This Indigenous Medicine Knowledge learning event introduces Queen’s University faculty and staff to the importance of traditional Indigenous “Medicine Knowledge” currently being developed within FHS curricula. Tim Yearington (Grey Thunderbird) will lead this educational experience by offering a traditional ceremony to help people become more mindful of the Medicine Wheel model of wellness and acknowledge its existence.

On Friday June 21st – National Indigenous People’s Day – from 8am to 9am, faculty, staff and students alike are invited to gather behind Summerhill where the Queen’s “Medical Quadrangle” sits. Beginning with a smudge, Tim will perform an introductory “medicine ceremony” to help people understand the relevance of the Four Colours of the Four Directions. A traditional Algonquin story will be shared about how the Otter first taught Nanaboozhoo (Original Man) the medicinal purpose of the Four Directions and the greater role of the Circle.

Representing the Four Directions of East, South, West and North, four short (metre-length) strips of coloured cloth in yellow, red, black and white will be tied gently, hung temporarily, to a tree standing in each quadrant. These coloured strips of cloth will contain the traditional medicines of tobacco, cedar, sage and sweetgrass. Once the ceremony is finished, the Four Colours will remain on each tree for only four days then removed.