How Do We Stop Aboriginal Women from Disappearing?

This talk was given at a local TEDx event, produced independently of the TED Conferences. Calling upon us to recognize the epidemic of missing and murdered Aboriginal women in Canada, Beverley Jacobs reminds us of our collective responsibility to end this violence first by acknowledging the tough truths about colonization, racism and sexism in our communities.

She is the former President of the Native Women’s Association of Canada.

Beverley Jacobs has made numerous presentations around the world on various issues affecting Indigenous people. She is the former President of the Native Women’s Association of Canada (2004-2009). Jacobs researched, advised and wrote the first draft of the Stolen Sisters…, a sobering report for Amnesty International, released in 2004, that brought international attention to the issue of missing and murdered Aboriginal women in Canada.

In November 2008, she was recognized for her contribution to the advancement of Aboriginal women’s equality with the Governor General’s Award in Commemoration of the Persons Case. Jacobs has been a Professor in Ontario, Saskatchewan and Alberta and taught courses on Indigenous Governance, Self-Determination, Canadian Indian policies, Canadian Law and Aboriginal People, First Nations Women and the Law, and Indigenous Law. She is also a member of the National Aboriginal Advisory Council to the Corrections Services Canada.

She is currently in her last year of an interdisciplinary PhD at the University of Calgary that includes Law, Indigenous Wholistic Health and Indigenous Research Methodologies. Jacobs’s Mohawk name is Gowehgyuseh. It means: “She is visiting.”