Staying Connected: The Aboriginal Community of Northern Alberta Canada
The Windspeaker is an Aboriginal newspaper based out of Alberta Canada whose sole purpose is to provide a voice to the Aboriginal people of northern Alberta who are otherwise silenced by the overwhelming presence of mainstream media. The Windspeaker is a part of the Aboriginal Multi Media Society of Alberta (AMMSA), which is committed to reporting about “information and entertainment relevant to Aboriginal issues and peoples while maintaining profound respect for the values, principles and traditions of Aboriginal people.” The publication shows a deep commitment to its community.
Canada is very rich in culture and has close ties to European cultures, mainly influenced by the French and British. A large part of Canada’s culture is indigenous. There is a strong news presence in Canada with many large news organizations, but in every community there are multiple local papers. These community newspapers are what keep cultures connected, and this is where Windspeaker shines.
Canada ranks 18th in 2018 World Press Freedom Index with their Prime Minister Justin Trudeau strongly advocating for a “free media” according to the RSF, putting it well above the United States, which ranks in at 45th. Along with that, Canada also ranks 10th on the Human Development Index (HDI), which is very comparable with the United States and in many aspects much better.
Windspeaker’s mission is to keep small Aboriginal communities involved and informed while staying tightly connected. The first publication of Windspeaker was in 1983 as a monthly publication for the Aboriginal people of northern Alberta. As the community grew, so did readership, allowing them to reach out to other communities and spread their news throughout Alberta.
A phone call to the head office of Windspeaker revealed that founder Bert Crowfoot is a very busy man, but he was able to tell me some great things to get a better sense of what the Windspeaker is all about.
During a phone interview with Bert, he revealed some things that proved to me how Windspeaker as an organization was perfect for this case study. Bert went in depth with me on one of his favorite stories where they brought up a case on murder and racism that was previously dropped and exposed everyone involved.
Bert also talked with me over the phone about how he is most proud of how Windspeaker stays true to the ethics of journalism as well as being objective, balanced and not bias due to their great editor Deb Steel, who also had a lot of great things to say about Windspeaker.
Finally, Bert went over how CNN is very left sided, while Fox News is right sided and the same thing happens in Canada. While corporate-owned news organizations like Sun News are bias, Windspeaker is always in the middle, “staying true to the basic fundamentals of journalism,” Bert said. One last thing he said to me was what he believes the biggest compliment a journalist could ever receive. The National Minister of Canada told him that although Windspeaker hammered even him along with many other political parties, Windspeaker took no sides and was always right down the middle with not even a hint of bias.
Like most things, Windspeaker was not an overnight success. It took years to become what it is today. To get a better look at how it all started, we can turn to an interview Crowfoot once spoke in, stating that, “My friend offered me a job as a freelance sports writer and I covered a basketball tournament and a hockey tournament and took pictures. He liked what I did so he offered me a full-time job.” Crowfoot left that job to write his very own newspaper in his basement with one of his friends, which went on for a couple of years. He later went on to peruse a grant to publish for Aboriginal media. Crowfoot was approved for the grant in March of 1983, followed by the creation and publication of the first issue of AMMSA on March 18, 1983.
“One of our organization’s philosophies is to turn stumbling blocks into stepping stones,” Crowfoot said.
In 1990, there was a massive cut in federal funding and a complete cut in government funding, which pushed out many of the major Aboriginal news outlets, forcing the majority of them to shut down leaving Windspeaker as one of only two Aboriginal news outlets left. This created the perfect storm for Windspeaker to expand where others lacked.
“This was an excellent window of opportunity for us, and Windspeaker took up the challenge. Our goal was to provide news, information and views from a national perspective in a way that would complement the work of other Aboriginal media, which typically served a much more local community,” Bert said.
This window greatly helped the Aboriginal culture to connect more and in the early 2000s, Windspeaker started to adapt with changing technology, digitizing over 20,000 of the past Windspeaker news and informational articles, putting them on their brand new website aside the new and up to date content. Along with their radio broadcasts that cover 54 Alberta Aboriginal communities, this only helped to further connect the community by making information about the past as well as the present of the Aboriginal culture easily available for anyone and everyone to read. While expanding, Crowfoot kept true to the culture by connecting with the community and even having some stories published by the community, for the community.
Another driving force behind Windspeaker is the director of publishing and marketing for the AMMSA organization, Paul Macedo, who is particularly proud of how the Windspeaker has developed over the years. AMMSA helped Crowfoot to stay in circulation by adopting Windspeaker into the AMMSA. In an interview, Macedo said he takes pride in the fact that Windspeaker, which was once a small Northern Alberta newspaper, has become a news source for many more while keeping its local charm. Macedo also said that he is “proud of the fact Windspeaker has helped to nurture young journalists,” which really shows how Windspeaker stays rooted and helps the community to thrive by teaching the young generation in the culture.
The Windspeaker closely follows traditions of the Aboriginal people showing a close relationship to the community. People like Bert Crowfoot, Deb Steel and Paul Macedo report and publish topics directly relating to their people, which gives them a voice that might otherwise be drowned out by mass media. This puts the Windspeaker into multiple categories as a community, from affinity to proximate, Windspeaker’s underlying goal is to bring Aboriginal communities together as well as the culture as a whole closer and more involved.
