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Heritage BC
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  • About

    About

    • What We Do
    • Advocacy
    • Heritage Update
    • Plans and Reports
    • Membership
    • Donate
    • Sponsors
    • Board of Directors
    • Staff
  • Events & Activities

    Events & Activities

    • 2022 Conference
    • BC Heritage Awards
    • Heritage Week
    • Dates to Know
  • Learning Centre

    Learning Centre

    • ICH: Creating a Community-Based Inventory
    • Climate Adaptation: Making a Case
    • Climate Adaptation: Framework and Implementation
    • Intangible Cultural Heritage
    • Setting the Bar: A Reconciliation Guide for Heritage
    • A Guide to Making a Case for Heritage
    • Heritage Conservation Tools: Resource Guides
    • Webinars On-Demand
    • Other Heritage Education Programs
  • Cultural Maps

    Cultural Maps

    • Submerged Heritage Resources
    • Columbia Basin Region Heritage Places
    • Francophone Historic Places Map
    • Chinese Canadian Historic Places Map
    • Japanese Canadian Historic Places
    • South Asian Canadian Map
    • War Monuments and Memorials Map
    • Mapping Heritage
  • Resources

    Resources

    • Accessibility for Historic Places
    • Conservation in BC Reports
    • Definitions and Heritage FAQs
    • Funding Opportunities
    • Heritage Real Estate
    • State of Heritage: Provincial Roundtables
    • Indigenous Cultural Heritage
    • Local Government: Library of Source Documents
    • Racism: Do Not Let the Forgetting Prevail
    • Heritage Quick Studies
    • Other Tools, Publications, Guides
  • Heritage Legacy Fund

    Heritage Legacy Fund

    • Who Benefits?
    • Past Grant Recipients
    • Climate Disaster Response Fund
  • Job Board

    Job Board

    • Job Hunting Resources
    • Job Postings
    • Submit a Job
  • Contact
  • 1. Setting the Bar: Heritage and Reconciliation Pledge
  • 2. Setting the Bar: Acknowledging Land and People
  • 3. Setting the Bar: Celebrating Days of Recognition and Commemoration
  • 4. Setting the Bar: With a Commitment to Learn
  • 5. Setting the Bar: Committing to Strategic Organizational Diversity
  • 6. Setting the Bar: Mission-Making Room for Reconciliation
  • 7. Setting the Bar: Possession, Interpretation, Repatriation and Cultural Care
  • 8. Setting the Bar: Shared Decision Making
  • 9. Setting the Bar: Statements of Significance and other heritage planning documents
  • 10. Setting the Bar: Heritage Conservation Tools, Local Government Act
  • Setting the Bar: A Guide to Achieve New Standards for Reconciliation within the Heritage Sector

6. Setting the Bar: Mission-Making Room for Reconciliation

cover image of Setting the Bar resource guide

 

ACTION: review your organization’s mission, programs and activities to examine the unintended biases, oversights, and roadblocks.

Download 6. Setting the Bar: Mission-Making Room for Reconciliation

We will illustrate this reconciliation action with a true story about a meeting of museum workers, artists, and business people, who had come together to discuss heritage in their rural community.

As part of the introductory comments, a manager of a small museum described the concisely defined mission: to tell the story of white labourers in a local industry. It happened the meeting and the museum were located on land that is widely celebrated for its deep Indigenous traditions and heritage and so this mission seemed to be unaware of the museum’s context. Yet the group, which included Indigenous people, seemed to understand and respect the chosen direction and nothing was said.

Throughout the day-long meeting, people spoke about the many challenges they face, and much time was given to describing a hopeful future of heritage that will equitably include all people and all stories.

At the close of the meeting, when the attendees summarized the meeting, the museum manager offered the realization that is it possible to honour the museum’s mission while expanding it to include the stories of other settlers and Indigenous people.

It was a significant shift in thinking – transitioning from what is known to what can be. And for any organization, this is an important step toward reconciliation.

Like a lot of other aspects of reconciliation, achievement comes from an openness to different ideas and perspectives and a resolution for self-reflection. The work can be challenging as you look beyond what is familiar and you examine what is comfortable.

This action is not a direction to rewrite your mission statement and we are not suggesting your programming is deficient. This is about contemplation, with clarity and honesty, of your mission and your work in the community.

Do you know why you tell the stories that you do? How were those stories chosen? How were they created and who informed the stories? Have the stories evolved? Do you have permission to tell the stories?

Whose stories are missing and why? Have stories been told from the appropriate perspectives? How does your organization define heritage? Is your mission and work aligned with that definition? Where are the gaps in organizational practice?”

In the context of reconciliation, it is important to understand whose stories are being told and for whom they are told. It is not possible for one organization to tell every story, but it is possible for an organization to tell one story with diversity, respect and integrity.

Tackling these issues can be daunting and time consuming, so it can be helpful  break things down into manageable pieces. For example, start analyzing a program/exhibition:

  • Why does this program/exhibition exist?
  • Whom does it serve? How do we serve this audience? Do we know we meet expectations? Why are people intentionally or unintentionally excluded?
  • What needs to change so that the program is more accessible? What are the cost/benefits to make changes?
  • If our organization holds reconciliation as a value, how is the programming advancing this value and how it is hindering?
  • Does your organization imbed practices/interpretations that contribute to the marginalization (especially unconsciously)?

“Group think” and “confirmation bias” can be problematic when, for example, a group of individuals share similar perspectives and experiences and use these to valid each other’s opinions. It is important to invite differing perspectives and experiences into the conversation. Without judgement, listen, consider the differences, and look for the misunderstandings, misinterpretations and gaps. You might be surprised with what you learn.

This action is about organizational and personal self-examination and tackling change with a commitment to imbed reconciliation into your mission, programs and activities. Keep in mind, this work is ongoing and requires an ongoing commitment.

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As an organization of provincial scope, Heritage BC recognizes that its members, and the local history and heritage they seek to preserve, occupy the lands and territories of B.C.’s Indigenous peoples. Heritage BC asks its members and everyone working in the heritage sector to reflect on the places where they reside and work, and to respect the diversity of cultures and experiences that form the richness of our provincial heritage.