“What motivated me to get here was really ancestral,” says Sarah Jeffrey. She is of Squamish, Gitxsan, German and Polish ancestry. She moved around a lot growing up, living in Chase, Victoria, Tumbler Ridge and Mackenzie, but her grandmothers’ homes in Hazleton and Capilano are where she feels most at home. She works at the Sníchim Foundation as the Communications Director and also served as their Executive Director. The organization revitalizes the Squamish language through adult immersion.

At work, Jeffrey engages with third parties and manages the organization’s email and social media. She conducts language research, creates resources and tends to in person lessons. Prior to this, she was a research intern at the Firelight Group, researching land use, occupancy and GIS mapping. She also worked retail, customer service and waitressing.  

Jeffrey moved to Vancouver from Mackenzie to pursue her education and ended up in a Squamish language immersion program, studying audio of her great grandfather speaking the language. At first, she didn’t understand any of it, but over time, she grew to understand it. Her grandmother was a day school survivor and silent speaker, understanding the language but never speaking it. Her great grandmother was a residential school survivor who suffered abuse for speaking her language. Her great grandfather, Dominic Charlie, was a Squamish language advocate and after studying his audio recordings he came to her in a dream and affirmed that she needed to bring back their language. She has always felt he put her there to do this work.

What started off as a nine-month certificate program progressed into a proficiency diploma, totaling three years of Squamish language education. Jeffrey went on to complete a program through NVIT to learn computer skills so she could be helpful to the Foundation because they needed administrative support. While she doesn’t consider herself a language teacher, she does language work and is immersed in the language in her home with her partner.

Jeffrey had many powerful moments around her pregnancy where she had signs from her family that were deeply meaningful. From finding out she was pregnant, having a boy and what his name would be, she was so moved by these moments. Together, she and her son’s father made choices like ensuring Squamish was the first language he would hear and speaking the language to him every day during her pregnancy.

They are raising their child to speak the language as his first language, a challenge as Jeffrey is not fluent herself, but she’s finding resources to make things easier. Teaching people to say his name has been tough. He’s the first in four generations of her family to be a first language speaker. He’s also learning Kwak’wala, English, ASL and a range of other First Nations languages so he can speak with other members of his family.

Thinking of Indigenous youth thinking about leaving their community for school or work, Jeffrey’s advice would be, “it's really hard when you're so familiar with an area to get the comfort to leave it, because you don't know if there's community elsewhere… You can find community anywhere. It doesn't matter where you are. You're going to be able to find people who are like minded, who have the same goals as you, who have similar morals as you. You need to be open and willing to accept love from a different community, and you need to be open and willing to put yourself out there to also extend the love that you're hoping to receive.”

“Education is so important and valuable. I may not use all of the tools from each part of the education training that I got, but from each thing that I did, there was a new learning experience that I'm able to apply into my new life that I have now. Education just opens up different doors and avenues, introduces you to new people who might show you something different. All of the people who are in my life that are really important to me now I would not have met if I did not have the courage to just go decide I needed to further my education. It was a courageous act to decide to leave my small community, leave everybody I knew to come somewhere where I knew absolutely nobody but my immediate family, but it's totally possible, totally freeing and really, really empowering to have to build your own independence,” Jeffrey continues.

When it comes to obstacles, one Jeffrey has faced is the lack of first language speakers. She’s also faced racism, directly and as a bystander, especially in non-Indigenous workplaces. Growing up in predominantly white communities, she found it wasn’t always safe to be loud and proud about her heritage. Because she has been vocal about her pride, she has been able to help others reconnect with their heritage and be proud of where they were from, too.

If Jeffrey could share a message with her younger self it would be, “It's safe to be who you are, and if, for some reason, it starts to get to be unsafe to be who you are, then who's around you needs to change.” Thinking back to all the shame she had around her Indigeneity when she was growing up and how she tried to hide it, she wishes she hadn’t done so. She’s glad she left those environments and doesn’t have those people in her life anymore.

To balance her mental health, Jeffrey goes to therapy, something she finds helpful personally and professionally. Taking her weekends to ensure she finds balance is helpful and moving to a four day work week has made a difference. Working as interim executive director was a lot of pressure because she felt like she had to be available to everyone all the time and moving out of that level of responsibility has been helpful for reducing her stress.

“You need to think about the future and the legacy that you're leaving behind”

Looking to the sources of her inspiration, Jeffrey shares, “I am so inspired by my ancestors, they guide me and move me through my life all the time.” She aspires to move to a less colonial way of life and thinks about how her choices will impact her son and future generations, values her grandparents reinforced in her. Her cultural beliefs, practices and teachings are constant sources of inspiration.

Ancestrally motivated, Sarah Jeffrey is dedicated in her professional and personal life to language and culture revitalization. Moved and guided by powerful signs from her family, she’s creating a legacy, raising a first language speaker and building her own fluency. She didn’t always feel safe to be herself but she’s found her place and joy in her identity, language and culture and it grows every day.

Thank you to Alison Tedford Seaweed for writing this article!