Braiding Indigenous Yoga
Worldview, Culture, and Reconciliation in Treaty 6 Territory
Keywords:
yoga, medicine wheel, universalism, decolonization, reconciliation, interculturality, Indigenous spirituality, grounded theoryAbstract
This paper highlights the intercultural approach of a yoga teacher training program for Indigenous people in Treaty 6 territory in the prairie region of central Canada. Using a grounded theory methodology, we analyzed qualitative data to foreground Indigenous experiences and understandings of yoga. In yoga, as in the Indigenous Medicine Wheel, wellbeing is understood as multi-dimensional, integrative, and holistic. Drawing on Indigenous values of ceremony, relationship building, and the environment, trainees gain fluency in Indigenous ways of knowing and being. While yoga practice at a commercial studio may be exclusionary and perpetuate colonial appropriation of South Asian religion, the practice of yoga by Indigenous people is understood as an act of decolonization. In this way, the practice of yoga can be a culturally appropriate support for the development of Indigenous spirituality, and it may be understood as an act of Reconciliation.
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