This co-valedictorian gave her speech in Anishnaabemowin

CBC

01-06-2025

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It was an historic moment at the Bora Laskin Law School graduation earlier this spring. Co-valedictorian Cassandra Spade gave her speech in Anishnaabemowin.
Cassandra is from Mishkeegogamang First Nation but also spent a lot of her time growing up in Couchiching First Nation and she has big plans as she moves forward in her law career.
She spoke with Mary-Jean Cormier, the host of Superior Morning, about those plans and what it was like giving her speech in Anishnaabemowin.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Mary-Jean Cormier: Can you tell me what it was like to be up on stage speaking Anishnaabemowin?
Cassandra Spade: I cried walking up to the stage. I was trying to hold myself together during the speech. Throughout the speech, you can hear pauses where I'm very much overcome with emotion, and it's because it's such an unimaginable thing to think that a valedictorian address would be given in an Indigenous language and especially at a law school.
So, it was really special to me, but it also felt like all of the language teachers and the people who supported my language learning were in that room with me. So, it was very, very special.
MC: What did you say?
CS: I opened by saying that this is perhaps the first time at a Canadian law school where this address is given in an Indigenous language, specifically Anishinaabe.
But I also said that this moment didn't happen by myself alone. There are a lot of people who have nurtured me and loved me and taken care of me to get me to this point and who taught me the Anishinaabe language.
So, I'm not a first language speaker. I learned as an adult and I'm specifically talking about one elder from Lac Seul First Nation. She specifically told me when I first started learning that if you take care of the Anishinaabe language it will take care of you. I didn't really know what it meant at the time, but throughout law school I learned that our language holds all of our law, and by learning my language and taking care of it and practising it, I was really reinforcing our laws and learning and kind of preserving them. So it was really special to learn that in law school.
MC: Speaking of law school, beyond the language piece, what did it mean for you to graduate from law school?
CS: I've obtained a law degree, which is really special. I'm the first one in my family to go to law school and to graduate, and it makes me reflect on all of the people in my family who are so talented and skilled and are able to give to the community in so many different ways. So, I think about all of the things that my family has taught me specifically about kindness or thinking about other people or listening to other stories.
Throughout law school, those are the skills that kind of carry you through law, and it's all about your community. And so it was really special for me because I wouldn't have been in law school had it not been for my family, my broader community, all of the support at law school.
So, it really is an accomplishment to the community at large. I only did two per cent of the work and everyone else kind of did like 98 per cent of the work.
MC: What drew you to this field in the first place?
CS: When I was nine years old my sister was bit by a dog on our reservation. It wasn't a bad bite, it was just a little nip, but I kind of got this idea that the dog should be vaccinated and tagged in the community, not only to protect the children in the community, but also to take care of the dogs.
So, at that time, I had learned that there were a lot of bylaws and policies about getting veterinarians onto reserves. So, I created this petition and with the help of my dad, I walked from house to house to house in the winter, it was very cold, to get people to sign this petition so that the community would do vaccination and tagging for the dogs.
Eventually it came to fruition, and it was the first time I felt like wow, I can make some change and this is really exciting. So, since I was very young, I've always wanted to be a lawyer.
MC: What kind of path do you see before you in law?
CS: I'm very much interested in practicing Inaakonigewin, which is Anishinaabe law and right now across all Canadian law schools who are just kind of beginning to think about indigenous laws. This is something that I'm very passionate about. I wrote research in my last year of law that interviewed people in the Anishinaabe language so that we could talk about Anishinaabe law. It's just such a different legal system compared to the Canadian one, and I think Canadian law schools and the Canadian legal system at large has a lot to learn from Indigenous people.
MC: Do you think looking at law from a different perspective could change some of the situations we're in?
CS: Indigenous laws are very good at doing something called pluralism, and that's where many different legal systems can exist at the same place. So, Canadian laws, Indigenous laws and other laws like international law can all exist in a relationship together.
And so although the Canadian justice system may look very different from an Anishinaabe one, the Anishinaabe structure at large can hold place for both of them. What I mean by this is the Canadian justice system is built on deterrence and denunciation, whereas the Anishinaabe one is more focused on rehabilitation and building relationships and kind of restoring people so that they can continue to be part of the community.
So, Indigenous law offers Canadians a new way to think about this relationship between different legal systems and I think at this moment in time in Canada, the Canadian law structure is really struggling to think about what is that relationship. I think when people learn about Indigenous law, it offers an opportunity to start thinking about what does this relationship really look like? What should it look like? And how do we exist without really trampling on one another or trying to take over one another?
MC: Who will you be working with? I think they're going to be very lucky.
CS: I'm going to hopefully, upon being called to the bar and becoming a lawyer and licensed, I'll be practising in the Rainy River District at Judson Howie. But until then, I'll be a student at law, so you'll see my face around the office. I'll be supporting them in all the work and I'm so excited to be working in this region, particularly because I spent so much time growing up in Couchiching.
MC: How long before you get called to the bar?
I have to study for the bar and there are two exams — there's the barrister, which is basically when you go to the courthouse and you do your criminal law and you do your civil litigation and family law. And then I have to finish the solicitor's exam, which is more focused on business law and contracts and wills and estates. These giant, massive exams happen in the month of June and if I pass them, fingers crossed, I'll be called to the bar in August or early September.