old, I’m never disconnected. When you’ve got a strong identity and pride built as a child, and you believe in who you are and in your own nation, that strength never leaves you.”
But by the time Fleury was raising his own children, passing down that language, identity and pride had become more difficult.
There were fewer Michif speakers living nearby to practice with, and there was no chance to learn the language at school.
“There was never anything in the curriculum,” Fleury said. “Indigenous people, Métis people, were never included.”
So, even as Fleury worked with schools, conferences and organizations all around the world to preserve and celebrate the Michif language, his first goal was to make sure his children were immersed in their culture at home.
“Since they were born, my children grew up seeing me working in Michif all the time,” he said.
“They’ve seen me writing it, they’ve seen me translating, they’ve seen me transcribing for Census Canada and different Métis nations across Canada and developing language programs. When my daughter Chantelle was 13 years old, we traveled to Scandinavian countries to do presentations at universities — telling our story about who we were, who we are, and who we still are. All of a sudden, the whole world was talking about our language.”
Now, Michif is growing back to its previous strength among families and communities, and even blossoming in ways he could never have imagined, he said. He is particularly delighted by the newfound ability to text his friends in Michif, marrying the oral language with writing systems and technology.
But the most important achievement of all, he said — greater than any award, honour or degree — is happening at home, where he is hearing Michif spoken as “a family language” once more.
“My daughter is a mentor for my grandkids,” he said. “She’s always teaching them, all the time — telling them about the language, interacting with them in the language. And when I was a child, that was the natural thing; that was how we lived. But then, we went through a phase in life where we thought this was going to be a lost language.
“Now, when I see these little kids practising Michif, going to school in Michif, it’s totally amazing. The language will continue. So I’m laughing, and I’m happy, and I’m overwhelmed to have the family all talking together again.”