What is Response-Based Practice?

Please join us for a discussion of Response-Based Practice, with Dr. Shelly Dean and Dr. Catherine Richardson of the Centre for Response-Based Practice, as well as Rénee-Claude Carrier, Innu Anti-Violence Activist. We will be discussing how response-based practice can be used to help in addressing colonial and systemic violence. The recent unearthings of child graves below colonial institutions invites us to focus on the links between healing, resistance, justice and the need for truth-telling.

To close Moe Clark will offer closing songs and a Round Dance Celebration as we honour Indigenous Resistance and Survival in the face of prison camps (residential school system) and the ongoing impacts of colonialism. 

In this way, we will commemorate the National Day of Truth and Reconciliation by emphasizing Truth-Telling, Honouring Resistance, and Uplifting Anti-Violence, Dignity and Justice. 

How can you participate? Join us in person or online by registering for the Zoom Meeting or watching live on YouTube.

Have questions? Send them to info.4@concordia.ca

Catherine Richardson Kineweskwêw

Cathy is a Métis therapist, family therapist, researcher and academic working at

Concordia University. Her maternal relatives come from Fort Chipewyan and have ties to Red River. She holds a research Chair in Indigenous Healing Knowledges. Cathy is also interested in the broader and multi-dimensional aspects of healing, such as the person as whole being, a spirit in a body with emotions, intelligence, physicality and in relation to all beings in the natural world. She has taught in various counselling and social work programs and is the former director of the First Peoples Studies program at Concordia University. She explores various approaches to well- being on her substack podcast, where she speaks with healers, activists and response-based therapists. She is a student of shamanic practice and the mother of three amazing adult children.

Dr. Shelly Dean

Shelly Dean Ph.D. gratefully lives on the traditional unceded ancestral lands of the Secwépemc Nation, known as Kamloops, BC, Canada. Shelly is a wife, a mother and

grandmother. She grew up in Northern British Columbia, in the small community of Moberly Lake. Shelly is a family therapist, clinical supervisor and educator who works with organizations and communities to address issues of violence. She works closely with her colleagues through the Centre for Response-Based Practice, developing

and practicing a specialized approach to violence and other forms of adversity, with a special interest in working for children who have experienced domestic and institutionalized violence. Her research has focused on children’s responses and resistance to violence--specifically understanding their behaviour in context, the nature of social interactions with young people, the connection between violence and mutualizing language, and the social responses that children and their families receive. We have found that when young people begin to acknowledge their own history of responses to, and resistance against violence, the conversation naturally shifts to their capacities and knowledge rather than focusing on deficiencies and leading to interventions. Shelly has also taught in the Master of Counselling programs through City University of Seattle and the Master of Education program at Thompson Rivers University.

Renee Claude Carrier

Feminist activist Renee-Claude Carrier has devoted her career to ending violence against women and advocating for equality for women and gender diverse individuals. Renee first began her activist career at L’Auberge Transition, a women’s shelter in Montreal. She is now the Manager of the Yukon Women’s Transition Home Society, also known as Kaushee’s Place. Renee developed and runs a response based social justice program in a High School called Youth for Dignity for the Liard Aboriginal Women’s Society. Over the years, she has collaborated with other shelter activists from around the world to examine the progression of the women’s movement and to redirect our global direction toward women’s equality.

Now, Renee is seen by her community as an expert on understanding women’s resistance to violence and how language often conceals violence. She has raised awareness of these issues by educating diverse groups from elementary school children to federal court judges. Renee is empowered and energized by women’s resilience, responses, and resourcefulness, and she is always honored when women share their stories with her.

Moe Clark

Métis/mixed-settler multidisciplinary artist Moe Clark is a 2Spirit singing thunderbird. Moe was born and raised in Treaty 7, and they are a proud member of the Métis Nation of Alberta. Currently she resides as a guest in Tio'tiá:ke/ Mooniyang/ Montréal (QC) where she works as an artist and educator. A dedicated nêhiyawêwin (Plains Cree language) and Michif language learner, Moe collaborates intimately with Elders and knowledge keepers to advance language resurgence through song-based practices. She works across disciplines of vocal improvisation, sound design, land-based oskapêw facilitation (ceremonial Elder apprenticeship), and performance creation, to create work that centres embodied knowledge, 2Spirit Indigenous resurgence, and creative kinship.