Feb. 12, 2018

Audience-interactive play examines real meaning of reconciliation

Award-winning theatre group brings sold-out national tour to Mac Hall Ballroom Feb. 17-18
An Indigenous and non-Indigenous cast probes the roadblocks we face in reconciliation in the audience-interactive play šxʷʔam̓ət, Feb. 17 and 18.

An Indigenous and non-Indigenous cast probes the roadblocks we face in reconciliation.

What does reconciliation mean to you? If it feels like a personal question, that’s because it is a personal question, which sometimes gets lost with the often-institutional lens applied to the Calls to Action generated by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. 

“One of the reasons we wanted to host šxʷʔam̓ət on campus was to really continue and encourage reflection and discussion around reconciliation,” explains Jackie Sieppert, dean of the Faculty of Social Work. “We hope this play will play a small part in furthering that goal.”

Šxʷʔam̓ət, which means “home” in Hǝn̓q̓ǝmin̓ǝm̓, a Coast Salish dialect, is a production by award-winning Vancouver theatre company Theatre for Living. The production is currently on a sold-out Western Canadian tour. Calgary is the final tour stop outside of B.C.

The audience-interactive play examines what reconciliation between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Peoples looks and feels like, and asks how the idea of “reconciliation” translates into our day-to-day human relationships.

šxʷʔam̓ət means “home” in Hǝn̓q̓ǝmin̓ǝm̓, a Coast Salish dialect, a word with many different meanings to all of us who are living on this land. The play examines how the idea of “reconciliation” translates into our day-to-day human relationships.

The play examines how the idea of “reconciliation” translates into our day-to-day relationships.

Šxʷʔam̓ət is created and performed by the mixed Indigenous and non-Indigenous cast and weaves together stories based on real life, including the actors' lived experiences. The play challenges all of us to make reconciliation true and honourable. Šxʷʔam̓ət invites audiences to try to offer solutions to the real-life problems presented on the stage.

The play runs Saturday, Feb. 17 and Sunday Feb. 18 in the MacEwan Hall Ballroom (third floor of MacEwan Hall.) Doors open at 7 p.m. and the play begins at 7:30 p.m. Tickets for šxʷʔam̓ət are $15 and are available online. The play is co-sponsored by the University of Calgary Students' Union.

Only 120 tickets are available each night, with a limited number of free tickets reserved for University of Calgary students and those in the community who are unable to afford the ticket price. The play is part of the faculty’s ongoing Positive Disruption event series, which continues Monday, March 19 with a visit from one of Canada’s most respected social work researchers and thought leaders, the Honourable Senator Wanda Thomas Bernard. 

The University of Calgary unveiled its Indigenous Strategy, ii' taa' poh' to' p, on Nov. 16, 2017. The strategy is the result of nearly two years of community dialogue and campus engagement, and involved the work of a number of people from the university, Indigenous communities and community stakeholders. Recommendations from the strategy are being implemented as we move forward with promise, hope and caring for the future.